Instead of the usual pseudo-political babble or cultural commentary, today's blog is a bit more personal than those so far. A little over 2 and half years ago I finished my doctoral thesis work, which in itself was the end result of eight years of graduate school, which is definitely on the long side for Astronomy (6 years is norm). Well, in science nothing has really happened unless the results appear in a refereed journal. I can't count the number of times exciting new results have been discussed at meetings or in news releases only to never see the light of day again. Success in science is also generally (although not universally) tallied in number of and significance of refereed publications.
Today is the day that the last of my papers from my thesis (of which there are a total of two, so this is the second) has been accepted by the Astrophysical Journal for publication. As I started this work in the beginning of my 3rd year of graduate school (Fall 1997) this represents the culmination of eight and a half years of work, covering the majority of my professional science career. Phew! Now I can move on to the pile of much more recent (2+ years) projects which have yet to be brought to a proper conclusion. Seriously, it feels pretty good. Like I finally finished graduating.
My former advisor, MM, was so thrilled he waxed poetic:
in our field the timescale for great achievements
is so long that we often miss out on lauding the really
singular events. the publication of the
main science results from [JIMBILLY4]'s thesis truly
is a "red letter" landmark day--a day we are
living for--which i for one
am definitely going to celebrate in my own
fashion. for now all i will pass on is my deep conviction
that this is a great field, a great exploration of
scientific discovery, a great profession,
and a downright wonderful great referree, i only wish
i could give him or her a huge hug.
i was not aware of it this morning, but i
now realize that today
is a great day, perhaps even a great time in
human history to be alive.
Before MM makes sweet love to the referee, it should probably be noted the very fast turnaround on re-submittance and acceptance (2 working days) probably means the Editor decided the referee had been accomodated enough and accepted it outright. Since I once worked for/with the Editor and am an acquaintance if not a friend, it seems doubly likely (i.e., cut the poor boy a break).
No comments:
Post a Comment