ß 2014. Published by The Company of Biologists Ltd | Journal of Cell Science (2014) 127, 2995–2996 doi:10.1242/jcs.157727
STICKY WICKET
The whole story I – mysteries
Drat. Drat drat drat. Drat. I’ve just been reading a mystery story, a
good one. With a strange death and a scroungy detective and an
alluring love interest, who is actually not who we think she is, I
mean he is, I mean – but that isn’t the point. The problem is that I
got to the last page and there was no last page. Must have gotten
torn out somewhere (maybe when I stuffed it between journals
and my laptop in my carry-on bag. But I mean, drat. It’s killing
me.
When we envision writing a paper, we often think of it as a
mystery story. In our outline we set up the scene (our figure 1)
and then we explore the territory (figure 2). Then, wham, we
describe the mystery – the body in the locked room with no
Correspondence for Mole and his friends can be sent to [email protected],
and may be published in forthcoming issues.
windows (figure 3). We examine the crime scene, finding clues
(figure 4). We connect the dots (figure 5). And then we reveal (ta
da!) the answer (figure 6) and wrap everything up neatly (figure
7). At least, that’s how we often think about writing up our cool
mystery, knowing that the reader will be breathless with
anticipation until we, the detectives, call everyone into the
sitting room to reveal the culprit in the stunning climax.
But really? Bad idea. Because we (the readers) aren’t going to
curl up with your paper and patiently let you build to your climax.
What we’re going to do is read your work up to the first or second
figure, and if it doesn’t grab us, we’re going to go to the next
paper. I mean, you already blew the ending in the abstract, right?
So what is the sense of taking us slowly to your big final scene?
I learned all this the hard way. Many, many years ago, when I
was just a molet, a senior post-doc in the lab, Dr Red Panda (not
An occasional column, in which Mole and other characters share their views on various aspects of life-science research.
2995
Journal of Cell Science
Mole
STICKY WICKET
application of the scientific method by people who have some
idea of how to use it. And in reality, slowly but surely, some of
these problems are being addressed. And of course, some aren’t.
Sure, a huge part of the reason is that science is really, really
hard. Even if we have what could be a genuine breakthrough, and
we know how rare those are, it will take years and years before
we know if this will actually solve anything (and meanwhile,
those who translate the work to the problems that people have
must choose, carefully, what might represent such a
breakthrough). All of this is terribly difficult, slow and full of
landmines that could blow up the effort (even if the basic idea
was right). Breakthrough (or maybe breakthrough), translation,
misstep, back two steps, forward a bit, ka-boom, back to the
drawing board, and back to the bench. And meanwhile, your
mother’s friend is asking, ‘‘So how long before you cure this
disease?’’
I’ve been thinking about this a lot (hey, I’m the Mole, I can’t
help it). So we have this problem: lots and lots of new
information, petabytes of information, are hitting the e-press
every day. (I just checked: 75,302 publications in the past two
weeks. Wait, 75,307.) New cures, not so much.
There has been quite a bit of discussion about this problem,
even from me. Part of the problem (just part) seems to lie with the
quality of what is being published. Some pundits suggest that too
little of it is reproducible (see Replicant). Some suggest that too
much of it is just faked (see The End of Science), but those people
are just wrong. Some even think we should just give them the
money, and they’ll fix it (yeh, how could that go wrong? – but
watch out for these people, some of whom are in the other two
camps making a lot of noise).
I think that maybe it would be useful, instead of whining about
not being able to repeat someone’s figure 6b, or gazing endlessly
at the smudge on the third loading control in the second western
blot, to take another look at the way we write, review, rewrite,
review, re-rewrite papers. Maybe the whole way we approach
reporting on our findings. And. maybe, what we think papers are
for, anyway (thanks, RP).
But wait! I just found a torn-out page tucked between my
journal with the nice, soft pages and the one that is big and shiny!
Maybe it’s my long-lost solution to the mystery, the one that has
been driving me nuts. I’ll be back.
Journal of Cell Science
to be confused with Dr Panda – different family altogether) read a
draft of my paper and eviscerated it. Boring! I had a great result
but RP told me to put it right up front, figure 1, to grab the reader.
‘‘But,’’ I cried, ‘‘then the rest of the paper is just analyzing the
result and testing the conclusion!’’ ‘‘Exactly!’’ said RP. ‘‘Anyone
who only gets to figure 1 will get the main message, and those of
us who keep reading will learn more about it. What do you think a
paper is for, anyway?’’ I never forgot it and, indeed, it is a lesson I
teach to my own trainees now, and we go through the same dance.
La dee dah.
But that isn’t what I really wanted to talk about. What I really
wanted to talk about is what actually happens when we’ve written
our nice, lovely, exciting detective story. We have to publish it.
And that’s when it all goes wrong. First, the editors of the journal,
and then the next one, and maybe the next, don’t want to review
it. And then it’s reviewed (hopefully) and the reviewers want to
know more. Much much more. Because even if we’ve told a good
story (we thought that we had) it just isn’t the whole story. And
anyone (even a reviewer) can think of more we can do. So back to
the bench and, hopefully, back to the journal, and maybe back to
the bench a bit more. In the end, if everyone has done their job
well, the story is, in fact, richer, better, more complete. Maybe it
isn’t the whole story, but it’s more satisfying. Sure, by the time
it’s published, we’re sick to death of it (‘‘finally got that frickin’
paper accepted’’). But somehow, the system sort of works. Sort
of.
Sure, I’m complaining, but there’s more here. And something
that might be terribly important (and, perhaps, wrong) about the
way we do things. Everything. The way we do science. And I
think I can prove it.
There is a growing perception that science, in general, and
biomedical research, in particular, is simply too slow. Not the
emergence of new information – that happens so quickly that it is
nearly impossible to keep up with everything. But step back a bit
and look at the big picture. Why we receive public support for our
work (or, if you are in the private sector, why gobs of money is
coming from investors). While an argument could be made that
paying scientists so they stay in their labs instead of causing
trouble in the community is ultimately cost-effective, I really
don’t think that is the rationale. The fact is, the public are paying
in hopes that real, live problems will be solved through the
Journal of Cell Science (2014) 127, 2995–2996 doi:10.1242/jcs.157727
2996