The Science Knowledge and Education Network Building a User Base around Scientific Publications: Editing Online Content and Annotating Scientific Materials

Cornell Univ - State: Awds Made Prior May 2010, Ithaca NY

Investigators

Abstract

This project is developing an open-source infrastructure to create a knowledge and education network - a new and powerful application, called a Scientific Knowledge and Education Network (SKEN), for building dynamic collaborative communities centered around primary scientific references. The underlying goals of SKEN are to expand traditional, content-based scientific information into a community-based information exchange and to provide an innovative mechanism for blending science knowledge with opportunities for formal and informal science education. This transforms primary scientific references into "living" publications that include the most current information on their topics and allow continuous annotations of the content through community input from both researchers and members of the public. Scholarly authors and editors vet and edit any new information before uploading it to the primary content. Educators can also use SKEN to locate information for their teaching, as well as to post teaching resources and strategies back to the community. Using advanced information technologies SKEN is moving primary scientific resources from restricted content distribution points (bricks and mortar libraries) to ubiquitous availability over the Internet. It is also decreasing the time required to update these scientific resources, and improving access, search, and archival capabilities. By ensuring that all scientific communities implementing the SKEN architecture become part of the NSDL infrastructure, this project provides easy cross-fertilization of scientific disciplines.