Scientific Essays

Reducing uncertainty:
the raison d’être of open science?

Jeremy G. Frey* and Colin Bird

Science has been aware for centuries of the idea of known unknowns and unknown unknowns, even though scientists would articulate the notion differently from Donald Rumsfeld. The methodology of science is to investigate the known unknowns, striving to reduce uncertainty, but occasionally the unexpected happens and the scientist enters the realm of unknown unknowns. Uncertainty reduces when research is reproducible...

The SCIentific publishing conundrum:
A perspective from chemistry

Stephen A. Matlin,* Goverdhan Mehta, Alain Krief and Henning Hopf

The present model for scientific publishing – in the field of chemical sciences – is flawed. It is damaging not only to science but also to the careers of many scientists and to the reputation of the field of scientific publishing as an honest, ethical and respected endeavour. It is time for the stakeholders in science publishing to seek new, systemic approaches that comprehensively address the fundamental flaws. The outlines of an action plan for the scientific community to generate such a process are suggested.

Calculations and simulations:
an invaluable resource

Timothy Clark

What is the role of calculations, modeling and simulation in chemistry and biology? The answer to this question is time dependent and is changing ever faster as Moore’s Law continues to describe the increase in our computational power. Gordon Moore’s editorial in Electronics Magazine was published the day before my 16th birthday. Contrary to what we like to believe, Moore was careful to limit his prognosis to the next decade...

How drugs pass through biological cell membranes – a paradigm shift in our understanding?

Douglas B. Kell

It was once widely believed, and text books still portray it thus, that much (or even most) of the flux of pharmaceutical drugs into biological cells occurs by diffusion through whatever lipid bilayers may be present. A number of logical fallacies underpin this belief. Instead, an increasing amount of evidence indicates, perhaps surprisingly, that such phospholipid bilayer-mediated diffusion is in fact negligible in intact cells...