Month: February 2013

Mendelife – Meet See Wah Cheng

Alice Bonasio1 Comment

This week we continue to introduce you to the fantastic people that make Mendeley what it is. See Wah Cheng has been Software Engineer/Product Manager with us for almost 3 years, so a true Mendeley veteran! Before coming to us, he got interested in academic research through his work at Cancer Research UK, so we start out by asking what made him apply for the job at Mendeley?

“After 2 years at CRUK, I wanted to go back to working in a startup. The fact that Mendeley was voted the best social innovation startup at the Europas made me want to apply”

When you started working here, were things like you expected?
The office was QUIET (everyone has headphones on)! Everyone was very clever.

Have things changed in Mendeley since you started working here?
The office is much less quiet now! More clever people

What’s the best thing about coming to work at Mendeley?
Seeing my colleagues, knowing that I am making progress with a great product

Do you have any pets?
No, but I’d like to have a giant St Bernard

Who would be invited to your perfect dinner party?
Beethoven (as follows from the above!)

What is the one website you can’t live without?
currently brockleycentral.blogspot.com

If you could acquire one extra skill or talent, what would that be?
To be able to swim

What book are you reading at the moment and why?
Last one I read was 1984 by George Orwell

What would you change about the world if you could change one thing?
More respect between cyclists and drivers

What was the first record you ever bought?
Umm.. cannot remember. Manic Street Preachers perhaps?

What music is on your iPod at the moment?
Godspeed You! Black Emperor (Yes, Steve, still listening to them)

Favourite video game/hobby?
Angry Birds / climbing

Favourite food/drink?
Oreo /  Good ale

Your greatest vice?
too many…

Favourite film?
Apocalypse Now

Favourite place in the world?
Sighișoara

Three things you would put in Room 101
Crap TV, Crap Music and More crap music

If you could give unlimited funding and resources to one area of research, what would it be and why?
Renewable Energy

You Know What’s Cool? $3 million

Alice Bonasio1 Comment

Original Image from forbes.com

In science it is, anyway. As Eric S. Lander– one of the eleven winners of the first Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences – explains, this is a “staggering” amount of money for a scientist. Lander is a leader of the Human Genome Project, and in an interview quoted in the New York Times he told of how he planned on using the prize money to help pay for new approaches to teaching biology online.

The winners of what is now the world’s richest academic prize for medicine and biology – more than twice the amount of the Nobel Prize – work mostly in areas advancing cancer research, but Cornelia I. Bargmann’s work on nervous system and behaviour was also recognised, as was Dr. Shinya Yamanaka’s groundbreaking research on developing stem cells.

This follows from the establishment of the Fundamental Physics Prize – also worth $3 million – awarded to 9 scientists last July. It’s the brainchild of Russian Billionaire investor, entrepreneur and philanthropist Yuri Milner, who himself was a Physics student. Inaugural winners includedAlexei Kitaev,  Maxim Kontsevich, and Ashoke Sen.

Previous winners will help make decisions on future awards, and both prizes – as well as a $100,000 award to honour promising young researchers – will now be awarded annually to people who “think big, take risks and have made a significant impact on our lives.”

But while the physics prize was funded exclusively by Mr Milner, who personally chose the first batch of winners, for the Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences he partnered with a select group of Internet tycoons. Apple chairman Arthur D. Levison helped in the selection process while Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, Google co-founder Sergey Brin and his wife Anne Wojcicki – founder of genetics company 23andMe were also involved and donated towards the $33 million prize fund.

Mark Zuckerberg told GigaOM that he believes society needs more hero scientist, researchers and engineers: “The things that we talk about in the media and the things the market rewards has a big influence on what the next generation of people growing up will choose to do and I think it’s really important that a lot of the smartest people go and choose to solve these problems and go into these lines of work.”

In a world obsessed with film, music and sports celebrities, the goal is to “move the needle” of public awareness and give scientists who have significantly contributed to the advancement of human knowledge a chance at the limelight. The foundation’s website will soon be accepting nominations for the next batch of prizes, and anyone can send one in. There are no limits as to age or how many people can share a prize. Also, people can win more than once. “If you’re Einsten,” said Mr Milner, “you will be getting three.”

Do you think that prizes such as the Life Sciences Breakthrough and the Fundamental Physics Prize have the potential to inspire more young people to pursue a scientific career? Is it fair to single out researchers for such large prizes or would it be more productive to fund their area of research directly rather than individuals? Does the fact that most winners are male and from the US represent a problem? What are your thoughts on the researchers who have been recognized so far and their contribution to science? Please let us know what you think by leaving a comment below or joining the conversation on Twitter or Facebook.

Mendelife – Meet Matthew Green

Alice Bonasio

This week we introduce another member of the Mendeley team: Business Executive Matthew “Matty” Green. He’s a relative newbie, having been with us for 3 months now, so we thought we’d get his thoughts on coming on board while they’re still fresh!

Why did you apply for this job at Mendeley?
There aren’t many small exciting companies around in London that combine a great product with huge potential, as well as the desire to change the world (of research) for the better. What more could you ask for?

And were things like you expected once you started working here?
I’d worked in tech companies before so knew roughly what to expect, though the office atmosphere was really much better! Had to get used to table football instead of table tennis…which I’m still struggling to adapt to.

Have things changed since you started?
The company is growing really fast so even in the 3 months since I started there have been more desks (and people) around me, so I guess that’s a good thing!

Do you have any pets?
No, but I’d love a Koala, or a Hippo. Logistically, both could be problematic – for different reasons.

Who would be invited to your perfect dinner party?
Marilyn Monroe, Scarlett Johansson, Angelina Jolie, Billy Connolly & Michael Palin…

What is the one website you can’t live without?
Not strictly a website, but Spotify gets me through a lot. The boring answer would be BBC

When you were growing up, what did you want to be?
A footballer…

If you could acquire one extra skill or talent, what would that be?
Can this be fictional as well? If so, flying.

What would you change about the world if you could change one thing?
Stop anything Reality TV related ever being created… Or man’s inhumanity to others…

What was the first record you ever bought?
Ace of Base – All that she wants

What music is on your iPod at the moment?
The Tallest Man on Earth

Favourite food/drink?
Steak & red wine…

Favourite film?
Goodfellas

Favourite place in the world?
Parque Tayrona in Colombia

Three things you would put in Room 101
Minor celebrities ‘famous’ for being on a reality-TV show; George Osbourne; Crying babies on public transport

Now for a serious one worthy of the Mendeley vision: If you could give unlimited funding and resources to one area of research, what would it be and why?
Astrophysics – just seems to be so much out there that we still have absolutely no idea about…

Mendelife – Meet James Rasell

Alice Bonasio

 

 

Welcome to a new series of posts directly “from the horse’s mouth” where the team here at Mendeley tells you a bit more about themselves.

As English author, poet and artist John Ruskin once said: “Tell me what you like and I’ll tell you what you are,” so we thought it would be nice to share with our community not only what life as a Mendeleyan is like, but also what makes them tick, their likes, dislikes and aspirations.

For our very first post, meet systems administrator James Rasell (also known as Tatooed James), who’s been with Mendeley for 4 months now and aspires to owning a black and white cat (“what’s not to like about them?”)

So, James, what’s the best thing about coming to work at Mendeley?
Free breakfast and the ability think freely!

Who would be invited to your perfect dinner party?
Jimi Hendrix, Gandhi, Gautama Buddah, David Attenborough, David Bowie, Tony Stark, Brian Cox

What is the one website you can’t live without?
sourceforge.net (source for finding, creating and publishing open source software for free)

When you were growing up, what did you want to be?
Astronaut or as it was known as a child…Space Man!

What was the first record you ever bought?
Offspring – Smash

Favourite food/drink?
dolsot bibimbap (a Korean Hot Stone Bowl with mixed rice, vegetables, meat and egg)

Favourite film?
Impossible to pick, but forced on the spot – The Matrix.

Favourite place in the world?
Koh Tao, Thailand…30m underwater scuba diving.

What book are you reading at the moment and why?
World War Z as I want to read it before seeing the film.

Favourite video game/hobby?
Listening to and playing music

If you could acquire one extra skill or talent, what would that be?
Teleportation or fluency in languages

If you could give unlimited funding and resources to one area of research, what would it be and why?
Astrophysics – As an earth and planetary science graduate it is something close to my heart and a subject which can have great resonance. It is said Christianity put science back by 500-1000 years; imagine what the world would be like if that was not the case (ignoring obviously the lack of renaissance art and so forth). I also believe a greater understanding of the universe and its working would aid most others subject fields and lead to a better world.

 

Mendeley Desktop v1.8 Released!

Alice Bonasio2 Comments

Here at Mendeley we’ve been hard at work trying to improve the product for our community, which now has well over 2 million researchers around the world. This includes a better onboarding wizard that takes new users through the tools available on the platform. The wizard also includes an expanded ‘Claim your Publications’ feature that enables Mendeley to link user profile pages to the wider catalog when they access Mendeley for the first time.

Some might say that this is one of our finest-looking desktops yet, but we’ll leave that judgment to you. As usual, we’ve focused a lot of attention in making the user experience as smooth as it can possibly be, improving looks and flow under windows 8 and fixing a few bugs, including:

  • Added options for obtaining help or checking for updates
  • More effective display of non-English text in the documents list
  • Fixed problem with crashing plugin in Word 2003 and OS X 10.5
  • Accurate progress indicator when importing large RIS, BibTeX and EndNote XML files

You can download the new v1.8 Mendeley Desktop here. This version supports Mac OSX 10.5 and above, Linux Ubuntu 10.04, Debian Squeeze or equivalent, and Windows XP SP2 or later. We hope you like the changes, but as always we really value your opinion, so don’t be shy… Let us know what you think in the UserVoice forum, and if you have any problems just contact our support team.