UK and US to build global science portal 

The British Library and the United States Department of Energy (DOE) have agreed to work together to develop a global science gateway. This single Internet portal aims to make science information resources of as many countries as possible accessible to all. "It is time to make the science offerings of all nations searchable in one global gateway," said US Under Secretary for Science, Raymond Orbach. 

The agreement to build the Science.world. portal was signed in late January 2007 and a prototype is expected to be developed already in 2007. Other countries are invited to participate in this venture and representatives of at least Finland, France, Germany and Portugal as well as of Canada, China, the Russian Federation and South Korea were present when the Science.world agreement was signed.

The Science.world portal will build on the US portal science.gov  and allow users to search for information by subject, rather than by country or organisation. "Our goal is to speed up the sharing of knowledge on a global scale. As a result, we believe that science itself will speed up," said Orbach.

The initiative follows a Commission Communication on scientific information in the digital age, presented on 14 February (EurActiv 16/02/07). The Communication announces a series of measures planned to be taken at EU level to support new ways of promoting access to scientific information online and to preserve research results in digital format for future generations.