Harry W. T. Morgan
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hwtmorganlab.bsky.social
Harry W. T. Morgan
@hwtmorganlab.bsky.social
76 followers 130 following 11 posts
Lecturer in computational chemistry at the University of Manchester. Postdoc UCLA, DPhil Oxford.
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Reposted by Harry W. T. Morgan
hansonmark.bsky.social
We wrote the Strain on scientific publishing to highlight the problems of time & trust. With a fantastic group of co-authors, we present The Drain of Scientific Publishing:

a 🧵 1/n

Drain: arxiv.org/abs/2511.04820
Strain: direct.mit.edu/qss/article/...
Oligopoly: direct.mit.edu/qss/article/...
A table showing profit margins of major publishers. A snippet of text related to this table is below. 1. The four-fold drain 1.1 Money Currently, academic publishing is dominated by profit-oriented, multinational companies for whom scientific knowledge is a commodity to be sold back to the academic community who created it. The dominant four are Elsevier, Springer Nature, Wiley and Taylor & Francis, which collectively generated over US$7.1 billion in revenue from journal publishing in 2024 alone, and over US$12 billion in profits between 2019 and 2024 (Table 1A). Their profit margins have always been over 30% in the last five years, and for the largest publisher (Elsevier) always over 37%. Against many comparators, across many sectors, scientific publishing is one of the most consistently profitable industries (Table S1). These financial arrangements make a substantial difference to science budgets. In 2024, 46% of Elsevier revenues and 53% of Taylor & Francis revenues were generated in North America, meaning that North American researchers were charged over US$2.27 billion by just two for-profit publishers. The Canadian research councils and the US National Science Foundation were allocated US$9.3 billion in that year. A figure detailing the drain on researcher time. 1. The four-fold drain 1.2 Time The number of papers published each year is growing faster than the scientific workforce, with the number of papers per researcher almost doubling between 1996 and 2022 (Figure 1A). This reflects the fact that publishers’ commercial desire to publish (sell) more material has aligned well with the competitive prestige culture in which publications help secure jobs, grants, promotions, and awards. To the extent that this growth is driven by a pressure for profit, rather than scholarly imperatives, it distorts the way researchers spend their time. The publishing system depends on unpaid reviewer labour, estimated to be over 130 million unpaid hours annually in 2020 alone (9). Researchers have complained about the demands of peer-review for decades, but the scale of the problem is now worse, with editors reporting widespread difficulties recruiting reviewers. The growth in publications involves not only the authors’ time, but that of academic editors and reviewers who are dealing with so many review demands. Even more seriously, the imperative to produce ever more articles reshapes the nature of scientific inquiry. Evidence across multiple fields shows that more papers result in ‘ossification’, not new ideas (10). It may seem paradoxical that more papers can slow progress until one considers how it affects researchers’ time. While rewards remain tied to volume, prestige, and impact of publications, researchers will be nudged away from riskier, local, interdisciplinary, and long-term work. The result is a treadmill of constant activity with limited progress whereas core scholarly practices – such as reading, reflecting and engaging with others’ contributions – is de-prioritized. What looks like productivity often masks intellectual exhaustion built on a demoralizing, narrowing scientific vision. A table of profit margins across industries. The section of text related to this table is below: 1. The four-fold drain 1.1 Money Currently, academic publishing is dominated by profit-oriented, multinational companies for whom scientific knowledge is a commodity to be sold back to the academic community who created it. The dominant four are Elsevier, Springer Nature, Wiley and Taylor & Francis, which collectively generated over US$7.1 billion in revenue from journal publishing in 2024 alone, and over US$12 billion in profits between 2019 and 2024 (Table 1A). Their profit margins have always been over 30% in the last five years, and for the largest publisher (Elsevier) always over 37%. Against many comparators, across many sectors, scientific publishing is one of the most consistently profitable industries (Table S1). These financial arrangements make a substantial difference to science budgets. In 2024, 46% of Elsevier revenues and 53% of Taylor & Francis revenues were generated in North America, meaning that North American researchers were charged over US$2.27 billion by just two for-profit publishers. The Canadian research councils and the US National Science Foundation were allocated US$9.3 billion in that year. The costs of inaction are plain: wasted public funds, lost researcher time, compromised scientific integrity and eroded public trust. Today, the system rewards commercial publishers first, and science second. Without bold action from the funders we risk continuing to pour resources into a system that prioritizes profit over the advancement of scientific knowledge.
November 11, 2025 at 11:52 AM
Reposted by Harry W. T. Morgan
chemjen.bsky.social
This is bonkers - in popular energy-related areas, 10 -15% of the TOTAL papers are reviews or perspectives @pubs.acs.org #ACSEnergyLetters

Editorial: Should You Really be Writing A(nother) Review Manuscript?
pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/...
September 23, 2025 at 4:17 AM
hwtmorganlab.bsky.social
It seems that institutional access to JACS is back - has the ACS negotiation been resolved?
March 7, 2025 at 10:34 AM
hwtmorganlab.bsky.social
So much for one of my favourite fun chemistry facts, but I enjoyed reading the paper nonetheless
February 7, 2025 at 3:43 PM
hwtmorganlab.bsky.social
I am looking for a PhD student! If you are interested in understanding the chemistry of quantum materials, please get in touch. 3.5 year project in Manchester, fully funded for home students. #chemsky @official-uom.bsky.social

www.findaphd.com/phds/project...
Chemical bonding models of quantum materials at The University of Manchester on FindAPhD.com
PhD Project - Chemical bonding models of quantum materials at The University of Manchester, listed on FindAPhD.com
www.findaphd.com
January 27, 2025 at 1:06 PM
Reposted by Harry W. T. Morgan
davidhiggins.bsky.social
Good to hear that my university (Leeds) is completely withdrawing from X. I hope others follow suit.
January 23, 2025 at 8:59 AM
Reposted by Harry W. T. Morgan
faccts.de
Join us at the free Virtual Winter School on Computational Chemistry and learn more about the features of ORCA 6! The ORCA workshop starts on Thursday, January 30th at 2 pm CET. The program and more information can be found here:

winterschool.cc/program/day-...

#ORCAqc #ORCA6 #VWSCC #ChemSky
Virtual Winter School on Computational Chemistry - Workshop - ORCA 6
Online congress discussing state of the art computational chemistry
winterschool.cc
January 17, 2025 at 9:56 AM
hwtmorganlab.bsky.social
I'm proud to say that I've joined the University of Manchester @official-uom.bsky.social as a lecturer in computational chemistry!
January 13, 2025 at 2:36 PM
hwtmorganlab.bsky.social
Hello Bluesky!
January 13, 2025 at 2:35 PM