BackgroundVirtual Communities of Practice (CoPs) are flexible communication and knowledge management tools enabling collaboration, sharing of best practice and professional development. There have been few studies that have looked at the use and usefulness of virtual CoPs in public health.MethodsThis project sought to gather the evidence and develop recommendations for the value of virtual CoPs in public health through a literature review, and through piloting two CoPs in obesity. The research aimed to find out how useful CoPs are in obesity prevention, what makes a CoP successful and what evaluation methods are appropriate.ResultsCoPs are composed of observers, passive and active contributors with a small group of 'super-users'. All users learn through reading and listening, even if they do not post. The CoPs had higher levels of reading activity as opposed to low levels of posting activity. Longer existence of CoPs usually means more active membership. There are complex reasons why users fail to engage in knowledge sharing. Success of a CoP is creating an online environment where users feel comfortable. CoPs need administrative support and facilitation. Champions play a vital role.ConclusionsEvidence shows some encouraging results about the value of CoPs in enabling collaboration and information sharing. Despite low membership numbers of the obesity CoPs piloted, members see value and suggest improvements. Findings suggest that success comes from leadership, champions, and larger networks with more posting activity. Mixed methods of quantitative and qualitative research are appropriate in measuring the use and impact of CoPs.

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BackgroundImproving mechanisms for knowledge translation (KT) and connecting decision-makers to each other and the information and evidence they consider relevant to their work remains a priority for public health. Virtual communities of practices (CoPs) potentially offer an affordable and flexible means of encouraging connection and sharing of evidence, information and learning among the public health community in ways that transgress traditional geographical, professional, institutional and time boundaries. The suitability of online CoPs in public health, however, has rarely been tested. This paper explores the reasons why particular online CoP for alcohol harm reduction hosted by the UK Health Forum failed to generate sufficient interest from the group of public health professionals at which it was aimed.MethodsThe study utilises online web-metrics demonstrating a lack of online activity on the CoP. One hundred and twenty seven responses to an online questionnaire were used to explore whether the lack of activity could be explained by the target audience’s existing information and evidence practices and needs. Qualitative interviews with 10 members describe in more detail the factors that shape and inhibit use of the virtual CoP by those at which it was targeted.ResultsQuantitative and qualitative data confirm that the target audience had an interest in the kind of information and evidence the CoP was set up to share and generate discussion about, but also that participants considered themselves to already have relatively good access to the information and evidence they needed to inform their work. Qualitative data revealed that the main barriers to using the CoP were a proliferation of information sources meaning that participants preferred to utilise trusted sources that were already established within their daily routines and a lack of time to engage with new online tools that required any significant commitment.ConclusionsSpecialist online CoPs are competing for space in an already crowded market. A target audience that regards itself as busy and over-supplied is unlikely to commit to a new service without the assurance that the service will provide unique and valuable well-summarised information, which would reduce the need to spend time accessing competing resources.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13012-017-0622-8) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

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This article is the first in the feature to highlight the social network site Twitter as a tool for health information and it reports on a study by Emma Hughes, who completed an MSc in information and library studies at Aberystwyth University in 2014. Emma's research investigated the quality of health information available on Twitter, in particular the information available on UK alcohol consumption guidelines. Her research suggests that users searching for this information would need certain literacy skills to interpret it correctly. However, there is no doubt that Twitter is an increasingly popular resource for information dissemination and health professionals, and organisations should be encouraged to use it frequently as a tool for sharing information. AM.

This collection of essays is the result of a two-day conference that took place in Copenhagen in August 2008 that brought together scholars from the humanities and the history of science. The aim of the conference was to explore the history of fieldwork, cartography, and scientific exploration from a multidisciplinary perspective. The contributions to this work demonstrate the interdisciplinary fields of the conference's authors as well as their namesake society, the Danish Network for the History and Sociology of Fieldwork and Scientific Exploration. Opening with an introductory essay written by its editors, the volume contains 17 papers arranged chronologically covering the 17 th century to present-day expeditions. The case studies offer examples drawn from Europe, Africa, Asia, and North America with a strong Nordic presence among its papers-taken in part from the location of the conference. True to its interdisciplinary label, this volume steps back from the direct study of research data and instead examines the collecting process in order to understand the practitioners and their impact on society and institutions. As a result, many of the essays focus on the identities of the scientists, as well as the public's perception of expeditions and their accompanying research. On the whole, each author shares the desire to reexamine the traditional discourse regarding fieldwork's 20 th-century origins. The first section, drawing on early modern research, includes case studies and uses historiographical comparisons to highlight the specific topics of study: anthropology, cartography, botany, and military history. Michael Harbsmeier's paper argues against the traditional narrative of anthropology's establishment in the 20 th century by highlighting the similar fieldwork practices found among two early modern German naturalists, Leonhard Raunwolf and Peter Kolb. Jeppe Strandsbjerg sketches Danish state cartographic projects and their various networks used to collect geographic data. Similar to Harbsmeier, Rengenier Rittersma's contribution highlights Luigi Ferdinando Marsili's prediscipline field research and his fascination with the origins of truffles, arguing for Marsili's recognition alongside Marcello Malpighi as examples of an 18 th-century ''proto'' field scientists. Meanwhile, Kasper Risbjerg Eskilden and Daniel E. Clinkman provide institutional focuses in their papers: the former centered on Dutch scientists' interactions with the Republic of Letters, and later exploring the Royal Society's partnership with the Royal Navy.

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