Documente Academic
Documente Profesional
Documente Cultură
Kevin W. Plaxco*
Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Interdepartmental Program in Biomolecular Science and Engineering,
University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, California 93106
Published by Wiley-Blackwell. V
C 2010 The Protein Society PROTEIN SCIENCE 2010 VOL 19:2261—2266 2261
burden. Second, if at all possible avoid using abbre- mon in scientific writing, is a bore that your readers’
viations. Consider, for example, writing the phrase eyes will tend to glide over without taking in. Some-
‘‘the forward rate constant’’ rather than, say, using times passivity is easy to spot, sometimes less so.
the abbreviation kf. The latter may make your job as But it is almost always dull. ‘‘Sequences were
a writer easier, but it makes your audience’s job as searched’’ is easy to recognize as passive (and should
readers that much harder. If you must use an abbre- be cut! ‘‘We searched the sequence database
viation, make it meaningful. For example, use kf for using. . .’’). But here is a more pernicious example:
the forward reaction rate, rather than, say, k1 as ‘‘The level of sequence identity between Chimp and
your readers are more likely to remember what the Human genes is large, which illustrates the related-
former means without having to refer to some scheme ness of these species’’ is more passive than ‘‘The
or figure elsewhere in your paper. Likewise, if you close relatedness of Chimps and Humans is illus-
must use a large number of abbreviations or other trated by the high degree of sequence identity
identifiers, avoid arbitrary names in favor of names so shared by their common genes’’, or ‘‘The high level of
logical that your readers can effortlessly keep track of sequence identity between Chimp and Human genes
them. For example, ‘‘protein dilution buffer’’ and ‘‘4- illustrates the relatedness of these species’’. The
amino-1,10-phenanthroline’’ are far easier to under- latter two sentences shift the focus of their action
stand and keep track of than ‘‘buffer A’’ or ‘‘compound more firmly onto their subjects, making for more
2.’’ If this is not possible, the third best approach (a engaging reading.
distant third at that) is to provide a table that your Beware of long sentences. While it is good to
readers can conveniently refer to. But I have to warn vary your sentence length across a paragraph (this
you that I am lazy enough that I am likely to set a pa- mimics the cadence of spoken language and is thus
per down if I am forced to break from reading to look easier to follow), longer sentences are generally
up anything more than twice. harder to parse than their shorter brethren. Indeed,
Word choice also impacts the precision of your average sentence length is a key predictor of reading
writing, which affects the ease with which it is read: difficulty in most of the commonly employed meas-
any ambiguity in your writing forces your reader to ures of ‘‘readability’’ (e.g., Ref. 5).
work to understand your meaning. For this reason, Symmetry of language is often helpful. Parallel
when faced with the choice between a colloquial, but structures within a sentence, or within adjacent
imprecise, way of saying something and a more sentences or paragraphs, can often be used to good
formal, but more precise, way of saying the same effect to hammer a point home. In this context, it is
thing, I opt for the latter. For example, ‘‘these data more than acceptable to repeat words or phrases in
show’’ is less precise than ‘‘these data indicate’’ or a sentence. (‘‘While it is largely accepted that
‘‘these data demonstrate’’; although ‘‘show’’ can Chimps and Humans reside in the same taxonomic
denote both ‘‘indicate’’ or ‘‘demonstrate,’’ the two order, there has been much debate as to whether or
words are not interchangeable as the former is syn- not they reside in the same taxonomic family’’). Con-
onymous with ‘‘suggest’’ and the latter with ‘‘prove’’. versely, missed opportunities for symmetry can
Using the word ‘‘show’’ thus forces your readers to create a void or hiccup in the text, as the reader’s
pause, break their stream of consciousness, and brain screeches to a halt after failing to find an
waste effort deciding which you meant. anticipated parallel.
Think hard about your tenses. We all agree that
some observations are truly past tense (any specific
supernova, for example, explodes only once). But, Paragraphs
while not all authors agree with me on this, I believe In my experience, paragraph structure is both the
most observations reported in the scientific literature most difficult element of writing to master, and the
are better described in the present tense because, most important. Here are my favorite paragraph
assuming your experiments are reproducible, the rules.
observation remains true even after the experiment The first sentence of each paragraph should tell
was performed. As an added bonus, present tense is the reader what you expect them to get out of the
more engaging than past tense. For example, I prefer paragraph that follows, which makes their job of
‘‘the phylogenetic data indicates that Chimps and following it far easier. Put another way; use the
Humans are related’’ over ‘‘the phylogenetic data indi- opening sentence of your paragraph to state your
cated that chimps and humans are related’’; although argument, and the rest of the paragraph to make
both phrasings are equally true, the former is more your argument. This issue is so important that I
general, and sounds more exciting, than the latter. regularly test my students by reading only the first
sentence of each paragraph in their drafts, scrutiniz-
Sentences ing whether this alone is enough to communicate
A well-written sentence usually leads with the their entire story. If not, it is back to the drawing
action. Passive language, although extremely com- board. (Go back and re-read the first sentence of