Viewpoint

Smartphones can help you understand and look after your health says Bruce Hellman, chief executive of health app start-up uMotif

With the prospect of cuts hanging over the EU’s research budget, scientists should be stirring, MEP Claude Turmes tells Science|Business

But in a time of dwindling resources in Europe and beyond, new energy technologies and processes must have efficiency as their watchword, says David Eyton, group head of technology at BP

The budget of the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research should be absorbed by the European Research Council. A proviso that projects backed by Dutch money be conducted in the Netherlands would strengthen the country’s research, says Luc Soete, Rector Magnificus, Maastricht University

The search engine giant will dramatically increase its investment in European start-ups and skills in 2015. Prospects are good, but there must be broader acceptance in Europe that some ventures will fail, says David Drummond, chair of Google Ventures

While other social media networks for researchers are about showing off publications or keeping tabs on impact metrics, Piirus makes introductions. This is the way to find your perfect partner – for research, says Piirus founder Fiona Colligan

Breakthroughs in renewable energy don’t come from Eureka moments in the laboratory, but from long term effort and investment to push nascent technologies to the point of cost efficiency, says Carlos Härtel, GE’s head of R&D in Europe

The Bloodhound car will be a 1,000mph machine that is part spaceship, part jet fighter and part racing car. This is not a big vanity project but an engineering adventure designed to stir a new generation, says Mark Elvin

Incessant talk of a North-South R&D divide is not baseless but it’s becoming tired. It is time to try and change things says Carlos Zorrinho, Brussels’ quiet revolutionary

Europe’s carbon market is not dead in the water, but rather a work in progress, says Andreas Loeschel, who advises Chancellor Angela Merkel on overhauling Germany’s energy mix