Speaking to @resprofnews.bsky.social (£), RoRI's Peter Kolarz explains why plummeting success rates and AI pressures mean the current funding treadmill is unsustainable, drawing on solutions from our latest report, The Future of Peer Review: www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-uk-r...

‘Bravery’ needed to ditch grants for individual researchers. Research on Research Institute urges shift to institution-level funding and move beyond “laissez-faire” research system. www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-uk-r...

Is equity in science a beautiful lie? At a high-level summit in Germany, RoRI & British Academy Fellow Similo Ngwenya discussed the structural inequalities embedded in global research systems: researchonresearch.org/equity-in-sc...

Driven by AI surges and tight budgets, global science has become an unsustainable competition machine. @ludowaltman.bsky.social & co-authors argue we must move away from micro-managing individual survival towards strategic leadership: researchonresearchinstitute.substack.com/p/from-hyper...

Latest episode of my Under Review podcast is out and this time we look at how generative AI has changed the research funding landscape beyond recognition with @jameswilsdon.bsky.social @rorinstitute.bsky.social Ep 7: The death of the funding bid as we know it. www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWbp... 1/2

In this panel I will discuss some of the ideas developed in the RoRI Future of Peer Review report, to be published early next week! @rorinstitute.bsky.social @cwts.nl

📢 New RoRI Report: The Future of Peer Review Peer review is at a breaking point. Strained by hyper-competition & AI, we need system-wide reform. Read here: rori.figshare.com/articles/report/The_Future_of_Peer_Review_A_system-wide_perspective/32685351?file=65684898

Roughly half of social science findings fail to replicate, but tracking them is notoriously difficult. New community-led tools make replication a routine feedback loop rather than research "policing": researchonresearchinstitute.substack.com/p/did-you-kn...

*NEW* on the @rorinstitute.bsky.social Substack: @alexrushforth.bsky.social, @ludowaltman.bsky.social & Paul Wouters examine the threat that AI brings to the conduct of national research assessment exercises. substack.com/home/post/p-...

A new episode of my Under Review podcast is out and we're discussing how generative AI has changed the research funding landscape beyond recognition with @jameswilsdon.bsky.social from @rorinstitute.bsky.social Ep 7: The death of the funding bid as we know it. www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWbp... 1/2

RoRI’s @jameswilsdon.bsky.social joins @andytattersall.bsky.social’s Under Review podcast to discuss how generative AI could transform research funding, challenge traditional grant systems, and force a rethink of how excellence is assessed: www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWbp...

@alexrushforth.bsky.social, Paul Wouters, and @ludowaltman.bsky.social (RoRI & @cwts.nl) warn that national research assessment systems face a dual legitimacy crisis: AI is polluting published literature and infiltrating evaluation itself: researchonresearchinstitute.substack.com/p/can-nation...

Great to see Science|Business feature our latest landscape review of funder experiments to cut grant bureaucracy; read the piece here (£): sciencebusiness.net/news/r-d-fun...

In ResearchProfessional News (£) @scurry.bsky.social discusses our paper on fast and flexible research funding, warning there are no "silver bullets" and funders must track data to prove their bureaucracy-cutting works: www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-uk-r...

A clip from next week's Under Review podcast where I chatted with @jameswilsdon.bsky.social about the rapid change to the research funding landscape due to generative AI. We discuss many things including how AI-generated grant proposals have increased vastly in number and what to do about that.

How much red tape is actually necessary to run the research ecosystem? 📄❌ @scurry.bsky.social's latest post looks at why past attempts to cut funding bureaucracy have seen mixed success & why funders must work harder to defend risk-taking: researchonresearchinstitute.substack.com/p/red-tape-a...

Our new working paper, "Fast and flexible research funding: a review," analyzes the unsustainable time and paperwork required for grant applications, offering key recommendations to help global funders reduce this bureaucratic burden: rori.figshare.com/articles/pre...

NEW on the @rorinstitute.bsky.social Substack: I look at the headlines on our review (published today) of studies of interventions to cut red tape and make research funding faster & more flexible. substack.com/@stephencurr...

Brilliant to be at @unimelb.edu.au to hear @fidlerfm.bsky.social opening a workshop on the future of metascience in Australia, linked to our ‘Meta-Moment’ project researchonresearch.org/rori-launche...

🇳🇦 We are delighted to welcome Namibia's NCRST as a new collaborator! At the GRC in Bangkok, we signed a partnership to work together on improving research funding efficiency and strengthening Global South perspectives in metascience: researchonresearch.org/rori-welcome...

Delighted to welcome Budd Hall (UNESCO) to RoRI to present the DECODE project on indigenous science and participatory research. Meanwhile, Co-Chair Rajesh Tandon discussed funding implications at the GRC in Bangkok. 🔗 unescochair-cbrsr.org/decode/

🌍 RoRI has launched META-MOMENT, the largest comparative study mapping metascience across 21 countries, at the 14th Annual Meeting of the Global Research Council in Bangkok, where RoRI’s @jameswilsdon.bsky.social joined a panel of international funding leaders: researchonresearch.org/rori-launche...

In research systems, one person’s "culture" is another's unyielding "environment." Since no single metric captures this complexity, Cameron Neylon argues we must focus on whether communities can process feedback productively: researchonresearchinstitute.substack.com/p/the-more-t...

NEW on the @rorinstitute.bsky.social Substack: Cameron Neylon previews his just-published RoRI working paper examining the challenges & opportunities for developing indicators to track improvement in research cultures & environments open.substack.com/pub/research...

The EU’s next FP10 faces a dysfunctional future unless it adapts to the wave of AI grant proposals. Speaking to Science|Business (£), RoRI's @jameswilsdon.bsky.social warns agentic AI is threatening to turn peer review into a recursive loop of AI evaluating AI: sciencebusiness.net/news/r-d-fun...

New RoRI Working Paper: Why generic indicators for research culture don't work The study examines the feasibility of defining & tracking indicators for research culture & environment, exploring the structural data gaps and feedback mismatches in current systems: rori.figshare.com/articles/pre...

RoRI’s @stephenpinfield.bsky.social talked to @resprofnews.bsky.social (£) about the push to pay peer reviewers. He argues that instead of a "sticking plaster" fix, we need reform that makes review work visible and professionally valued: www.researchprofessional.com/news-article...

‘AI-assisted grants: prioritize fairness with excellence.’ Thoughtful editorial in @nature.com sparked by the article @profgeraintrees.bsky.social & I wrote last week, plus ongoing debates at ERC about how to cope with volume/demand spikes www.nature.com/articles/d41... @rorinstitute.bsky.social

A new editorial in @nature.com highlights how the "AI grant flood" is forcing funding agencies to find fair rationales for rejection. Building on our recent analysis, the piece notes that with peer review facing a crisis, the search for equitable countermeasures is on: www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Our Experimental Funders Group meets quarterly to discuss experimental methods. Next up: AI in Funding on 13 May, featuring insights from Stanford Impact Labs and the DSIT/UKRI Metascience Unit. Open to all research funders. Register: forms.gle/TV9DdsAHHP5a...

The Cultural Traction project (funded by UKRI’s Metascience scheme) is hosting a webinar on 14 May to explore the gap between official university policies and the reality of day-to-day research life: docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

Following our study in Nature, @timeshighered.bsky.social reports on the 142% surge in applications for some funding schemes: www.timeshighereducation.com/news/researc... With the system under strain, funders must move beyond bans to new ways of assessing quality.

The art of the impact case study researchonresearchinstitute.substack.com/p/the-art-of... We loved the message in this @rorinstitute.bsky.social blog that impact is more than just dissemination or engagement in and of itself - the important element is the actual change your research produces!

A new report suggests that up to 89% of the costs of research grant peer review are borne by applicants. James Coe explores this "inefficiency market" in @wonkhe.bsky.social and asks why such a high-cost, low-success architecture remains so resistant to change: wonkhe.com/blogs/expens...

It's been interesting and illuminating reading responses to this article - here; on LinkedIn, and unbelievably, Mastodon. I've learned a lot, and refined my thinking a little. If I were to rewrite it now, I'd frame things a little differently.

Could agentic AI topple grant-funding systems? New article in @nature.com by @profgeraintrees.bsky.social & me, with data from 12 funders showing a 57% increase in grant applications since 2022 (& the launch of LLMs) rdcu.be/ffApn @rorinstitute.bsky.social @magdalenaskipper.bsky.social

🇯🇵 Metascience is gaining serious momentum in Japan. This new report on the Tokyo Metascience Meetup 2026 sheds light on how the field is being formally integrated into policy: researchonresearchinstitute.substack.com/p/the-enthus...

“If we don’t change our approach, we are probably 18 months away from the system collapsing entirely." RoRI’s @jameswilsdon.bsky.social tells @resprofnews.bsky.social that agentic AI is pushing grant systems to a breaking point: www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-uk-r...

RoRI’s @scurry.bsky.social joins Andy Tattersall on the Under Review podcast to discuss the staggering hidden costs of burying negative results and how we can finally start rewarding rigour over "exciting" outcomes: www.youtube.com/watch?v=N4Ps...

Is research funding facing an "agentic" collapse? In @nature.com today, RoRI’s @jameswilsdon.bsky.social & @profgeraintrees.bsky.social warn that AI agents are overwhelming a system built for a pre-AI world. We need AI-native funding, not unenforceable bans. Read the piece: tinyurl.com/mtxpcf7k

LATEST on the @rorinstitute.bsky.social Substack: Marta Wróblewska offer 10 practical suggestions on how to write an impactful impact case study: open.substack.com/pub/research...

Great to be in sunny Leusden, NL at the International School for Philosophy (ISVW) for the 2026 RoRI Research Retreat. And here’s (most of!) RoRI’s research and operational team — huge thanks to them all for everything they’ve contributed over the past year. @rorinstitute.bsky.social @cwts.nl

Great day in Den Haag with RoRI partners NWO and ZonMw diving into funder experiments, impact pathways, and global metascience movements. International partnerships like this are essential for strengthening the evidence base and networks needed to improve how research is funded and practiced.

Writing a great Impact Case Study can take as much time as writing a research paper. In today's post, Marta Natalia Wróblewska PhD shares ten practical observations from her experience as "Impact Ninja": researchonresearchinstitute.substack.com/p/the-art-of...

Institutions and teams, not ‘superstar’ academics, must be the heart of the research funding system. RoRI's Peter Kolarz argues that the competitive funding model is at a breaking point and requires an urgent shift toward systemic reforms: www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-uk-v...

We’ve added two new countries to RoRI’s Atlas of Assessment: Estonia 🇪🇪 and Sweden 🇸🇪. The Atlas provides an overview of how research is assessed around the world to help policymakers & researchers compare national approaches: researchonresearch.org/atlas/

Provocative NEW POST on the @rorinstitute.bsky.social Substack: @cash4questions.bsky.social asks how universities and funders might 'cull' uncompetitive research grant applications to relieve unsustainable pressures on the system. researchonresearchinstitute.substack.com/p/reducing-w...

What if we prevented the least competitive 20% of grant applications from being submitted? Adam Golberg (Strategic Research Development Manager at the University of Nottingham) argues this could ease pressure across the funding system: researchonresearchinstitute.substack.com/p/reducing-w...

The time has come for big changes to research funding. New piece by RoRI’s Peter Kolarz on why incremental fixes may no longer be enough: journals.plos.org/plosbiology/...

The competitive #researchfunding system is at breaking point. In our new Perspective, Peter Kolarz from @rorinstitute.bsky.social argues for whole system transformation, as innovations to address ongoing problems will not suffice. 🧪 #AcademicSky plos.io/4mjCi0g