We have been talking a lot about Web 2.0 approaches for scientific papers. Now Elsevier announced an Article 2.0 Contest: Demonstrate your best ideas for how scientific research articles should be presented on the web and compete to win great prizes! The contest runs from September 1st until December 31st.

For my Paper Writing Dream Machine I obviously need a reference manager. My list of required features includes: Easy addition of references by integration with Pubmed, Google Scholar and other online databases. A special bookmarklet would be a bonus.

I’ve written a similar post before , put I would like to talk about some of the features that I would like to see in an ideal paper writing application. Intelligent Formatting Content and formatting should be separated from each other.

Earlier this week Matt Brown announced important changes to the Nature Network software: The first step towards new local hubs. Most importantly, it is now possible to set your location and hub. The hub can be the same as the location, or a city or region nearby (as in my case Berlin). Later this year, Nature Network will add new hubs to the existing London and Boston.

In the last issue of Nature, a news feature and research highlight look at two recent high-profile paper retractions. The two papers by biochemist Homme Hellinga delt with rational enzyme design. A second group couldn't reproduce the results, ultimately leading to the paper retractions. Then a third group was able to demonstrate that rational enzyme design is indeed possible.

The success or failure of Web 2.0 efforts for scientists depends to a large extend on the availability of cool applications that make the everyday life of a scientist easier. Many of these applications of course already exist, but I would argue that there is a lot of room for improvement.

Last week I received email invitations from three different journals to submit a research article. I should have felt flattered, but it is unclear why it is me that received invitations to the journals Biomarker Insights , Genomics Insights and International Journal of Medical Sciences . All three journals already exist for a few years, and I wouldn't say that the focus of my research is biomarkers or genomics.

Our recent discussion on public access made me have a closer look on the options I have for my own papers. The results aren't pretty. Most journals allow posting post-prints on a university website The copyright agreement with the journal is the easy part. Most publishers allow posting of post-prints (after peer-review, but not the journal PDF) in a non-commercial repository, usually the repository of your institution.

The legal disputes following the withdrawal from the market of two drugs for the treatment of pain (the COX-2 inhibitors rofecoxib and valdecoxib) have led to another critical examination of the paper publishing process. I have written in February about the drug company Pfizer trying to obtain confidential peer review documents from the journals JAMA and NEJM. Courts in Chicago and Boston have denied such requests.

The new NIH Public Access policy started this past Monday. Fellow Nature Networker Graham Steel has summarized this week's reaction of the blogosphere. I would like to highlight some of the discussions we had here on Nature Network. Bob O'Hara wonders about the cost of publishing in Open Access: Show us the Money!. He argues that shifting the costs from reader to author can create problems.