#EUROmicroMOOC: using Twitter to share trends in Microbiology worldwide

I López-Goñi; J Giner-Lamia; A Álvarez-Ordoñez; Alfonso Benitez-Páez; D Claessen; M Cortesao; M de Toro; D García-Ruano; E T Granato; Á T Kovács; J L Romalde; T G Sana; M Sánchez-Angulo; F J Sangari; W K Smits; T Sturm; J L Thomassin; K N G Valdehuesa; M Zapotoczna

doi:10.1093/femsle/fnz141

#EUROmicroMOOC: using Twitter to share trends in Microbiology worldwide

FEMS Microbiol Lett. 2019 Jun 1;366(11):fnz141. doi: 10.1093/femsle/fnz141.

Authors

I López-Goñi¹, J Giner-Lamia^{2

3}, A Álvarez-Ordoñez⁴, Alfonso Benitez-Páez⁵, D Claessen⁶, M Cortesao⁷, M de Toro⁸, D García-Ruano⁹, E T Granato¹⁰, Á T Kovács¹¹, J L Romalde¹², T G Sana¹³, M Sánchez-Angulo¹⁴, F J Sangari¹⁵, W K Smits¹⁶, T Sturm¹⁷, J L Thomassin¹⁸, K N G Valdehuesa¹⁹, M Zapotoczna²⁰

Affiliations

¹ Departamento de Microbiología y Parasitología, Universidad de Navarra, E-31080 Pamplona, Spain.
² Centro de Biotecnología y Genómica de Plantas (CBGP, UPM-INIA), Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (UPM), Campus Montegancedo-UPM, E-28223 Pozuelo de Alarcón, Madrid,Spain.
³ Departamento de Biotecnología-Biología Vegetal, ETSIAAB, UPM, Ciudad Universitaria, E-28040 Madrid, Spain.
⁴ Departamento de Higiene y Tecnología de los Alimentos, Instituto de Ciencia y Tecnología de los Alimentos, Universidad de León, E-24071 León, Spain.
⁵ Institute of Agrochemistry and Food Technology IATA-CSIC. C/Catedràtic Agustín Escardino Benlloch, 7, E-46980 Paterna-Valencia, Spain.
⁶ Intitute of Biology, Leiden University, NL-2333 Leiden, the Netherlands.
⁷ German Aerospace Center (DLR), D-51147 Cologne, Germany.
⁸ Fundacion Rioja Salud, E-26006 Logroño, Spain.
⁹ Institute of Functional Biology and Genomics, USAL-CSIC, University of Salamanca, E-37002 Salamanca, Spain.
¹⁰ Department of Zoology, University of Oxford, OX1 3SZ Oxford, United Kingdom.
¹¹ DTU Bioengineering, Bacterial Interactions and Evolution group,1 Technical University of Denmark, 2800 Kgs. Lyngby, Denmark.
¹² Departamento de Microbiología y Parasitología, CIBUS-Facultad de Biología, Universidade de Santiago de Compostela, E-15782 Santiago de Compostela, Spain.
¹³ Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305, USA.
¹⁴ Departamento de Producción Vegetal y Microbiología, University of Miguel Hernández, E-03202 Elche, Spain.
¹⁵ Instituto de Biomedicina y Biotecnología de Cantabria (IBBTEC) CSIC-University of Cantabria and Department of Molecular Biology, University of Cantabria, E-39011 Santander, Spain.
¹⁶ Department of Medical Microbiology, Leiden University Medical Center, NL-2300 RC Leiden, the Netherlands.
¹⁷ Cabrillo College, Aptos, CA 95003, USA.
¹⁸ Biochemistry of Macromolecular Interactions Unit, Department of Structural Biology and Chemistry, Institut Pasteur, 28 rue du Dr. Roux, Paris F-75724 France.
¹⁹ Department of Energy Science and Technology, Myongji University, 03674 South Korea.
²⁰ Institute of Physical Chemistry, Polish Academy of Sciences, 01-224 Warsaw, Poland.

PMID: 31253991
DOI: 10.1093/femsle/fnz141

Abstract

Twitter is one of the most popular social media networks that, in recent years, has been increasingly used by researchers as a platform to share science and discuss ongoing work. Despite its popularity, Twitter is not commonly used as a medium to teach science. Here, we summarize the results of #EUROmicroMOOC: the first worldwide Microbiology Massive Open Online Course taught in English using Twitter. Content analytics indicated that more than 3 million users saw posts with the hashtag #EUROmicroMOOC, which resulted in over 42 million Twitter impressions worldwide. These analyses demonstrate that free Microbiology MOOCs shared on Twitter are valuable educational tools that reach broad audiences throughout the world. We also describe our experience teaching an entire Microbiology course using Twitter and provide recommendations when using social media to communicate science to a broad audience.

Keywords: MOOC; Twitter; open access; science communication; social networks.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Communication
Information Dissemination / methods
Microbiology*
Social Media*
Social Networking