Science 2.0 in action: Iowa Graduate Student Creates Labspaces.net, a 'Facebook' for the Scientific Community

Labspaces.net is a social network designed to spread scientific news, maintain and create friendships, and harbor collaboration in the sciences.

Iowa City, IA (PRWEB) April 14, 2008 -- Social networks such as Facebook and Myspace have become increasingly popular with students over the past few years; however, their utility has been underappreciated by other communities. An Iowa graduate student in Molecular and Cellular Biology is looking to change that view in the scientific community with the release of Labspaces.net. Designed as a social network for the sciences, Labspaces.net aims to spread scientific news, maintain and create friendships, and harbor collaboration in the sciences by bringing a diverse set of researchers together in one place on the internet.

"Unlike other social networks, I like to think of Labspaces as a website with a purpose," said Brian Krueger, who developed the website. "It's not just a time waster, it hosts a wide variety of content which should spur some interesting scientific discussions." Labspaces currently hosts approximately 30 science news articles a day and links to another 10 articles from outside sources.

Though it is geared toward the scientific community, Labspaces.net is not an exclusive network and encourages the intermingling of both scientists and the public. The website contains the familiar features of other social networks such as user profiles, groups, a forum, and blogs; however, it also includes lab profiles and gives users the ability to add their publication history and technical research protocols to their profiles. "There are other websites on the internet that host a science forum, or display science news, or host protocols," said Krueger, "but none of them bring all of those features together in one place like Labspaces.net."

The website began as a hobby for Krueger, who wondered back in 2005 if he could program his own social network from the ground up. Labspaces.net first went live in August of 2007. Its articles have been featured on Yahoo!, Fark.com, and CBS news.

For more information about Labspaces.net, please visit Labspaces.net Website (http://www.labspaces.net)

To view Labspaces' news feeds please visit Labspaces RSS news feeds (http://www.labspaces.net/rss.php)

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