Knowledge Should Come to You
The goal of ZappyLab (the company behind PubChase) is to transform information exchange between researchers. But enabling the sharing of critical information via our mobile suite and its visualization on protocols.io is just half the story. The other half of our company is about how that information reaches you. Search engines are amazing nowadays, but you often don’t know what to search for or that you should be doing the search in the first place. So for two years, we’ve been working hard to make your life easier. You shouldn’t have to search. The information that you need should come to you. Here’s what we have done, are doing, and will do next at ZappyLab to simplify discovery of knowledge. 1. PubChase is not a search engine. You can search for papers, and our search is smart, but the reason Matt Davis conceived of PubChase is so that the papers you need will come to you. Of course, if you need a given article, you can easily find it by title via Google or PubMed. But when a new paper is published, how do you know you should be searching for it? With PubChase, you just sit back and check your recommendations, and "let the research find you." 2. Today, we are announcing a new feature of PubChase – retraction notifications. You have a thousand papers in your library. One of them is retracted today. How do you know? Starting today, any new story on Retraction Watch will be linked to from the corresponding paper in PubChase. Most importantly, starting today, if a paper in your library is retracted and there is an announcement on Retraction Watch or PubMed, you will get a notification from PubChase right away.3. Retractions may be rare, but modifications and corrections are a constant stream. PLOS recently announced versions of papers, and we are working on connecting that information to you, just as we have done with retractions. Of course, protocols.io is all about changes, corrections, improvements. And should a protocol that you use be modified, you will get a buzz on your phone inside Bench Tools.
Science is an ever-evolving enterprise and no paper is ever final or static. We are pushing hard to facilitate the sharing of new knowledge and to ensure that this information finds you.