International Open Access Week is currently underway between 24-30 October 2022, with the theme "Openness for Climate Justice". This year's theme draws attention to the importance of promoting the connection and cooperation between the climate movement and the international open (access) community.
Within the scope of the week, an event titled "TUBITAK Open Science Week Event 2022" was organised.
TUBITAK ULAKBIM Open Course Platform was launched in the online event held with the participation of Prof. Dr. Hasan Mandal, President of TUBITAK.
The event, moderated by Ebru Soyuyüce Aydın, started with the opening speech of TUBITAK ULAKBIM Director Mehmet Mirat Satoğlu. In the programme attended by many national and international academics and researchers, Satoğlu mentioned that Open Access Week has been celebrated in our country since 2012 and emphasised that open science is an opportunity for the whole world and that it is important for all countries and researchers to use these opportunities of technology.
Expressing that models have started to develop in the transformation taking place in the world in the field of open access, new software and new concepts are becoming more mature every day, Satoğlu emphasised that TUBITAK ULAKBIM closely follows the developments in this field. In his speech, Satoğlu added: "As TUBITAK, we offer research infrastructures to the service of our researchers; we embrace open access and open science with our policies”.
Satoğlu stated that it is now possible to reach many people with the possibilities of technology in scientific activities, publishing, laboratory notes, distance education course materials in the world, and that cooperation and efficiency are increased in a much cheaper and accessible way.
Prof. Dr. Hasan Mandal, who made a presentation titled "Climate Change and Open Science Approaches in Open Science Week", expressed his satisfaction with the Open Access Week Event with the theme of Climate Justice: "This issue is also very critical for us, and it completely meets our focus in the science, technology and innovation ecosystem at the focus of TUBITAK. Therefore, I consider this event to be very invaluable."
Introducing the TUBITAK ULAKBIM Open Course Platform, which is planned by TUBITAK ULAKBIM to raise awareness on open science and related issues throughout Türkiye to increase the current level of knowledge, to facilitate the project processes of researchers and to contribute to the protection of scientific content produced with public funds, Mandal pointed out in his speech that open science is a necessity beyond awareness by evaluating that "In order to combat the climate crisis, there is a need to access information faster and more openly."
Stating that the climate crisis will have different effects in different parts of the world, Mandal emphasised that different solutions should be identified to overcome complex risks and that open science is important in this context. Reminding that TUBITAK's open science policy was published in 2019, Mandal underlined that they were one of the earliest institutions to act in this field and explained the innovations to improve the processes.
Noting that the open science approach is implemented to share with institutions at all levels and is a national policy, Mandal stated that they are in a policymaking and sometimes even pioneering approach.
Pointing out that the science ecosystem is now expected to create more impact, Mandal said, "There is a need to work together more than cooperation. I think that the answer to the "How" question regarding the solution of the problems, the solutions and the facilitating way pass through open science." "With our Open Course Platform, we create awareness, increase the level of knowledge, facilitate the project processes of researchers and protect the scientific content produced with public funds."
The event continued with the Open Course Platform application presentations of Assoc. Prof. Dr. Zehra Taşkın and Dr. Güleda Doğan from Hacettepe University. Stating that the platform located at https://acikders.ulakbim.gov.tr/ is Türkiye 's most comprehensive open science education platform, Taşkın said that every element of open science is included in the content. Taşkın stated that you can participate in certified programmes by becoming a member of the system or you can access the content by using public packages without being a member. Dr. Güleda Doğan explained that there is a very rich content in the Open Course Platform, introducing the modules titled Research Data Management Training, Open Science Handbook, Responsible Research and Innovation, Open Peer Review, Open Refereeing, Open Citations, Text and Data Mining and Open Reproducible Research. He also stated that this platform continues to develop, and new modules can be added soon.
Dr. André Brasil from CWTS (Leiden University Centre for Science and Technology Studies) made an impressive presentation on the importance of local language publications and interdisciplinary differences through the example of the Brazilian research evaluation system.
Dr. Anca Hienola from the Finnish Meteorological Institute presented "Open Science in climate research: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly", and talked about how open access studies can have a great social impact when they reach non-governmental organisations and compared good and bad practices in the world.
Dr. Emrah Akkoyun made a presentation titled "Aperta in Data Sharing" at the online event. In his presentation, Akkoyun explained the Aperta Türkiye Data Archive and shared his experiences of putting the data obtained from 5123 proteins belonging to the PHACT paper (https://doi.org/10.1093/molbev/msac114), which was conducted by Sabancı University Faculty of Engineering and Natural Sciences Faculty Member Ogün Adebali and published in the Oxford MBE journal in August, into the Aperta Türkiye Open Archive. "Aperta is critical in enabling new collaborations by increasingly hosting outputs such as data and software produced in other research groups, making the work visible and reducing research costs”. He stated that the establishment of a scientific data pool that will enable large data sets in the future and increase national/international collaborations can provide significant benefits.
Dr. Mahur Turan, in his presentation titled "TUBITAK Open Science Policy and Applications in ARDEB", stated that with the Open Course Platform, none of the questions of the researchers will remain unanswered, and that every question is systematically explained on the platform. She stated that they are working on the automatic uploading of publications and data produced within the scope of ARDEB projects to Aperta.
The last speech of the event was delivered by Assoc. Prof. Dr. Duygu Çelik with her presentation on EOSC and Open Science. They made a detailed presentation on how and why EOSC started, the European Union commission policies and where we are now as Türkiye.
TUBITAK ULAKBIM Open Course Platform https://acikders.ulakbim.gov.tr/ offers the Open Science Training Handbook to researchers in addition to comprehensive trainings on topics such as research data management, creating a data management plan, responsible research, open citations. The book, which is available at https://tubitak-ulakbim.gitbook.io/acik-bilim-egitim-el-kitabi/, has been developed as the first reference source for researchers who want to get information about in Open Science principles. The platform ensures that the data used in research are protected in accordance with the standards and for a long time with trainings on data management plans and open data, while enabling new studies to be carried out with the same data.
You can access the video recording of the event from the links below.
- YouTube ULAKBIM TV
- Open Science Week 2022 "Openness for Climate Justice"