New on PLoS today!

Lots of new stuff on PLoS today. So, let's go over it one by one.

First, today is the inaugural day of the Clinical Trials Hub, central place for all the papers reporting on clinical trials and discussions of them, hosted on TOPAZ platform (just like PLoS ONE) so users can comment, rate and annotate all the papers (and links from blog posts will show up as trackbacks). Emma Veitch has all the details.

Second, the Trackbacks are now working for some, but not all blogging platforms, as long as the correct URL of the article is used. Links from Drupal blogs form automatically. For MoveableType (at least more recent versions) and Wordpress blogs, it is necessary to input the correct trackback URL into the appropriate field. We are assuming that other high-end platforms (e.g., Text Pattern, Scoop, Expression Engine, Typepad, etc.) will work the same way and I would like to know if that is true or if there are glitches with any of them. The lower-end platforms (e.g., Blogspot, LiveJournal, etc.) apparently are incapable of sending trackbacks at this point in time.

The PLoS Medicine team has taken to blogging like fish to water - already three posts this week:
Setting better standards in reporting - and doing - animal research by Virginia Barbour;
Should patients tell researchers what to do? by Paul Chinnock; and
Nominate classic trials in child health by Gavin Yamey.
Encourage them in this endeavor by posting comments (they will not immediately show up on the site, but don't despair, they will eventually).

Finally, there are new papers published today in the Community Journals: PLoS Genetics, PLoS Computational Biology and PLoS Pathogens. My picks:

What Are Lightness Illusions and Why Do We See Them?, Developing Computational Biology, The Impact of PLoS Pathogens and Genetics of Aging in Caenorhabditis elegans.

Oh, and someone really, really likes the design of PLoS ONE pages. ;-)

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"The PLoS Medicine team has taken to blogging like fish to water..." Why don't you tell them that there will be more traffic and interest, if they also reply to the comments now and then?

I really do like the design! ALOT! I'll be sure to use it in the future when I decide to become smart and need to write research papers again...hahah.

Good luck with the site though! I'll be sure to watch and see how things go. I really like what you've got so far. Keep up the good work.