On impact

Yesterday, something happened to me for the first time ever. I opened my e-mail inbox to find a message from a science reporter. Check it out:

Hi,

I’m a science writer with Science magazine in D.C. I’ve written a short news blurb about your discovery of the living macroalga 166 m deep in an Arctic fjord. I need an image to run with the story, and I was hoping that you’d be able to send me one. Either image in figure 2 of the paper would work, but if you have another that you like better, that’s great, too.

Thanks,

E

I immediately read the message out loud to a friend, because only when pronounced did the words begin to seem real. A science reporter - a real person, someone with a journalism degree, who is employed by a magazine and paid to write news stories about science - is interested in my work. Mine. Of all things!

Granted, the article is going to be very short - the reporter just calls it a "blurb" - but still, I consider it a leap forward. This is the first time I've ever been contacted by a journalist about my work. The manuscript in question here is a short communication that Andrew and I co-authored, noting the presence of an abundant, living macroalga at great depth in the high Arctic. It appeared in Marine Biodiversity Records earlier this month (see it here). 

Having one of my published papers covered in a news blurb means a greater number and wider variety of people will be aware of my research. In science, there's a lot of talk about impact - basically, how widely-communicated and -cited a manuscript is. Journals are rated by their "impact factor;" grant programs call for "high-impact" proposals; researchers are always trying to publish their work in higher-impact publications. My impact just increased by a lot.

Honestly, I'm proud of Andrew and myself for the attention our little manuscript has drawn, but there's also a bit more to it than that. If my goal was as simple as world domination (making everyone aware of our discovery) there are a lot faster ways to go about it. I could rent billboards, buy ad space on the radio, send postcards to everyone I know - not just wait around for a reporter to notice my paper. I'm proud of the manuscript not because it's drawn a bit of attention. I'm proud because it's important enough to draw a bit of attention. 

As my career continues, I want to always remember the feeling of opening that e-mail, not because I want to be flashy or famous, but because I want to do research that merits a news blurb. It's all about asking the right questions. May my research always be imporant enough to be noticed.

Update: Find the finished news blurb here.