Hip, hip hooray to Wouter Vlemmings, Theo Khouri, Behzad Bojnordi Arbab, Elvire De Beck and Matthias Maercker from SEE, who have been awarded Chalmers Library’s Open Access Prize 2025. Their article, “One month convection timescale on the surface of a giant evolved star” in Nature has the highest almetric score of all publications in Chalmers Research.
Congratulations! What are your thoughts on this award?
– We think initiatives like this award are very important to highlight open access research and are very happy that we can contribute to this.
Your article received an exceptionally high online visibility and engagement across news, social media, and other platforms. In your opinion, what explains this strong response?
– While scores and rankings are not that good a measure of interesting research, it’s very nice to see such a strong international response. In this case, the attention we received highlights the public’s curiosity for fundamental research questions like those addressed in our paper. Astronomy is a very thankful subject to interact with the public on, and it inspires many to be curious about the world around them. Imaging the bubbling surface of stars other than our own sun is nothing short of awe-inspiring. And of course, a lot of credit must be given to several excellent communication officers who helped with making the research accessible to the public.
Imaging the bubbling surface of stars other than our own sun is nothing short of awe-inspiring.
What does Open Access mean to you, and why is it important?
– Open Access is not only crucial in allowing scientific results to be accessible to as many other researchers as possible, but it is also essential for reducing the distance between research and the public. Especially when trust in science is under threat. Fortunately, in our field of astronomy, we have long been using open-access platforms like ArXiv to spread our publications. Alongside this, we have a strong tradition of data archives where observatories store and make publicly available the cutting-edge data they collect. This way, the experiment doesn’t “stay in the lab” and can be inspected in detail by anyone who is interested.
How can we encourage more people to publish their research openly? Are there any challenges that universities need to overcome, as you see it?
– Universities should encourage the usage of preprint servers like ArXiv and actively support these services, especially considering their current vulnerability to political decisions. At the same time as actively advocating for Open Access publication as a standard, universities should make sure Open Access does not become just another business model for publishers.
Read full story here One month convection timescale on the surface of a giant evolved star | Nature
What is Chalmers Library’s Open Access Prize?
The award has been given since 2015 and is a way for Chalmers Library to highlight the global event, Open Access Week, which runs for one week in October. This year, the theme for the week is “Who owns our knowledge?” and is described as follows: This year’s theme asks a pointed question about the present moment and how, in a time of disruption, communities can reassert control over the knowledge they produce. It also challenges us to reflect on not only who has access to education and research but on how knowledge is created and shared, where it has come from, and whose voices are recognized and valued.