interview
A scientist’s opinion : Interview with Professor Johan Neyts about COVID-19 vaccines
Johan Neyts is full professor of virology at the University of Leuven, Belgium. He teaches virology at the medical school and at the school of dentistry. His lab is deeply involved in the development of antivirals against SARS-CoV-2. A second focus of the lab is the development of novel vaccine technologies. To that end, the yellow ...
A scientist’s opinion : Interview with Professor Earl Brown about COVID-19 vaccines
Professor Earl Brown is specialized in virology and microbiology. His main activities are on viral genetics and evolution, mainly directed at understanding how viruses cause disease (pathogenesis) or become adapted to new hosts; and the mechanism used by influenza virus to control the antiviral interferon response. He has experience with several viruses, including hepatitis C, ...
What is driving people’s belief in conspiracy theories?
Interview with Prof Karen Douglas Karen Douglas is a professor of social psychology at the University of Kent. She studies why people believe in conspiracy theories, and what the consequences of conspiracy theories are for individuals, groups, and societies. As a social psychology scholar, what brought you to conspiracy theories as a research subject in ...
A scientist’s opinion : Interview with Dr M. Alejandra Tortorici about passive immunisation for COVID-19
M. Alejandra Tortorici works as a virologist at the Institut Pasteur, Paris, France. She is also visiting scientist at the Biochemistry Department, University of Washington, Seattle, USA. Dr Tortorici holds a Bachelor in Biological Sciences from the University of Buenos Aires, and a PhD from the University of La Plata. She carried out postdoctoral studies ...
A scientist’s opinion : Interview with Dr Lise Estcourt about passive immunisation for COVID-19
Lise Estcourt is a consultant in Haematology and Transfusion Medicine at NHS Blood and Transplant (NHSBT), Oxford, UK, and a Senior Clinical Lecturer at the University of Oxford. She is the Director of NHSBT’s Clinical Trials Unit, the Clinical Lead for the National Comparative Audit in Blood Transfusion, Clinical Tutor for NHSBT, and the coordinating ...
An expert’s opinion: An interview with Ludo Waltman on the surge in COVID-19 research papers
We speak with Ludo Waltman, Professor of Quantitative Science Studies and Deputy Director of the Centre for Science and Technology Studies (CWTS) at Leiden University, on how the COVID-19 pandemic is changing the way we assess the quality of scientific literature. What are you working on at the moment? I am looking at how many ...
An expert’s opinion: An interview with Adam Marcus on scientific publishing in times of COVID-19
Adam Marcus, Co-founder of Retraction Watch and managing editor of Gastroenterology & Endoscopy News, highlights the need to be vigilant about the quality of COVID-19 research papers and encourages publishers to publish fewer but better-quality papers. How many COVID-19 papers have been retracted so far this year? Our latest count is 37 retractions and three ...
A scientist’s opinion : Interview with Samuel Scarpino about clusters & superspreading
Interview with Samuel Scarpino, assistant professor in the Network Science Institute at Northeastern University in Boston, Massachusetts. What impact does the news about fresh vaccines for COVID-19 have on the importance of backward tracing? With the new vaccines, I think certainly the early signs are a lot more optimistic than most of us were planning ...
A scientist’s opinion : Interview with Dr Akira Endo about clusters & superspreading
Interview with Dr Akira Endo in the Department of Infectious Disease Epidemiology at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Is it still beneficial to look into combining backward with forward contact tracing, as you describe in your recent paper, following the recent developments with COVID vaccines? It’s very good news about the vaccines, ...
Interview with Philipp Schmid on science denialism, misinformation & the importance of public confidence in the safety & effectiveness of the Covid-19 vaccine
Dr. Philipp Schmid is a scientific researcher at the Department of Psychology at the University of Erfurt (Germany). Philipp’s research aims at analysing the psychological reasons of science denialism. He is the lead author of the WHO guideline on how to respond to vocal vaccine denier in public and a co-author of the Debunking Handbook ...
