IOP Publishing has expanded its growing ebook collection today with the publication of ‘Creativity for Scientists and Engineers: A practical guide’ which explores how scientists can utilise collaboration and thinking outside the box to be more creative and in turn, further scientific development and breakthroughs. 

“Although the ‘Eureka moment’ makes a great story – the genius inventor suddenly magics up a great new device, the genius scientist runs to her desk to write down the great equation  –  the  much  more  prosaic  truth  is  that  creativity is the outcome of very hard work, over often very long periods of time and building on the work of others” explains Dennis Sherwood, one of the country’s leading experts on creativity and innovation and author of the book published today. 

Miriam Maus, publishing director at IOP Publishing says: “Creativity is at the core of all we do, and we are proud to publish a book that provides a practical ‘how to’ guide for scientists to improve and develop their creative confidence, decipher between good and bad ideas and how to sustain a culture of creativity and innovation within a team.” 

The book combines pragmatic and powerful processes for generating novel ideas with the fundamental first principles on which creativity is based, including Koestler’s Law in which unrelated components come together in a meaningful way to create a new innovative concept, as well as exploring the cultural factors that need to be addressed for creativity to happen.  

To illustrate the principles, the book gives examples of creativity in science and engineering, as it happened both historically and in modern science, from the discovery of DNA to Newton’s laws of motion and Einstein’s discovery of Special Relativity.   

A key example Sherwood uses to demonstrate the power of Koestler’s law in physics is the discovery of Special Relativity by Einstein. In the paper, Einstein has no references which may suggest special relativity was the creation of a “lone genius”. However, throughout his work, he pulls on the “giants before him” such as James Clark Maxwell and Henrik Lorentz. 

Moreover, the book includes a chapter in which 13 contemporary scientists and engineers tell their own stimulating stories, from how cows in Kansas triggered an idea for reducing noise in valves to the discovery of gravitational waves.  

“The essence of Koestler’s Law, combining knowledge from one domain, solved the problem of suspending the interferometer mirrors to detect the waves,” explains Professor Sheila Rowan CBE FRS, from the Institute for Gravitational Research at the University of Glasgow, “I think if you look, you’ll find this kind of story over and over again in the field of gravitational wave detection – where the right ideas and inventions at the right times came together to make progress.” 

Creativity for Scientists and Engineers is written for people who wish to enhance their personal creativity as well as that of the teams they lead. 

This publication adds to IOP Publishing’s high-quality ebook collection which brings together innovative digital publishing with leading authors from across the physical sciences. In 2021, IOP Publishing expanded its collection by 111 new titles.  

Building on the use of artificial intelligence (AI) to generate books, Springer Nature has invested in, and developed, an AI-based Digital Editing language polishing tool which is designed to add value to scientific publishing. This was done via AJE, part of Research Square Company. 

The AJE Digital Editing tool is the first to provide rapid language polish for scholarly manuscripts, reducing the time authors need to spend preparing their research for publication. The tool frees up more time for researchers to advance society. 

The AJE Digital Editing tool allows authors to automatically improve their manuscripts within minutes, primarily by correcting grammatical errors and improving wording and word usage. Springer Nature recently announced it is making this tool a free service for its book authors and editors after successfully piloting the tool in its Scientific Reports and Discover series of journals. 

The AJE Digital Editing tool achieved high author satisfaction values and improved article acceptance rates over the course of a pilot comprising 500 manuscripts which all had low language scores. All these papers were submitted to Scientific Reports between September 2021 and January 2022. It is notable that, amongst these, manuscripts from China were improved the most in terms of acceptance rates.

INCLUDED PAPERS SAW ACCEPTANCE RATES RISE FROM 28% BEFORE USE OF THE TOOL TO 42% ON AVERAGE.

This highlights the value of the AJE Digital Editing tool for authors whose native language is not English. This increase in article acceptance is due to the tool helping reviewers see the value of the research itself as the language of the article becomes clearer. 

The AJE Digital Editing tool has also been shown to save external editors time and reduce article processing time. The tool helps editors make rejection decisions long before peer review. 

Based on these successful trials, Springer Nature selected a number of disciplines** in 2022 and will also include book authors and editors in these fields in the pilot to improve their publishing satisfaction and experience. Authors typically choose the service during the contract signing phase, so that they can use the tool at the beginning of the drafting and preparation phase, as well as several months before handover, for additional assistance in reviewing and editing the full manuscript.

 The AJE AI algorithm is unique because it was trained on revisions from more than 750,000 manuscripts which were carried out by native English-speaking editors with PhDs. These papers covered 447 fields and over 200 specific topics. This means that all original manuscripts also had an edited manuscript for comparison and makes the AJE tool 95% accurate. The tool is designed to complement the infrequent use of traditional professional editing services, providing all academic researchers with a writing assistant that can be scaled and used on a daily basis, allowing them to focus on the competition for research quality rather than language quality.

What our authors say about the AJE Digital Editing Tool: ‍

“It’s very flexible. I can submit the revised manuscript at any time.” Dr Chen‍

“I compared AJE with other software, and it is much better.” Dr Shi‍

“It is very convenient, the cost is reasonable, and the retouching effect is very good” Dr Fei‍

“Accurate, quick editing and corrections.” Dr Hassan‍

Many of the leading scholarly publishing organizations and research institutions across the world use AJE’s innovative services to support the authors and editors they work with every day.

If you’re interested in working with us, our Business Development team would love to hear from you! Click here to learn more about how and why the AJE Digital Editing Tool is best for academic research articles.

A new series of open access journals from Cambridge University Press will address global challenges by bringing together researchers across national and subject boundaries.

Cambridge Prisms will shape solutions to major scientific, technological and medical challenges with cutting-edge research and reviews.

That research will step out of subject silos, with the scope of each journal built around broad, subject neutral topics – Coastal Futures, Precision Medicine, Global Metal Health, Extinction, Plastics, Water – that encourage collaboration between researchers from different disciplines and make it easy for readers to find relevant content.

Collaboration will also be fostered by the journal’s editorial boards and by the Press, which will help researchers find co-authors that complement their work and bring new perspectives.

Jess Jones, the Publisher and Senior Scientific Editor at the Press overseeing the series, said: “As a publisher, we often see papers submitted where we know another author’s work in peer review would have strengthened its reach and impact. We want to break down these barriers and be involved in accelerating the formation of new research networks.

“That means working with our editorial boards to help authors build those networks and find co-authors that bring greater global representation and viewpoints.

“Ultimately, the aim is to unite researchers who are addressing real world challenges and so accelerate discovery.”

The Cambridge Prisms series will also aim for maximum transparency, with editors tracking and openly summarising the diversity and representation of every manuscript. Peer review of manuscripts will also be open. 

The Press has recruited some of the world’s leading scientists and academics to lead the journals in the role of Editor-in-Chief, all of them people who have dedicated their life’s work to addressing major real-world challenges.

Prior to launch, high-profile and rising star authors with diverse knowledge and expertise have been invited to publish reviews across each journal’s topic map and define the interdisciplinary focus for each world challenge.

Mandy Hill, Managing Director of Cambridge University Press, said: “We are launching Prisms as the need to address the world’s biggest challenges grows ever more urgent

“These challenges – climate change, pollution, mental health – are truly global, but all too often research that seeks to address them is not, either because it views those challenges through the lens of a particular discipline or because it provides limited perspectives. Prisms will unite researchers globally across different disciplines, building connections and capturing the wider conversations.”

She added: “It is also vital that this research is published open access so that it can have the widest possible reach and impact, with both an authorship and a readership that is as diverse as possible.

“Open research is at the heart of our mission to benefit society through the pursuit of education, learning and research. We are committed to making the majority of our research articles open access by 2025 and the launch of Prisms is another important step in that transition.”

Aligning with the strategic importance of improving submission quality, the Charlesworth Group and Writefull have now partnered to offer authors Writefull for free within the Charlesworth AI Paper Checking Service. The aim is to reduce the likelihood of manuscript rejection and help quicken the publication process. This integrated solution helps thousands of authors on the Charlesworth Author Services platform identify whether their paper needs additional language editing before submission.

The Charlesworth AI Paper Checking Service uses the Writefull technology to let authors assess their manuscript’s quality level and choose whether to submit or utilise professional editing support. The metrics powered by Writefull present the number of errors and changes in areas such as grammar, vocabulary, punctuation and style. Using these metrics, the tool recommends whether the paper requires additional editing support. By uploading their paper to Charlesworth Author Services, authors can choose to seamlessly submit to The Charlesworth Group’s editing solution to address any quality issues. As Charlesworth AI Paper Checking Service is currently in beta, active user feedback drives enhancements and progression at an accelerated pace.

Juan Castro, CEO and co-founder of Writefull, comments:
“We developed Writefull to help authors with their academic writing. We’re excited that, through this partnership with Charlesworth, we’ll give thousands of authors an objective measure of their manuscript editing needs. Authors may not be sure whether their work needs language editing, and Writefull’s metrics will give them more confidence in making their decision. If authors then do opt for extra copyediting, it’s likely to be beneficial to both themselves and the publisher. It’s a win-win.”

Michael Evans, CEO of Charlesworth, comments:
“We’re always looking at ways to improve not just the author experience, but how we can support our publishing partners to accomplish their goals. Partnering with a specialist solution-provider like Writefull means we can positively impact the quality of published work prior to submission. By combining our specialist expertise, we can provide a unified, integrated solution to support our author and publisher community sooner in the publication process. We are delighted to be working with Writefull to help improve author experience through this partnership.”