These days, it seems, new initiatives at the National Institutes of Health are about as safe as a legless rabbit at a greyhound convention. But here’s one that doesn’t have anything to do with money that might have a fighting chance of sticking around — and benefitting science along the way.
In what is “likely a watershed moment for preprints in the life sciences,” the NIH this month announced a new policy of encouraging researchers it funds to submit their work to preprint servers before they attempt to publish in conventional journals.
And perhaps even more important, the policy allows scientists to cite preprint papers in grant applications to the agency.
