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“There is no problem that a library card can't solve” according to author Eleanor Brown [1]. This advice is sound, probably for both life and science, but even the best tool (like the library) is most effective when accompanied by instructions and a basic understanding of how and when to use it. For many budding scientists, the first day in a new lab setting often involves a stack of papers, an email full of links to pertinent articles, or some promise of a richer understanding so long as one reads enough of the scientific literature. However, the purpose and approach to reading a scientific article is unlike that of reading a news story, novel, or even a textbook and can initially seem unapproachable. Having good habits for reading scientific literature is key to setting oneself up for success, identifying new research questions, and filling in the gaps in one’s current understanding; developing these good habits is the first crucial step. Advice typically centers around two main tips: read actively and read often. However, active reading, or reading with an intent to understand, is both a learned skill and a level of effort. Although there is no one best way to do this, we present 10 simple rules, relevant to novices and seasoned scientists alike, to teach our strategy for active reading based on our experience as readers and as mentors of undergraduate and graduate researchers, medical students, fellows, and early career faculty. Rules 1–5 are big picture recommendations. Rules 6–8 relate to philosophy of reading. Rules 9–10 guide the “now what?” questions one should ask after reading and how to integrate what was learned into one’s own science.

Workshops are used to explore a specific topic, to transfer knowledge, to solve identified problems, or to create something new. In funded research projects and other research endeavours, workshops are the mechanism used to gather the wider project, community, or interested people together around a particular topic. However, natural questions arise: how do we measure the impact of these workshops? Do we know whether they are meeting the goals and objectives we set for them? What indicators should we use? In response to these questions, this paper will outline rules that will improve the measurement of the impact of workshops.

Research integrity is frequently highlighted as an essential component of modern medicine and science. Adherence to the ethical principles of one’s profession might seem like a simple task, but research misconduct remains a serious problem. Despite repeated calls for increased emphasis on the importance of research integrity [1–6] and a proliferation of guidelines regulating scientific misconduct at the international, national, and institutional levels [7,8], recent scandals concerning falsification and suppression of results [9,10] suggest that we need to more carefully nurture the ethical integrity of our research endeavours. Most of the recent controversy concerning scientific misconduct has focused on plagiarism and fabrication of results. This type of malpractice has rightly been universally recognized as a very serious breach of research integrity. However, the focus on these abuses has distracted attention away from other practices which, while they may not jeopardize the scientific process to the same extent, are nonetheless clearly breaches of scientific integrity. Much more could be done to combat authorship misattribution, failure to declare relevant conflicts of interest (COIs), failure to report results, and misuse of metrics in funding decisions—in terms of both establishing stronger guidelines and ensuring their enforcement. Although many institutions have official integrity guidelines, these frequently act as a window dressing—claiming to address key integrity issues while allowing corrosive low-level misconduct to proliferate. For example, putting pressure on junior researchers to allow guest authors on papers is not only unethical but also makes it more likely that they will see such behaviour as acceptable. Here, we suggest ten simple rules that should be put into action by all research institutions and to which all researchers should adhere in order to ensure ethical behaviour in science and medicine. In our view, all integrity guidelines should mandate these minimum requirements. Rules 1–5 are specific recommendations for particular integrity issues, and Rules 6–10 concern what institutions themselves should do.