Pets flushed down toilets that turn into monster-sized, sewer-prowling predators. Large companies that promote occultism through secret messages in the labels on their products. Popular consumer goods that actually have toxic properties. All these are examples of urban myths — tales that have circulated by either word of mouth or forwarded e-mails. Many of these stories, and similar examples, perch perpetually on the threshold of belief, perhaps because they exploit people's fears so well. As a result, they tend to persist despite being frequently debunked.

Scientific employment has its own urban myths. PhDs who end up pursuing a career as a taxi driver. Legions of postdocs mired in fellowships that last a lifetime. The need for ever-more scientists in a particular ‘hot’ subdiscipline, despite an abundant supply of scientists in general.

Such myths can only be fought effectively if you have an abundance of reliable data, a panel of experts told a careers workshop at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Washington DC last week. But good information is not always easy to find — at least not all in one place. And even the best data on scientific employment and the workforce tend to be too old and broad to produce good projections for specific parts of the world or for narrow subdisciplines.

But this is set to change, the panellists said. The Commission on Professionals in Science and Technology (http://www.cpst.org) is bringing together key data from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, US census data, the National Science Foundation and a host of other scientific organizations. The new database should make it easier for people to debunk any scientific-career myths standing in the way of their professional path. For scientists wishing to confront such issues in their own workplace, the truth is out there.