(Press-News.org) The process of peer review is vital to contemporary science, but is also under enormous strain. This study uses mathematical models to dissect the threats to the long-term viability of peer review, suggesting paths forward to place peer review on more stable footing.
In your coverage, please use this URL to provide access to the freely available paper in PLOS Biology: https://plos.io/3NUgj2X
Article title: Screening, sorting, and the feedback cycles that imperil peer review
Author countries: United States of America
Funding: This work was partially supported by NSF (www.nsf.gov) awards SES-2346645 to CTB and SES-2346644 to KG, by Templeton World Charity Foundation (www.templetonworldcharity.org) Diverse Intelligences frameworks grant 32581 to CTB, and through visitor support at IAST (www.iast.fr) to KG via funding from the French National Research Agency (ANR) under grant ANR-17-EURE-0010 (Investissements d’Avenir program). No funder played any role in the study design, analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.
END
A feedback loop of rising submissions and overburdened peer reviewers threatens the peer review system of the scientific literature
2026-02-24
ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:
Rediscovered music may never sound the same twice, according to new Surrey study
2026-02-24
Rediscovering long forgotten music does not mean recovering how it was meant to be performed, and that is a major challenge for the arts, finds a new study from the University of Surrey. An expert found that rediscovered music comes with no shared understanding for how it should sound, leaving performers to make radically different interpretive choices that reshape the work itself.
In an article published in Performance Research: A Journal of the Performing Arts, a researcher focused on a little-known piano miniature by Surrey-based British composer ...
Ochsner Baton Rouge expands specialty physicians and providers at area clinics and O’Neal hospital
2026-02-24
BATON ROUGE, La. – As part of its continued investment in specialty care access for the Baton Rouge community, Ochsner Baton Rouge welcomes several new physicians and advanced practice providers who are now accepting new patients.
Alexis Ambeau, PhD, practices neuropsychology at Ochsner Health Center – O'Neal, specializing in assessing adults with a range of conditions, including neurodegenerative disorders and other dementias, movement disorders, multiple sclerosis and other autoimmune disorders, traumatic brain injury, stroke, central nervous ...
New strategies aim at HIV’s last strongholds
2026-02-24
A new study has overcome a long-standing challenge—how to isolate and study elusive HIV-infected cells called authentic reservoir clones (ARCs) that evade the immune system, making the disease difficult to cure. Researchers from Weill Cornell Medicine, Rockefeller University, and collaborating institutions offer a detailed look into these hidden HIV‑harboring cells and show that some may be more vulnerable to immune destruction than previously believed.
The findings, published Feb. 24 in Nature, detail how the researchers ...
Ambitious climate policy ensures reduction of CO2 emissions
2026-02-24
Global efforts to combat climate change in the last two decades have contributed to considerably cutting carbon emissions, according to a new study conducted primarily by scientists from Germany and the United Kingdom. The participating researchers investigated which climate policies were particularly effective. Reduced emissions have generally been the result of ambitious, i.e., larger and stricter climate policy portfolios. In addition, countries targeting the largest sources of emissions were particularly successful, according to the experts from Heidelberg University, who played a major role in the study.
The research findings are based on a statistical analysis ...
Frontiers in Science Deep Dive webinar series: How bacteria can reclaim lost energy, nutrients, and clean water from wastewater
2026-02-24
Wastewater contains untapped resources that, if reclaimed, could power agriculture, global sanitation, and its own treatment to help us meet UN SDG goals.
This is according to a new Frontiers in Science lead article in which researchers Prof Uwe Schröder, Prof Falk Harnisch, Dr Elizabeth Heidrich, and Dr Deepak Pant examine how microbial electrochemical technologies (METs) can convert organic waste streams into electricity, fuels, fertilizers, and usable water more efficiently. Pilot deployments—from the UK’s Glastonbury Festival to field trials in Uganda, Kenya, and South Africa—are demonstrating its ...
UMaine researcher develops model to protect freshwater fish worldwide from extinction
2026-02-24
Whether it’s redfin pickerel in the Kennebec River or sturgeon in the Great Lakes, nearly one-third of freshwater fish species are facing possible extinction, threatening food supplies, ecosystems and outdoor recreation.
As conservationists work to preserve these species, the University of Maine assistant professor Christina Murphy asked herself if there was an easier way to identify threats to fish before they become endangered.
After five years of data collection, programming and testing, Murphy and her colleagues developed a computer model that identifies potential threats to more than 10,000 freshwater species worldwide. Encouragingly, the majority of species accounted for ...
Illinois and UChicago physicists develop a new method to measure the expansion rate of the universe
2026-02-24
We have known for several decades that the universe is expanding. Scientists use multiple techniques to measure the present-day expansion rate of the universe, known as the Hubble constant. These methods are internally consistent and based on the same physics, so all observed values of the Hubble constant should agree. But those that come from early-universe datasets disagree with those that come from late-universe datasets. This problem is known as the Hubble tension and is considered to be one of the most significant open questions in cosmology.
Now a team of astrophysicists, cosmologists, and physicists at The Grainger College of Engineering at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign ...
Pathway to residency program helps kids and the pediatrician shortage
2026-02-24
With children across the U.S. facing long wait times for medical care due to a shortage of pediatricians, UC San Francisco has launched a medical education program designed to strengthen the pediatric workforce and improve childhood health outcomes.
The Pediatric Specialized Training and Advancement to Residency Track (Peds-START) is the only program of its kind in the West and provides early mentorship, individualized training, and a pathway into the UCSF pediatric residency program.
Nationwide, there are just 82 pediatricians per 100,000 children, ...
How the color of a theater affects sound perception
2026-02-24
WASHINGTON, Feb. 24, 2026 — Live music can engage more than just one sense, despite it being an auditory medium. Lighting and visual effects can enhance the listening experience, but it is unclear if they can also affect the impression of the sound.
In JASA, published on behalf of the Acoustical Society of America by AIP Publishing, researchers from Germany’s Technical University of Berlin found that the color of a concert hall has an impact on the sound perception of a listener.
“Room acoustics perception is multidimensional,” ...
Ensuring smartphones have not been tampered with
2026-02-24
WASHINGTON, Feb. 24, 2026 — With increasing cyberattacks and government data breaches, one of the most important devices to keep secure is the one in everyone’s pocket: smartphones. The problem is that it is difficult to check that a smartphone has not been tampered with without the risk of unintentionally damaging the device itself.
In AIP Advances, by AIP Publishing, researchers from the University of Colorado Boulder and the National Institute of Standards and Technology developed a way to remotely fingerprint and identify a cellular ...