What is the value of laboratory accreditation? Whom does it benefit? And what are those benefits? What is the standard of competence? What value does accreditation have from an internationally recognized body such as the American Association for Laboratory Accreditation?

Everyday people should have more weight in what topics university researchers investigate, said Dutch education minister Jet Bussemaker and her junior minister Sander Dekker, according to English-language news site DutchNews.nl.

The University of Illinois at Chicago’s (UIC) Artificial Intelligence Laboratory has received a $5.5 million research contract from the Illinois Department of Transportation to continue research, development and operation of the Gateway Traveler Information System and the TravelMidwest.com website. 

Squeezed R&D budgets in the EU, Japan and US are reducing the weight of advanced economies in science and technology research, patent applications and scientific publications and leaving China on track to be the world’s top R&D spender by around 2019, according to a new OECD report.

Join us on December 10 for a free webinar when Mark Baker, IP Specialist at Rich Products Corporation, will describe how Rich’s R&D went about selecting the ELN, conducting the pilot project, rolling out the ELN system and the results so far. He will be joined by BIOVIA’s Mats Kihlén who will show how an ELN enables organizations to increase researcher efficiency, streamline lab operations, and optimize experiment collaboration.

Science begins with observation, and many defining moments in scientific progress followed the introduction of new ways to observe the world, from microscopes and telescopes to X-rays and MRIs.

Our two highlighted tradeshows this month include the Materials Research Society Fall Meeting and Exhibit (MRS) and the American Society for Cell Biology’s annual meeting (2014 ASCB/IFCB). The 2014 MRS Fall Meeting takes place November 30-December 5, 2014 in Boston, Massachusetts, featuring over 6,000 presentations. Not long after, the 2014 ASCB/IFCB Meeting–a premier biomedical research conference–runs December 6-10 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Its Keynote Talks will span the origin of life to the cosmos. Remember that the companies highlighted here in Tech News will be exhibiting, but these specific products may not be at the shows.

A genetically diverse mouse model is able to predict the range of response to chemical exposures that might be observed in human populations, researchers from the National Institutes of Health have found. Like humans, each Diversity Outbred mouse is genetically unique, and the extent of genetic variability among these mice is similar to the genetic variation seen among humans.

Finalists to be coached by the Alan Alda Center for Communicating Science before ‘TED TALK’-type presentation on Dec. 11.

The issue of overregulation is not new for universities, but what is new is that academic scientists seem to finally be making progress with government officials, a ScienceInsider article says.

New methods are improving connections between private businesses and technology from the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory, with 101 licenses and options executed during the last three years.

Government, industry and foundations spend more than $65 billion each year on research at the nation's universities.