Los Angeles freelance science writer and editor
by Janice Nigro Blah blah blah...more studies performed to investigate gender disparity in science. We research the issues, we write about them, we even have to answer questions in our grants about them. But is it just talk or do we act on some of our rhetoric? I have had some of my own questionable... Continue Reading →
by Janice Nigro A highly successful scientist friend joked recently that he still doesn’t recognize much in his original drafts of manuscripts, even after thirty years of working consistently with a certain collaborator. Together they can boast of hundreds of articles reporting cutting edge science and hundreds of thousands of citations. After so much time, experience, and... Continue Reading →
by Janice Nigro I went to a work interview by metro rail this week. In most big cities around the world, even in the USA, no one would bother to make such a statement. Maybe you wouldn’t want anyone to know! More likely, everyone, or most everyone, uses public transportation there. In Los Angeles, not so... Continue Reading →
by Janice Nigro I was shocked once when my PhD advisor ran into the lab to read out loud the first sentence of my first draft of a manuscript. A nightmare moment-hearing your own words read in front of a group of extraordinarily talented and accomplished people. He read it and then said why he... Continue Reading →
by Janice Nigro We travel to escape. To escape our work, to escape our lives, and maybe to escape who we are. I would be the first to admit to trying things on holidays that I would never attempt back home. There is ample opportunity; real gelato can only be eaten in Italy. But also no one is there... Continue Reading →
by Janice Nigro Scientists just gave us yet another reason to love octopuses: RNA editing. Normally we are stuck with genes the way they are delivered to us when sperm and egg unite. RNA editing is a cellular tool enabling genetic diversity but without changing the DNA. Scientists have recently discovered that octopuses, along with other cephalopods, the cuttlefish and... Continue Reading →
Scientists are human too! by Janice Nigro Critical review serves as an important regulator of the quality of our science. We are supposed to man up and take it, but do we really know how to give it effectively? Based on the myriad reviews I now have the pleasure of reading as an editor, I... Continue Reading →
by Janice Nigro I was shocked once when my PhD advisor ran into the lab to read out loud the first sentence of my first draft of a manuscript. A nightmare moment-hearing your own words read in front of a group of extraordinarily talented and accomplished people. He read it and then said why he read it. "It is... Continue Reading →
#Pitmad for scientists by Janice Nigro Scientific grants are an incredible high...when we get them. Otherwise they can feel like another form of torture. Applications are information overload supplied sometimes in hundreds of pages for program projects. A grant of any size though is a huge effort requiring the input of many people of different backgrounds. All their... Continue Reading →
go forth and be curious by Janice Nigro Living a creative life we tend to think is reserved only for artists-anyone painting, writing, acting, or photographing. Not many would add scientists to a creative life list; science is problem solving or logic that has the end goal of producing previously unknown facts. We hope anyway! Art... Continue Reading →
Janice Nigro 