This is a case study about the creation of open science services in the University of Eastern Finland. The library has overseen the open science services that have been actively implemented from 2010 onwards due to the development of the digitalisation of science and open science policies. A survey was conducted to determine how the UEF’s academic faculty use the services provided as well as their attitudes towards opening their own research findings in this manner. The researchers seem to be most interested in issues that influence their daily work, i.e. data management plans and opening their publications. It seems that the culture of openness is still at the development stage within UEF. The innovators, i.e. active research groups and researchers, are already practicing and encouraging openness, but the majority of the academic staff seems to be either unaware of open science or unwilling to implement it, due to the fact that incentives and career advancements still support the traditional way of conducting research.

The coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) disease has affected millions of lives, forcing most of us to stay at home and work. However, there is an immediate need to conduct research on potential drugs against COVID-19. In this article, the extent to which major publishers have provided access for the public to read research articles relevant to potential drug candidates for the COVID-19 disease are presented. A systematic search of five electronic databases (Elsevier’s ScienceDirect, Taylor & Francis, SpringerLink, Wiley, and New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM)) was conducted on April 12-17, 2020. The total number of research articles containing terms ‘Ribavirin’, ‘Remdesivir’, ‘Hydroxychloroquine OR Chloroquine’, ‘Favipiravir’, ‘Lopinavir OR Ritonavir’, ‘Sarilumab’, and ‘Tocilizumab’, available for the public to read for free were determined. In this study, there was a lack of full access to research articles related to potential drugs of COVID-19 in commercial academic databases, except for ‘Remdesivir’ and ‘Favipiravir’ from NEJM.

Beginning in 2017 three major institutions on the island of Funen, Denmark, collaborated on a Citizen Science project: “A Healthier Funen” (AHF). The partners were a university, a university hospital and a regional broadcaster. The project invokes citizens to vote for the allocation of research funding.In the case study presented here, we analyze the Citizen Science aspects of AHF and the roles of libraries as collaborators, we examine the results and the reach of the project, and we argue that this strand of Citizen Science could be a possible new trend for Library, Faculty and media collaboration.Seen against the background of the scope and definitions of Open Science and LIBER’s Open Science Roadmap, the case of AHF suggests that the field of Citizen Science bears great potential in regard of providing a new level of innovation for Libraries: through a collaborative professional approach to science communication, libraries can assume a strategic role together with the Faculty staff.In the context of reciprocality within Citizen Science, the Library can build skills for engaging in projects, adopt toolkits or models, as well as participate in the recruitment and retention processes for staff/volunteers, participate in marketing activities and promote a positive attitude towards Citizen Science, thus creating an increased Public Understanding of Science, as the underlying public service criteria are seen in at least 31 countries.

Tubingen University Library offers a continuously improved next generation bibliographic database for theology and religious studies. The “Index theologicus” database is available worldwide in open access. It is funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (German Research Foundation) in the funding program “specialised information services” . This paper informs about the background of the project and the steps the Library took in order to transform a legacy online content database system into one of the most important international bibliographies in theology without increasing the number of staff involved.

Research librarians no longer need to perform as many of the traditional chores of the research library. This is due to many factors like digitalization, changing research policies and changes in researchers’ behaviour. With these changes also comes a demand for new skills. We seek an answer to how this demand can be met. We argue that changes that have taken place in the research library have also led to a loss of prestige for the research librarians. We use Bourdieu’s field theory to analyse the power struggles in the academic field and in the field of the research library and to identify means of reclaiming the previous prestigious position in both fields. We end up creating a 60 ECTS framework for a flexible part-time master’s program for research librarians. The first cohort of students has already been enrolled and they evaluate the program in very positive terms.

This article investigates how staff and management in Norwegian academic libraries have experienced the implementation of the new library management system Alma. As a new library management system is introduced, the need for learning on demand emerges. An anonymous survey was sent to all academic libraries in Norway, resulting in a total of 626 responses. This article presents the findings from this survey and provides some reflections on how a firm grip on knowledge management could have helped make such a transition easier.

The European Commission worked closely with North American colleagues in joint projects and developments. This paper describes developments with the National Science Foundation.

A recurring question in defining publicly funded research programmes is “what research should be funded publicly and what should be funded through the private sector?”. The way this question is usually answered has placed emphasis on seeking to ensure that research that has a payback in purely economic terms is funded (at least in part) by those most likely to receive the economic benefit, but evaluating “who benefits?” and “how?” is not always easy to deduce from the research questions posed.

Academic staff assessment in Poland is, to a large extent, based on bibliographic indicators, such as the number of scientific publications produced, the Ministry of Science and Higher Education score pertaining to the journal rank and the publication type, as well as the number of citations and derivatives. Relevant data is retrieved from bibliographic databases developed by libraries, international citation indexes available for Polish scientific institutions under a national licence, and from open-access international and Polish sources, which are briefly presented in the article. The workload entailed, and in consequence, the results of this citation search vary depending on the search method applied. For this reason university staff members and university authorities often seek assistance for this from the university library staff. This in return provides an opportunity for libraries to increase their role within the academic community.In order to investigate the matter further, the authors conducted a survey among the largest academic libraries in Poland. The findings confirm that bibliometric processes (namely, the registration and the formal acceptance of university staff scientific publications, and compilation of citation reports) have become a vital part of modern library work. Bibliographies of university staff publications developed by libraries include various bibliometric indicators (those most frequently used being identified in the article), and have become an important source of statistical and bibliometric information. The survey results highlight the most frequently used bibliometric sources and methods. Examples of bibliographic databases created by the libraries and bibliometric indicators used within these databases are also presented.

Whereas the first digital revolution of science by digitisation changed the scientific practices of data collection, analysis and reporting of results, the second digital revolution, i.e. open science, will also challenge the current roles of researchers, research organisations, libraries and publishers. From the early days of development, research libraries have joined different networks and been among the most active stakeholders working towards open science. Cohesive networks are needed for coordinated actions and support, whereas bridging networks can provide new approaches and novel information. The Finnish Open Science and Research Initiative is presented in this paper as an example of joining networks, motivating individuals and organisations to deliver high-quality services, infrastructures and competence building to promote a transition towards open science. This paper also presents milestones such as the publication of the academic publishing costs of Finnish research organisations and the maturity level of open science operating cultures in HEIs. Based on the experience of the Finnish open science initiative, joining different networks at the national level on an open mode of operation can significantly speed up the transition towards the era of open science.