Writing that charity

"The skies may be intelligent, but as long as he did not write, he would
lost in society and of history. Writing is work to
immortality "

Kouichi Tanaka and Eiji Osawa are two Japanese chemist. There is a fundamental difference between the two. Tanaka is a recipient of the Nobel Prize (Chemistry, 2002), while not Osawa. What distinguishes them is Tanaka writes, while Osawa no.

In 1970 Osawa predicted the existence of structural carbon materials that form a ball through the scientific literature. Unfortunately, the idea is written in a Japanese-language journals, so it never got to Europe and America. At the same time an American scientist RW Hanson was also predicted similar things. But he actually did not write the idea.

Fifteen years later, the carbon structure is realized Osawa predicted the experimental, and then called C60 by Harold Kroto, James R. Heath, Sean O'Brien, Robert Curl and Richard Smalley. This discovery continues with the discovery of fullerenes, the tube structure of carbon materials in nanometer scale, which is known in the scientific world with a carbon nanotube. Carbon nanotubes are one of the most important ingredients in the development of nanotechnology today. The discovery of these four scientists was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1996.

Tanaka is a researcher at the Shimazu corporation, a Japanese manufacturer of measuring instruments. He developed the mass spectrometer, an instrument that is able to parse the composition of a material by mass constituent molecules. Tanaka wrote his research results in English. One at an international conference, and another in an international journal of mass spectrometry. At first Nobel Prize for the discovery / development of the mass spectrometer was about to be given to British scientists produce more papers so it is better known. But recently, the committee found a paper published earlier Tanaka and a reference material, so it was decided to confer the award to him.

Tanaka was not proficient in English. Unlike most science Nobel Prize laureates who are mostly commonly associate professor internationally, Tanaka's "just" a scholar S1. She is the only recipient of the Nobel Prize in science are not doctors. During his lecture at the Nobel ceremony, he had to pass the English haltingly. When asked by reporters about his impression after the lecture, he said shortly, "I hate English!"

Writing is sharing. The idea that we write and read others may will inspire people to do more or better. That's the most basic thing in the world of science publications. From the findings of a scientist, other scientists will continue and expand. That can only be achieved if they are sharing. One of the media to share it is writing.

Osawa indeed had written earlier idea of ​​the carbon structure. Unfortunately the media that he used inadequate. He wrote in Japanese, which I could not reach the center of the world of science, namely Europe and America. This means that the idea does not spread well. Instead, Hanson actually have a better chance because he speaks English. But she misses one important thing, that he did not write down his ideas.

Writing is sharing. We're not writing to show that we are smart or great. If the intention Thus, our paper will be filled by the great things that may be difficult to understand the reader. Writing with the intention of sharing means we will try to make writing so maybe that is easily understood by the reader. If you feel that writing is hard, try writing your ideas. Then read their own writing, to imagine yourself as being very common in the things you wrote. That way you will empathize with the reader, found it difficult to understand in your writing. Then change the writing to be easily understood.