Research says language barriers are holding back science around the world. English is the language of science, but one-third of research is not published in English. This means researchers do not see a lot of important research. Researchers from the University of Cambridge said important science is being missed at an international level. They said journals should have basic summaries of a study's key findings in many languages. They also said universities should translate their research into different languages, especially Chinese, French, Portuguese and Spanish.

International companies are now asking their staff to communicate only in English. They want to reduce language barriers. Germany's Volkswagen just announced that English is its official language. It hopes the switch to English will attract employees. Japan's carmaker Honda also announced its staff must use English by 2020. Researcher Tatsuya Amano said scientists needed "to start seriously tackling this issue." He gave an example of important research about avian flu in China going unnoticed by the World Health Organization because it was published in journals in Chinese.