Scientists Hope to Network Facebook-Style
Scientists Hope to Network Facebook-Style
Associated Press (10/21/09) Kates, William
A coalition of seven academic institutions will use a $12.2
million National Institutes of Health grant to develop VIVOweb, a
Facebook-style professional networking system for biomedical
researchers across the United States. Participating institutions say
VIVOweb will make it easier for scientists to find one another,
ultimately enabling them to improve their ongoing studies and create
long-term collaborative projects that could result in new discoveries.
University of Florida professor Michael Conlon, the principal
investigator on the project, says scientists often have difficulty
finding each other, and currently the best way to connect with others
performing similar research is through lists of publications. Dean
Krafft, who is leading the project at Cornell University, says VIVOweb
will use the Semantic Web to make information more available to
scientists. The public also will be able to access the site, but some
information will be available only to scientists. The open source
software developed by Cornell for VIVOweb collects the facts a person
is looking for and assembles a unique Web page just for that search.
Participants expect to have VIVOweb connected across the country within
two years, and eventually plan to connect scientists from around the
world.