Frederik Bak
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fredebak.bsky.social
Frederik Bak
@fredebak.bsky.social
140 followers 140 following 44 posts
Assistant professor University of Copenhagen, Plant and Environmental Sciences | Visiting researcher AIT, Austrian Institute of Technology Bioresources.
Plant-microbe interactions | Subsurface microbiology | Microbial ecology | Football
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Reposted by Frederik Bak
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
fredebak.bsky.social
How to deal with a co-author who claims to have written and revised part of a manuscript, when it is clearly just ChatGPT or the like?
November 12, 2025 at 8:25 AM
Reposted by Frederik Bak
teamthomma.bsky.social
To all visionary microbe enthusiasts: @femsmicro.org is looking for an editor-in-chief for their flagship journal FEMS Microbiology Reviews! More details can be found here: fems-microbiology.org/opportunitie...
Editor-in-Chief for FEMS Microbiology Reviews - FEMS
The Federation of European Microbiological Societies (FEMS) is looking for an Editor-in-Chief to join its prestigious journal FEMS Microbiology Reviews for an initial period of three years, starting i...
fems-microbiology.org
November 5, 2025 at 5:38 PM
Reposted by Frederik Bak
thegsbi.bsky.social
🎉 Don't miss out on early bird registration for the 4th Global Soil Biodiversity Conference 🎉

Early bird registration is open until December 15th ,2025 🦜

Registration page 👇

globalsoilbiodiversity2026.org/registration/
November 2, 2025 at 10:06 PM
fredebak.bsky.social
A 2-y postdoc position in my former group at University of Copenhagen is available in microbial ecology and bioinformatics.

See more: employment.ku.dk/faculty/?sho...

Feel free to contact me if you have questions about the environment.

Please share the ad.
Postdoc in Microbial bioinformatics
employment.ku.dk
October 2, 2025 at 5:51 AM
Reposted by Frederik Bak
alexjprobst.bsky.social
New article on equitable reuse of public sequencing data, published in @natmicrobiol.nature.com!
Led by the Data reuse core team @lhug.bsky.social @environmicrobio.bsky.social Cristina Moraru, @geomicrosoares.bsky.social, @folker.bsky.social and with Anke Heyer and The Data Reuse Consotrium!
September 26, 2025 at 7:34 PM
Reposted by Frederik Bak
courtneyherms.bsky.social
Hot off the press from our lab, led by @fredebak.bsky.social 👇
NRPS gene dynamics in the wheat rhizoplane show increased proportion of viscosin NRPS genes of importance for root colonization during drought | mSphere journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/...
NRPS gene dynamics in the wheat rhizoplane show increased proportion of viscosin NRPS genes of importance for root colonization during drought | mSphere
To harness beneficial plant–microbe interactions for improved plant resilience, we need to advance our understanding of key factors required for successful root colonization. Bacterial-produced second...
journals.asm.org
September 16, 2025 at 12:04 PM
Reposted by Frederik Bak
micecoevo.bsky.social
Post-doc position on Biological Nitrification Inhibition in rice in Aberdeen (Scotland)! Join our nice team and environment! Deadline 23rd Sept! www.abdnjobs.co.uk/vacancy/rese...
September 11, 2025 at 9:21 AM
Reposted by Frederik Bak
soilmicrobes.bsky.social
📢 We are thrilled to announce the International Soil Virus Conference 2026 in conjunction with the Saint Loup Research Institute.
🗓️ June 16 – 18, 2026
📍 Château de Saint Loup sur Thouet, France
👇 RSVP by October 31st, 2025
#virus #phage #ISVC2026
ISVC2026
International Soil Virus Conference 2026! We are excited to announce and provide RSVP details for the next International Soil Virus Conference that will be held in Saint-Loup Lamaire, France on Jun…
soilmicrobes.fr
September 9, 2025 at 6:38 PM
Reposted by Frederik Bak
courtneyherms.bsky.social
Hot off the press!! At my exchange at @niab-uk.bsky.social, we found some interesting patterns in how root hairless wheat will use its microbiome (bacteria + fungi) to improve its phosphorus uptake.
The results in one sentence: bacteria may be cool, but AMF are the superstar!
biorxiv-microbiol.bsky.social bioRxiv Microbiology @biorxiv-microbiol.bsky.social · Aug 27
Wheat responds to lack of root hairs with recruitment of bacteria harboring P mineralization genes and increased arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi arbuscularisation https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.08.26.672279v1
August 27, 2025 at 8:40 AM
fredebak.bsky.social
Paper accepted! ☺️Great way to start the week.
We investigated the composition of non-ribosomal peptide synthases on the rhizoplane of #wheat during drought. Among other things, we showed that the potential to synthesize the biosurfactant #viscosin improves rhizoplane colonization during drought.
August 25, 2025 at 5:37 PM
Reposted by Frederik Bak
courtneyherms.bsky.social
Hey plant + soil people, what is your experience with RNA extraction kits? Will any ole kit work, or are some better with soil/soil-grown plants than others? We are buying our first RNA kits, drop your suggestions!! #PlantScience
August 5, 2025 at 12:34 PM
fredebak.bsky.social
And here it is:
environmentalmicrobiome.biomedcentral.com/articles/10....
Enjoy reading it.
July 1, 2025 at 10:31 AM
fredebak.bsky.social
Impacts of diverse undersown cover crops on seasonal soil microbial properties url: academic.oup.com/femsec/artic...
Impacts of diverse undersown cover crops on seasonal soil microbial properties
Abstract. Positive relationships between plant diversity, microbial diversity, and ecosystem functioning have widely been observed in experimental grasslan
academic.oup.com
June 30, 2025 at 12:09 PM
fredebak.bsky.social
Great final talk of the #rhizosphere6 conference. It was very rewarding to participste and hope to make it to Vienna in 4 years.
June 19, 2025 at 2:50 PM
fredebak.bsky.social
Paper accepted. #Nematode #Plantmicrobiome
June 16, 2025 at 3:51 PM
fredebak.bsky.social
#See#microbiome

environmentalmicrobiome.biomedcentral.com/articles/10....
Defining the cultured and uncultured bacterial fractions in Cannabis seeds - Environmental Microbiome
Background Seeds provide a unique environment shaped by co-evolutionary processes, hosting diverse microbial communities. While microbiome studies have uncovered an extensive diversity of microorganis...
environmentalmicrobiome.biomedcentral.com
June 13, 2025 at 6:56 PM
Reposted by Frederik Bak
courtneyherms.bsky.social
Above all, I hope that the collection of 112 wheat-derived, complete Pseudomonas genomes will be a useful and interesting tool for others.
Download them here: t.co/iFMgxWqnk4
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/bioproject/?term=PRJNA1108081
t.co
April 22, 2025 at 11:51 AM
Reposted by Frederik Bak
courtneyherms.bsky.social
My 1st first-author research article is published in Applied Soil Ecology!
This paper has been my constant companion over the past 4 years, but I'm so happy to send it off into the world 👇
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Pseudomonas taxonomic and functional microdiversity in the wheat rhizosphere is cultivar-dependent and links to disease resistance profile and root diameter
Diversity within lower taxonomic units in microbial communities is a key trait, giving rise to important ecological functions. In the rhizosphere, the…
www.sciencedirect.com
April 22, 2025 at 11:51 AM
Reposted by Frederik Bak
luederslab.bsky.social
Microbiology Postdocs from all over Europe and the Globe!
🦠😎👍
Application for the FEMS SSPD 2025 “Harnessing microbial solutions in environmental research and One Health” is now open 👇
2 – 10 Sept 2025 on Lake Ohrid, North Macedonia
Co-Directors: Joana Falcao Salles and @luederslab.bsky.social
FEMS Summer School for Postdocs 2025 - FEMS
Menu: Introduction – Applications – Programme This has been the most valuable and enjoyable scientific event I’ve attended so far. The atmosphere was incredible, with inspiring co-directors and mentor...
fems-microbiology.org
March 19, 2025 at 10:01 AM
Reposted by Frederik Bak
microbialmarie.bsky.social
📢 Open PhD Position
With @fly-florian.bsky.social, we are recruiting a PhD student to develop CRISPR-Based Microbiome Editing to Study Microbial Interactions in Early Plant Life 🧬 🌿
Join us in Angers, France in the @emersys-irhs.bsky.social at @inrae-france.bsky.social
🗓️ Deadline 03/31
More info 👇
March 6, 2025 at 4:42 PM
fredebak.bsky.social
An opnion worth reading, on how to improve the planning microbiome data analysis and the use of statistics
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Planning and describing a microbiome data analysis - Nature Microbiology
We provide guidance on the planning, execution and description of statistical analyses in microbiome studies.
www.nature.com
March 6, 2025 at 4:11 PM
fredebak.bsky.social
#PhD position in #Microbial Interactions group.
#Wheat #Microbiome #Phosphorous
RT appreciated
employment.ku.dk/phd?show=163...
PhD fellowship in Microbial ecology and plant-microbe interactions in the wheat rhizosphere
employment.ku.dk
February 27, 2025 at 10:11 AM
fredebak.bsky.social
#PhD positions at UCPH - Department of Plant and Envrionmental Sciences
#Microbiome #Biodiversity #Pathogens
jobportal.ku.dk/phd/?show=16...
PhD fellowships at the Department of Plant & Environmental Sciences.
jobportal.ku.dk
February 27, 2025 at 10:08 AM
fredebak.bsky.social
👨‍🎓 in 🌾🦠! Soon there will be an available #phd position in #plant #microbiome in out research group @ucph.bsky.social
More details in a couple of weeks.
February 19, 2025 at 8:15 AM