LabVisor

LabVisor is a group of PhD students that want to change things. Have you entered a research group thinking they are your best choice and then reality has hit you? There are multiple databases with the publications and scientific papers of all research groups … But has anyone told you how is the behavior of their scientists? The value they give to the enthusiasm and dedication of the fellows? Well, this is the kind of platform we want to build with your help. This is the reason why they have created this anonymous network, built among all, whether you are an undergraduate student, master, PhD student, technician, postdoc … in which you can expose your experience in each laboratory and thus inform and help others to make their choice. Thus, to be able to choose a research group that not only has scientific quality but HUMAN. This election will determine that the following years are the best or the worst of your academic life.

Yorick Peterse

Yorick Peterse has a background in biomedical sciences and psychology, for which he studied in the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and Germany. His PhD research in Munich, Germany, explored brain activity related to mental health disorders like anxiety disorders, depression and schizophrenia. During this period, he was one of the elected representatives of the ±5000 PhD candidates of the Max Planck Society, striving to improve working conditions for researchers. Additionally, he has been involved in science communication, with a special focus on articles and workshops about mental health-related topics. He has written several contributions for online and print outlets about the mental well-being of PhD candidates, which included proposals for improvements.

José Blanca

José Blanca is a geneticist working mainly on the domestication of tomato using population genetics approaches at Universitat Politécnica de Valencia. He is also a science enthusiast and has been very interested in various side topics, from theoretical physics to philosophy of science, to which he has devoted a good deal of his free time during the last years. José has been actively participating in science divulgation, as one of the organizers of Escépticos en el Pub in Valencia and has participated several times in the radio program A ciencia cierta, as an expert in genetics and evolution. He will give a talk in the CNIC PhDay about the foundations and principles of science: what is science and what is not.

Mate Palfy

Mate Palfy is from Budapest, Hungary, where he studied Biology at the Eotvos Lorand University. Following a year in Vienna at MFPL for his Master’s project, he pursued his PhD at the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics, Dresden, studying genome activation in zebrafish embryos. Mate works as a Community Manager for preLights, a preprint highlighting service that was launched in 2018 by The Company of Biologists (a publisher based in Cambridge, UK). His main tasks involve building a community of early-career researchers around preLights, supporting them, and evolving and promoting this new initiative.

Ulf Sandström

Dr. Ulf Sandström is docent in Technology and Social Change from Linkoping University and currently a part-time researcher at the department for Industrial Economics and Management of the ITM School. He has recently been a visiting professor in Science Studies at the medical faculty of Gothenburg University (50%) and at Orebro University (50%) as well as visiting prof at KTH (2010-13). Sandström took his PhD in 1989 and then entered into science policy studies. He combines an interest in quantitative analytical methods with the use of qualitative standard methods. He has developed a research line that uses publication data in combination with other register data. One of his achievements is a ranking of all Swedish researchers from 2008-2015. His research covers the following themes: research productivity and efficiency; gender issues and excellence; bias in peer review; the role of mobility in research; interdisciplinary research. Sandström publishes in academic journals such as Journal of Informetrics, PLoS ONE, Scientometrics, Research Evaluation, Science and Public Policy, Research Policy and others.

Ángel Abril-Ruiz

Ángel Abril-Ruiz began his professional career linked to the telecommunications and business sector. He graduated in Technical Telecommunication Engineering (Universidad Politécnica de Valencia, 2001) and studied Business and Business Management. As of 2010, he was interested in individual behavior, entering disciplines as emotional intelligence, personal growth, neuroscience or neuromarketing. Therefore, he started his PhD in the area of Consumer Behavior (application of sensory marketing and evolutionary psychology to consumer decisions). When he had almost completed the doctoral thesis, he presented the resignation to his defense due to the moral conflict that led him to discover the fabrication of data (scientific fraud) that his thesis director had done. After that, Ángel published an essay with which he tried to find an explanation for the dishonest behavior of his mentors during his PhD years, in addition to providing the data that proved his accusations of scientific fraud. In 2019, he published his second essay “Rotten apples. Bad research practices and neglected science”.

Stephen Curry

Stephen Curry is a Professor of Structural Biology at Imperial College London where he also serves as the Assistant Provost for Equality, Diversity and Inclusion. For many years he has been a writer and campaigner on a range of scientific issues including open access, research assessment, research funding and science policy. He is currently chair of the San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment (DORA).