It has been more than three months, since I’ve posted a short update on this blog. The post was about a workshop I organised with regard to a research project I had been involved with. Before that, I was basically saying that I was extremely busy and wouldn’t be able to update this blog regularly. So I guess I put out a fair warning.

Indeed, I’ve been packed with work, of which the first results can be yielded even before spring has arrived. A tiny fruit is a recent working paper of the aforementioned project regarding scientific advisory bodies. After some delay, it has been published by the institute I’m working at and can be downloaded for free from this webpage. As usual, the report has been written in German, but an English summary is available here.

The working paper is not a big deal, it simply details my colleagues and my diligent (read: time-consuming) work in trying to get a (quantitative) glimpse at where scientific advisory bodies are active within the German science system, and which functions they serve, according to their own descriptions. A qualitative view on the subject (ie. which functions they really have for both the advised and the advisors) relying on interiews and in-depth analyses, is about to follow in the next few months.

Additionally, the institute’s director has published a monograph about science communication, which includes bits and pieces I had written elsewhere. I am mentioned as contributor, but as literally all these nuggets have been recycled and only slightly refurbished, I do not see this as something that can go into my publication list. Anyway, the recycling and refurbishing also took some time, and thus I at least mention it here as another result of some hard work and to account for the past silences. Other, hopefully tastier, fruit is about to drop.