Academic CV glossary
Plain-language definitions of the key terms behind an academic CV — ORCID, OpenAlex, citation metrics (FWCI, h-index), the Citation Style Language, the NIH biosketch and more.
CSL
The Citation Style Language (CSL) is an open standard for describing citation and bibliography formats, used by Zotero, Mendeley and many other tools.
DORA
DORA, the San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment, is a global declaration calling for research to be assessed on its own merits rather than by journal-based metrics like the Journal Impact Factor.
FWCI
The Field-Weighted Citation Impact (FWCI) compares a work's citations to the world average for works of the same field, type and year — so 1.0 means exactly average.
h-index
The h-index is the largest number h such that you have h publications each cited at least h times.
Leiden Manifesto
The Leiden Manifesto for research metrics is a set of ten principles for using quantitative research metrics responsibly — to support, not replace, expert judgement.
NIH biosketch
An NIH biosketch is a short, structured CV the US National Institutes of Health requires in grant applications, highlighting your contributions to science and selected publications.
OpenAlex
OpenAlex is a free, open catalogue of the world's scholarly works, authors, institutions and venues, run by the non-profit OurResearch.
ORCID
ORCID is a free, unique, persistent digital identifier that distinguishes you from every other researcher and links you to your work.
preprint
A preprint is a complete version of a scholarly paper shared publicly before, or instead of, formal peer review — typically on a server like arXiv, bioRxiv or medRxiv.