Researchers have completed and released a chromosome-scale genome sequence of the Aldabra giant tortoise providing a much needed genetic resource for rescue efforts . The Aldabra giant tortoise is one of only two giant tortoise species left in the world, and it is currently on the threatened list. Conservation efforts are underway, but more and better tools to improve the chance of long-term success are greatly needed.

03/11/2023 EDIT: actually a rediscovery, this species was recorded in Belfast pre-1930 Earlier this year, I found a species of grass I didn’t recognise, growing as a pavement plant in East Belfast. With a guide I identified it as Polypogon monspeliensis (Annual Beard-grass), a new species for County Down. This species is known from Dublin and Cork, and there is a previous Ulster record from Keady in Armagh.

Frictionless Data improves not just machine readability of scientific articles, but also enables humans to directly interact with the data within the article itself.

The International Neuroinformatics Coordinating Facility (INCF) had its annual Neuroinformatics Assembly from 12 ^th -16 ^th September 2022.

GigaByte Journal wins the ALPSP Innovation Award for their interactive articles and tools aimed at fulfilling the UNESCO Recommendation on Open Science We at GigaScience Press are very pleased to announce that our newest journal GigaByte has won the 2022 ALPSP Award for Innovation in Scholarly Publishing.

Reading the reactionary defense of the digital stone age in AAAS’ flagship magazine Science , I felt reminded of the now infamous “Make American Science Great Again” letter to Trump and all the other public statements by scholarly societies over the last 30 years on how this internet thing is a threat to their revenue and hence must be opposed.

A guest post from our summer data science intern Raniere Silva. Raniere is a PhD Candidate at City University of Hong Kong and interested in reproducible research. During July and August 2022, I was a summer intern at GigaScience Press investigating how GigaScience and GigaByte journals could use Frictionless Data to help researchers make data driven discovery faster.

The h-index is a metric that was invented to summarise the publication output and impact of researchers. In a new GigaScience article, authors from the University of New South Wales (Australia) adopt the controversial metric for a completely different purpose: to explore systematic differences in research interest ( taxonomic bias ), using mammals as an example.

This summer I am cataloguing the flora and plant communities of twelve islands [EDIT 20/11/22: it ended up being eleven islands!] in Strangford Lough, with the help of a BSBI Plant Study Grant. The goal is to have a complete species list of each island and a map showing all of the plant communities and where they occur. I have been kayaking to these islands and doing a thorough survey, and also quadrats in each distinct plant community.

In July I spent a few days in Sligo as a field assistant with an international, interdisciplinary team who are studying peritidal stromatolites. Stromatolites are layered rock formations created by microbes, and peritidal stromatolites form in the area of the shore that is affected by seawater from the tide or from sea spray. This makes them unique as they can experience large changes in salinity.