We at Mendeley have now built one of the world’s largest open research catalogs, containing over 70 million documents. This is no small feat, considering we’ve only been at it for about 2 years, and we couldn’t have done it without you (nearly a million of you!).  By bringing control of research data back to the community, we hope to make research more collaborative, open, and efficient. If you’ve ever thought, “You know, I really wish I could search the literature better” or “Wouldn’t it be cool if I could see how this idea evolved over time?” or just “I wish I had $10,001 dollars”, well, now’s your chance.

What is the Binary Battle?

The Mendeley Binary Battle is a contest to build the coolest, most popular, and most useful application using Mendeley’s open database of over 70 million research papers, usage statistics, reader demographics, social tags, and related research recommendations. You can find the full details on the Mendeley API Binary Battle page.

What are the rules?

Applications will be judged by our all-star panel of judges on the following criteria:

• How active is your application? We’ll look at your API key usage.
• How popular/useful is the app? We’ll look at the number of sign ups on Mendeley and your application, and we’ll also have an eye on Twitter.
• Does the application increase collaboration and/or transparency? We’ll look at how much your application contributes to making research more open.
• How cool is your app? Does it make our jaws drop? Is it the most fun that you can have with your pants on?

Who are the judges?

	Juan Enriquez – Managing Director of Excel Venture Management and CEO of Biotechonomy. Juan is recognized as one of the world’s leading authorities on the economic and political impacts of life sciences.
	Tim O’Reilly – Founder and CEO of O’Reilly Media which is changing the world by spreading the knowledge of innovators. Tim also co-hosts the annual Science Foo Camp with Google and Nature.
	James Powell – CTO of Thomson Reuters, the world’s leading information services company. Still a nerd at heart, James is particularly interested in how technology gets applied to solve problems.
	Dr. Werner Vogels – CTO of Amazon.com and former research scientist at Cornell University. Werner is one of world’s top experts on cloud computing and ultra-scalable systems.
	John Wilbanks – VP for Science at Creative Commons. Seed Magazine named John a “Game Changer” among their Revolutionary Minds of 2008.

The Binary Battle is open to apps built previous to this announcement. Here is what our judges are saying:

Werner Vogels: “I am already seeing clear evidence that Mendeley is changing the face of science, and the Binary Battle is one of the reasons why. With tons of academic data, and all the computational power to handle it, I am certain that developers will provide innovative new ways to slice and dice and provide new insights.”

Tim O’Reilly: “I always tell developers to work on stuff that matters. It’s time to stretch beyond the consumer internet, and what better place to focus than on furthering the cutting edges of science?”

Juan Enriquez: “With the overwhelming amount of data and info available today, the challenge is how to sift, triage, find and ultimately use. May this battle determine and showcase some great contenders…”

When can I start?

The contest officially opens to submissions on Tuesday, March 8 and closes August 31st, 2011. Winners will be announced on October 31st. The winning application receives the Grand Prize of $10,001, and the the runner-up gets $1,000 and this awesome Parrot AR Drone Quadricopter. And now head over to the Mendeley API Binary Battle page to enter the contest!

Update: ‎…we have coverage in Ars Technica, ReadWriteWeb, Programmable Web and The Next Web!