22 What is the JACS β? I don’t really know, actually. It appears to be some kind of Google Labs lite. At first, when I saw the email announcement, I was skeptical. The thought that the ACS was going to commission something that might, possibly, result in an advancement of science informatics was just too much of a far flung notion to wrap my little head around. The society, after all, spends so much time thinking about itself, I didn’t realize it had time to think about Chemistry. I’ll take the hit there, I was wrong. In its current 
incarnation, JACS beta is sort of… well… promising. The PPT slide sets are kind of silly, since the picture steal function in Adobe works fine and you can rip the high res image out of the HTML. The listen to JACS communications is, I think, a novel idea, but scientific papers are not really intended to be listened to – they’re intended to be read since most authors write their text around the figures, graphs and charts, which are obviously incompatible with an audio recording. Now, the virtual issue is interesting. I did find that quite fascinating, even though the topic is clearly pandering the the most web savvy group of chemists (oh burrrrn). Indeed, why can’t online JACS be like that? Have a little summary written by someone who can write shit in plain English so that when a biochemist goes to read it, they don’t have to be like “Tandem Suzuki couplings to generate an enol whatsamer followed by macrolactonisomething from the seco what?” Or when I go read a biochemistry summary it’s not just “RNA polimerase with PTSI in FBKa 932 in HeLa cells with the Gib short sequence GFP protein hedgehogulase was purified using the FDLKShjDsIDJFS SELEX in an OIDSJ buffer with SDLKjf as a cofactor poopiepants.” It just makes sense to write a summary plain fucking English for a journal which is written for people across the whole spectra of chemical sciences.
(So we are all equally insulted, a nanothingiee paper’s summary would go something like “Click click click azide alkyne click click strained bicyclo click click click fluroescent nano bioprobe click click self assembled in situ click fluoride sensor”)
So, I give this JACS beta idea an affirmitive thumbs up, but aside from the Virtual Issue (which should be named “iJACS” to keep the gay Apple computer cult thing alive amongst chemists) they’ve not hit upon anything supahsweet.
Now… issues that read well on my iPhone so that I can enjoy them in the shitter… That would be supahsweet.
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I really like what JACS has done here. I have to agree with you, however, as to the usefulness of the PPT slides. Seem like they were whipped up in about 1h. That aspect has much promise, but needs drastic improvement to be of any use, say, in the classroom.
Seems like a rip-off of the Beilstein Journal of Organic Chemistry, without all the open-access goodness.
The audio feature would probably work better if it was a more plain-english run down of the paper. Given that its a podcast you could listen to what’s new in JACS on your way to work or something, which would be cool.
Exactly, that was my beef with it. It simply doesn’t work in its current incarnation. I’m sure the authors would be happy to do a plain english summary, given how much work they already do to get the paper published. And if they can’t voice it themselves, then the official reader could do it. Then I could listen to an entire JACS issue in about an hour. It would be perfect.
Some publications already do this such as the nature podcast, Science magazine, and Chemistry World. Some science societies also have shows like Science Update by the AAAS and The Naked Scientists by the Wellcome trust (UK equivalent of AAAS). There are also radio programs that summarise heavily from science publications, This Week in Science(TWIS), “the kickass science podcast”.
Content is usually a problem, as not every work is easily converted into simple and interesting listening material. It also takes alot more time and effort to stay focused and pay attention than just flipping through and checking out the figures. Synthetic chemistry would be awful in audio format without figures. However, biochemistry and physics often tell a good story, which is why they fill science shows.
Just as an exercise, take this weeks JACS and imagine trying to condense it into an hour of talk. How many articles would get more than a three sentence abstract?
What would you say if you had to read your paper to a general audience? Without figures?
Some publications already do this such as the nature podcast, Science magazine, and Chemistry World. However, these are summaries of interesting science stories, not just papers which may be a little dry.
I don’t think JACS has enough story telling potential. Even having to listen to the abstracts would be a chore, particularly without figures.
I could easily read my JCAS paper to a general “chemical” audience, or even focus on my field, where it would be interesting and engaging. An abstract is not a plain english summary. An abstract is impossible to understand in most cases even if you are a chemist.
I definitely think that a lot of articles in JCAS have storytelling potential. Otherwise, why the hell publish them?
Why sell yourself short?
along the same lines, the website scivee.tv has video presentations of scientists explaining their recent papers. it’s supposed to be fairly easy to put together the video, too.
“Click click click azide alkyne click click strained bicyclo click click click fluroescent nano bioprobe click click self assembled in situ click fluoride sensor”
you forgot dendrimer
a little summary written by someone who can write shit in plain English so that when a biochemist goes to read it
Technical words specific to a field are used for a reason. We would like to think that chemistry is more complicated than cooking dinner, so a title of “Asymmetric Petasis Reactions Catalyzed by Chiral Biphenols” in the current JACS is a bit more informative than “Yet another new method to make unusual amino acids in a way that we think is pretty neat – this time its got biphenols in it!”
Chemistry doesn’t tell good stories, synthesis in particular. People want to know what the thing does, not how you got there.
People read JACS, Nature, Science, Angew… etc. etc. for the cutting edge research, even though most of it isn’t inside of their field. Creating a summary so that everyone in chemical sciences can read it isn’t dumbing anything down, like you seem to suggest, but making the paper superficially more accessible for other scientists who are supposed to be able to benefit from it (it was published in JACS because it has broad impact, after all). Indeed, if one were so inclined, one could easily make a very easy formula for how a “plain English” summary would go, which would differ from the Abstract markedly. I’m always nervous around conservatives who think they’re vanguards of Chemistry: The Art (R) and resist change on the grounds that “we use these things for a reason – because we understand them” when the truth is, you’re publishing in a multidisciplinary journal. You can save your haughty technical terms for JOC, where people who don’t know what the Petasis Reaction is are way farther and fewer between.
I have to agree with Kyle completely on this one. As formerly separate disciplines start to intertwine, significant amounts of jargon skip right over the uninitiated reader’s head. When an abstract requires background reading, the task of determining if the paper has information useful to a project becomes difficult. Having a plain english summary (particularly in broad impact journals) doesn’t reduce the mystique of your Art, just makes it easier for readers in other fields to determine if the paper merits the time required to read the entire paper and fully understand its implications.
If your article doesn’t tell a good story, it doesn’t deserve to be in JCAS. I agree that it could get into Tet. Lett. though.
“Have a little summary written by someone who can write shit in plain English”
You’ll be pleased to know that’s exactly what we plan to do with Nature Chemistry, only we’ll probably call them ‘Editor Summaries’! They should appear in the table of contents, RSS feeds etc.
And the PPT files might be useful – the PDFs you download off the web and the jpgs/gifs in the HTML are actually really low res (72 dpi), so having higher quality ones available easily could help people out.
Seems like it’d be easier to click on an image to get the high quality version, rather than download a PPT. For example, see the web only BMC journals.
With all due respect to Nature, you guys don’t really publish a lot of chemistry papers. Perhaps these summaries would be more useful to a person with a more biological bent.
Nature Chemistry isn’t even out yet and it’ll be a year, but I agree that if it becomes as big as JCAS or Andjewandte, it’ll be a very useful feature for someone like me. It would be great if the summaries were voiced too so that I could listen to them while running a column or wasting time on blogs.
As a bonus, if you manage to make Nature Chemistry as big as the big two, then I promise I will think long and hard, and come up with a unique derogatory moniker for your journal. A true sign of greatness.
I do enjoy your modification of JACS into the Journal of the Canadian Agricultural Society.
Arggghhh! You’re being facetious. But what if someone else, a gentle soul in search for truth in this multi-disciplinary world, is led astray by your jovial deflection? We cannot allow that.
No dear reader, you are supposed to read JCAS very quickly as one word. Just as you would with JACS.
“Now… issues that read well on my iPhone so that I can enjoy them in the shitter… That would be supahsweet.”
The poll currently on the front page of JACS Beta makes me think your dreams will come true.
You miss the subtlety of ACS project SEED blooming. In the future all employable chemists will be diversely other-abled: blind, deaf, quadruplegic… with minimal dermal albedoes and smart as the current President. Multimedia feeds will be required to impart any communication at all. Interface will be mediated by minimum-waged techno-caregiver (look in the mirror, sucker) patriarchal historic White Protestant European oppressors of protected Challenged Minorities of Colour.
Don’t inappropriately touch your masters.
While JACkasS research is not supposed to be listened to, I could do it when I am stuck in the damn traffic. At least better than listening to some expensive audiobook.
Interesting discussion about having an abstract in plain English. When recruiting for my company, that was my first filter for a candidate. Can they explain the significance of their research to someone not familiar with it and in plain English? Sadly, many cannot.
It is also something that I need to do if I don’t want to hear about it later from my wife. If I wish to tell someone about what I do, I must do it in a way that uses their knowledge level and I must make it interesting. That or “I do research (as in don’t ask).”