Night sky brightness trends above Zagreb, 2012–2022

Krešimir Pavlić , Željko Andreić — Thu, 11 Apr 2024 00:00:00 +0200

The night sky brightness at the RGN site (near the centre of Zagreb, Croatia) was monitored from January 2012 to August 2022. The first data set, covering the period 2012 to 2017, has already been analysed and the conclusions were published in Andreić (2018). The main conclusions are repeated here for comparison and completeness. The results of the analysis of the second dataset, covering the period from January 2018 to July 2022, are reported here.

The first data analysis showed that the average night sky brightness did not change significantly from 2012 to 2017, excluding differences due to annual variations in meteorological parameters. The second data set (2018 to 2022) showed a slight decrease in night sky brightness compared to the first data set. The difference is small, about 0.2 mag/arcsec² (mean values). In the second data set, there is a trend toward darker nights in later years that began three or four years ago (around 2019 or 2020). It is attributed to the modernisation of the public lighting network, where old, often very poor lighting fixtures are slowly being replaced by modern LED lighting fixtures, and to the effects of climatic changes leading to warmer winters with more clear nights.

Quo vadis scientia? The tales of recent Croatian publications in geodesy and geophysics

Zvjezdana Bencetić Klaić, Ivica Vilibić — Thu, 11 Apr 2024 00:00:00 +0200

Research publications are a key indicator in evaluations of both the careers of scientists and the performance of research institutions and science systems. However, unprecedented changes in publishing have been made in recent decades following the development of solutions that can be helpful in managing publications and the conjoined peer-review process. In that spirit, we performed a comparative study of research articles reported by the Croatian Committee of Geodesy and Geophysics between two 4-year periods, 2019-2022 and 2015-2018, focusing in particular on the changes in journals and publishers between these periods. Apparently, there is a dramatic change in articles between these two periods, directed toward publishers that have much shorter evaluation times, such as MDPI and Frontiers. In almost all subcategories, the percentage of articles in the MDPI increased several times, reaching approximately 65% in hydrology and physical limnology and 30% in geodesy. We argue that these changes are worsening the reliability of science, driven by the national rules that favor the ‘publish or perish’ principle over the quality of research. Furthermore, we propose a way to cope with this problem at the national level, which should include a transition toward reliable publishers and peer-review assessments implemented during research evaluations.

G e o f i z i k a

Night sky brightness trends above Zagreb, 2012–2022

Quo vadis scientia? The tales of recent Croatian publications in geodesy and geophysics