Amazing new research at ScienceOpen!

Many of you are probably aware of this, but as well as our main aggregation/open peer review functions, we also totally publish! We’re an Open Access publisher, and employ innovative methods of peer review around this.

We just wanted to draw your attention to some great new research that we’ve recently had the pleasure of publishing!

The first of these is entitled “Female Secondary education is imperative for improved health outcomes in Nigeria“. I mean, what an important topic! Some of the key points are thus:

• The research team analysed factors that were linked to improved health outcomes based on the 2014 Nigerian National Bureau of Statistics report.
• They discovered that female secondary education is critical in improving health outcomes, and in particularly for factors such as infant and maternal mortality.

• Other factors such as female primary school, improved water resources, and sanitation services were not associated with improved health.
• Health quality is polarised, with generally poorer health for those living in states under Sharia law. This is also where the lowest rates of female secondary education are found.
• Therefore education of females to at least secondary school is necessary for improved health outcomes in Nigeria.

We have already passed on this research to the Nigerian Health Minister, and hope that the government there takes action based on this research. If you know anyone else who would benefit from this, please do get in contact with them.

The second paper could not be any more different! Entitled “The Pucangan and Kabuh Formation in Central and East Java“, this one studies the geological distribution of hominid fossils from eastern Java. Neat! Some of the key points again are:

• There is a great interest in discovering early hominid fossils from the Indonesian archipelago.
• Most fossils from this region come two geological units known as the Pucangan and Kabuh formations.

• The research team investigated the factors that influence the distribution of hominid fossils in these two formations.
• They found that most fossils can be found in rocks that were laid down in lake and river systems.
• This has important implications for future prospecting for fossils in these regions, and might help us to better understand early hominid evolution.

As you can see, both articles are currently in our development system, and should be published very shortly in their final pretty versions. Both are already available to share, comment on, and publicly peer review too! The hominid fossil paper was published through our ‘peer review by endorsement’ system, which we have found to be working exceptionally well for our authors.