As we gear up to focus on one of our main themes next week, gender and science at the Gender Summit in Brussels, we took a look at the research news from the week. We found faces (in ancient terracotta or serving as your password), plus science communication promoted (on Wikipedia and at AXA Pop Days), while the communication of creationism to British students was shot down. To learn more, have a look at our picks of the week.

(Credit: Maros via Wikipedia & io9)

On the MyScienceWork Menu:

We’re gearing up to focus on one of our main themes next week: gender and science. This Monday and Tuesday, we’ll be at the Gender Summit in Brussels, discussing gender policy at research organizations, the role of funders in promoting gender-aware science, how paying attention to gender can improve research and innovation…and a great deal more. Follow the hashtag #GS4EU for all the ideas and debates coming out of the discussion.

This week, we looked at several of our other favorite themes:

- Science communication, with a Storify covering the 2014 edition of AXA Pop Days, with the AXA Research Fund.

- Open science with a look at the principles of wiki collaboration and the benefits they could have for research:

When Science and Wikipedia Rub Elbows  

https://www.mysciencework.com/news/11461/when-science-and-wikipedia-rub-elbows

- The life and times of PhD students, with episode 2 from the first season of Knock Knock Doc.

Knock Knock Doc - Episode 02 # Season 1 - Meandering Rivers of Rain

https://www.mysciencework.com/news/11481/knock-knock-doc-episode-02-season-1

And, in case you missed it, #CephalopodWeek was celebrated on Twitter! We humbly offer our contribution, David Davila’s reverential tribute to the octopus:

The Science Behind Cthulu: Why Octopi Are Terrifying yet Awesome https://www.mysciencework.com/news/11433/the-science-behind-cthulu-why-octopi-are-terrifying-yet-awesome

Some favorites from around the web:

Also awesome, and possibly intended to be terrifying, is the ancient terracotta army of Chinese soldiers. A new imaging study may help understand them better, by analyzing their faces.

3D Imaging Could Solve the Mystery of China's Terracotta Army

http://io9.com/3d-imaging-could-solve-the-mystery-of-chinas-terracotta-1594301493

In an altogether different use for facial analysis,

Your Friends’ Faces Could Be Your Future Password

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/crux/2014/06/26/your-friends-faces-could-be-your-future-password/#.U62Pi42SzV5

In the UK this week, the government banned the teaching of creationism in publicly funded schools.

Creationism banned from U.K. schools http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/06/25/creationism-banned-uk-schools_n_5529693.html?&ir=Science&ncid=tweetlnkushpmg00000047

A bit farther away, somewhere in the general direction of the constellation Aquarius, there is a diamond of terrestrial proportions:

Astronomers Find Slow-Cooked Diamond the Size of Earth

http://phenomena.nationalgeographic.com/2014/06/24/diamond-the-size-of-earth/

This vessel might not get you as far as the space diamond, but could get ordinary citizens a lot closer to space:

World View Prototype Balloon Reaches for Edge of Space

http://news.discovery.com/space/private-spaceflight/world-view-prototype-balloon-reaches-edge-of-space-140625.htm?utm_source=twitter.com&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=DNewsSocial

And, finally, it seems Einstein had only one brush with peer review, and it wasn’t pretty...

Albert Einstein wasn't a big fan of anonymous peer review, definitely would have hated twttr... (via @prerana123) pic.twitter.com/d1LYWIdbhS

— Noah Gray (@noahWG) June 26, 2014