I AM TRULY SURROUNDED BY MY work: My computer runs on megabytes and RAMs; my car moves because of sparks and subsequent combusion, and sports more digital equipment than I care to imagine; and even my gym has the latest techno-gizmo to tell me just how many calories I've used up on a five-mile (albeit stationary) "bike ride." I cannot seem to get away from science and technology--but as a science writer, I do not mind, because it is more fuel for my science articles.
Science and technology encompass all our lives. If you find your hands sweating during the latest Space Shuttle launch, or you enthusiastically tell your friends the reasons why tsunamis crash along a coastline, you may be a potential science writer. And you do not have to be another Albert Einstein, Richard Feynman, or Isaac Asimov to succeed at it.
I became a science writer through the back door. I was a professional scientist who analyzed water samples and plotted flooding along sinuous river systems. A side trip back to college changed my life: The day my professor handed back the first draft of my thesis and said, "This reads like...well...an article for the general audience," sealed my fate. I have thanked her insight for ten years now.
You do not have to be a scientist or have a science background to write articles and books about science and technology. In fact, it may be helpful for you not to have a science background, because then you won't be caught up in the science jargon. If you are interviewing an astronomer on interstellar objects who says that MACHOs are found at the periphery of our galaxy, you would not just nod your head. You would ask him or her to explain--not only the acronym (Massive Compact Halo Objects)--but why MACHOs are important to your article.
The best part about science and technology writing is the range of topics from which you can choose--and each of those subjects can be further broken down into narrower topics for other articles. Topics include the physical sciences, (geology, chemistry, etc.); biology (plant, human, viral, bacterial); space science; or medical science. Many science writers also delve into technology: computers, robotics, and electronics. Under technology, a science writer may describe remote sensing techniques used to detect and track volcanic eruption plumes across the planet; or under medical science, show how using supercomputer modeling can help us understand how drugs react within the body.
Science writing does not have to be about current scientific developments; it can also be about science in the past or future. Science past had its wonderful moments of serendipity; science future has its promise of a better life. And do not overlook science fiction for article ideas. After all, most people know about "warp drive," an idea often referred to on "Star Trek." A science writer might ask, "Can we go faster than the speed of light? If we could, what type of propulsion would be needed to catapult a spaceship to such speeds?"
Although there is a myriad of topics to choose from, all science and technology writing must apply to and excite the readers. Will they be able to use the discovery in the present or future? Will it help their children to live happier lives? Does the topic stimulate their imagination, and is it enjoyable to read? Or will the story tell them about a person, place, or thing that they never knew about before?
Now that you have decided to try your hand at writing science, you will need the following:
* Intense curiosity. When you are curious about a subject in science, you are more apt to dig deeper, ask for more explanation--and your enthusiasm will show in your writing. An editor once told me, "The attention span of the reader is directly proportional to the writer's interest in the story."
* An interest in research. You may have all the curiosity about a subject, but you also need the tenacity to do the research. Science writers today have it easier than they did in the past: We have access to tremendous amounts of information, not only in libraries, but through computer communication services, where you can find articles on your subjects and leads to help you find other sources.
* Ability to recognize a good idea for a science article. A good idea for a science article is not "DNA"; a good science article idea is how DNA is being used as genetic "fingerprints" in crime investigations--and how it is also under fire because the technique is so new. Article ideas are everywhere, but the science writer has to know how to focus on that one kernel of interest.
* Contacts and sources to interview. A science writer's most valued possession is his or her contact/source list: past interviewees (experts in the fields you are writing about), reference librarians, earlier contacts from science conferences, public information offices of science-oriented institutions, organizations, and universities--and, of course, other science writers.
* Insistence on accuracy. The science writer's creed, to borrow from Thoreau, should read, "Simplicity, simplicity--not to mention accuracy, accuracy."
* Good interpretative skills. Science writers have a serious responsibility to their readers: They must interpret and present what they uncover in their research and interviews in a clear and interesting way. This interpretation is not always straightforward. I have heard it compared to translating Japanese into English: There are nuances of the Japanese culture integrated into their language that cannot be translated into English. It is often the same with explaining science to the general audiences, and as Nobel physicist Richard Feynman once said, not all science can be explained in a basic way. But do not use this as an excuse; a science writer must do the best he or she can to get the subject across to the reader.
Coming up with a good science article idea is not as difficult as it seems. There are many sources that spark ideas: newspapers, science journals, news releases, computer communication services (the ubiquitous "information highway"), and numerous publications from universities and science-oriented organizations--also other people's conversations: I began to research my article on microrobots (for Sky Magazine) when I overheard two people joking about "minimachines" taking over the planet Mars. The real microrobots may never take over the red planet, but the suggestion triggered the idea. It also started me on the trail of just how far we have come in space-oriented microrobotic research.
After you come up with a specialized science topic, your first stop should be the library to check on magazines. Read through current magazines and explore magazine topics in the Readers' Guide to Periodical Literature (and similar indexes) from the past year or so. This will help you avoid writing about an idea whose time has come and gone; also you will not send a query to a magazine that has just published an article on the same subject with the same angle. If your idea seems to be on track, then gather basic information on the subject from science magazines, brochures, encyclopedias, or books.
Next comes the query, usually a less-than-one-page "outline" (in text form) of your proposed article. The query persents your idea, sources, and credentials to the editor. A word of caution: Know your magazine. Do not send a query on industrial robotics to Woman's World, or an idea on the future of the American/Russian cooperation on the Space Station to Sailing; but also remember that certain non-science magazines will take science or technology topics, including some inflight and general audience magazines. Know your science magazines, too: Articles for Omni have a different slant from those for Popular Science.
The day the editor says, "Go for it," is the day you take all your basic information and outline-query letter, and get to work. Now is also the time to call on your sources for interviews. Some science writers write a sketchy first draft to their story before the interviews--a way to organize their thoughts and frame the questions to ask the interviewee in some semblance of order; other writers do a first draft after the interview. In either case, you will need a list of questions to ask your experts. Always remember that the only dumb question is the one you did not ask.
Writing a publishable science article takes the ability to explain complex concepts without baffling or confusing readers. One of the best approaches is to discuss the subject or idea in terms the reader can relate to. For example, in my article on agriculture in space (for Ad Astra) I wove familiar gardening terms (and references to many gardening problems) into the piece so the readers could relate to growing plants in the Space Station and beyond.
Another strategy to give your science article life is to use anecdotes. Usually, your interviewees have interesting stories to tell, such as how their discovery was made, or about the first patient to use their new drug. Since the general public often thinks of science as another world, descriptions of the scientists and their surroundings will "humanize" your article, showing that the expert has the same idiosyncrasies that we all have--right down to worries about money or celebrations of victories.
Of course, there are two more qualities that keep all science writers going: patience and perseverance. It takes patience to get an interview with a busy scientist (and sometimes you will not get the interview at all); and patience to see your words in print. Plus, it takes perseverance to understand the intricacies of your science article--and to keep up with the new science discoveries that pop up every week.
There is more than enough science to provide you with subjects for science articles. As a science writer just remember that the universe is now your beat.
Abstract: Science and technology affect our daily lives and provide a broad range of opportunities for potential science writers. Such writers should bring to their work a curiosity, interpretative skills, accuracy, research interest, and the skill to recognize a good idea.
Source Citation (MLA 7th Edition)
Barnes-Svarney, Patricia. "Science writing today and tomorrow." The Writer Nov. 1994: 15+. General OneFile. Web. 24 May 2013.
Document URL
http://go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CA15812453&v=2.1&u=22054_acld&it=r&p=GPS&sw=w
Gale Document Number: GALE|A15812453
Showing posts with label computer. Show all posts
Showing posts with label computer. Show all posts
Friday, May 24, 2013
Monday, March 5, 2012
Making House Calls Via Home Computers
Online disease management programs help the chronically ill closely monitor their conditions
IT'S BEEN THREE MONTHS since Shirl Hutton received a free personal computer from LifeMasters, a disease management company, and began using the Internet to track and monitor her heart condition. At 76, she feels more aware and in control of her health thanks to the Internet, but less in control of her new habit: Web surfing and e-mailing her children and grandchildren.
"Being on the Internet is great, but it cut into my reading time, so I've cut hack." said the energetic woman in a recent interview in her sunlit home facing the Pacific ocean in Santa Cruz. Calif. After years of taking medication for a weak heart valve, Hutton. a trim and stylish swimmer and walker, suffered a heart attack a year and a half ago.
LifeMasters, based in Newport Beach and South San Francisco, Calif., was founded in 1994 but just started marketing its programs about a year ago. Initially it is working with its HMO customers to serve patients with congestive heart failure (CHF) and diabetes, but it plans to eventually include those with lung disease and other chronic conditions.
The company appears to be the first player in the field to introduce an Internet component--thanks to an investment by Intel Corp.--to its disease management programs. Some rivals, including Cardiac Solutions, based in Buffalo Grove, ill., are planning to follow suit.
Physicians whose patients enroll in a LifeMasters program lay out a treatment program, and the company's nurses teach patients to monitor their health at home between office visits.
For those who have never used a computer or the Internet, LifeMasters' technical staff offers computer training to get them started. (Beyond the specific Intel-funded pilot programs, LifeMasters does not plan to give away PCs to patients.)
Then, like Ms. Hutton, patients log on daily from home to their password-protected, customized Web site, designed by LifeMasters, and take a few minutes to measure and report their vital signs and answer a few questions regarding their illness.
Patients are assigned a personal LifeMasters nurse (whom the company likens to a personal trainer for weightlifters), who calls them whenever they answer "yes" to the final question or report any aberration.
Nurses also call their patients every week to discuss their health in detail, including their medications and any visits they have made or might need to make to their physician.
LifeMasters executives are betting that, of the estimated 100 million chronically ill patients in the United States, the large percentage who are not in critical condition are healthy enough to use a computer and thereby take more control of their medical care.
Most of the patients it targets are over 50, and many are in their 70s and 80s.
Intel knows well that the elderly are taking to the Internet in droves. That means the promise of more Intel-inside computers, and more internet-aided LifeMasters SelfCare programs in U.S. households down the road.
According to market research firm Jupiter Communications, 14.8 percent of people over 50 have an online account. That number is expected to rise to 33.6 percent in 2003.
Hutton is one of about 150 CHF patients in Santa Cruz whom LifeMasters has enrolled in a pilot study, largely funded by Intel, through Physicians Medical Group.
A third of the patients were randomly selected to use computers to track their disease; another third are using an automated telephone system, and the rest are a control group, receiving daily calls from staff nurses.
Chris Selecky, president and chief executive officer of LifeMasters, said it's too soon to tell if patients using the company's Web-based program are making doctor or emergency room visits with less frequency, but they are clearly entering their vital data at least as regularly as they would using the more conventional interactive voice response (IVR) method.
"Our philosophy is to do whatever it takes to make patients successful," Selecky said. "That's why we use multiple systems--the phone, IVR, the Internet, and eventually paging devices. The Internet is the most cost-effective means."
The advantage of using Internet technology, she said, is that it already exists, it's flexible, it's nearly ubiquitous, and it offers the opportunity for community.
For community-building measures, LifeMasters provides bulletin boards and chat rooms for its Web-connected patients, and it encourages them to contact each other directly and to access health-related Web sites.
Selecky said managed-care companies and agencies have begun embracing the disease management concept in the past six months, partly out of a "huge backlash in public opinion" against HMOs and demands for better care, especially for the chronically ill. As part of that trend, she said, "there's been a real sea change [by health organizations] to incorporate the Internet as a tool."
Rich Jacobsen, an investment banker at Bear Steams who follows the health care industry, said LifeMasters' foray into cyberspace is well timed. With HMOs trying to cut costs, and with doctors less willing to assume the risks they might have accepted a couple of years ago, HMOs are looking for outside vendors such as disease management companies to help them improve care while curbing costs, he said.
"In general, disease management companies are offering the prospect of higher-quality care at lower cost," Jacobsen said. "LifeMasters is ahead of the game, in general, in its move to an Internet-based strategy."
The Internet strategy has helped woo investors, too. LifeMasters has received three rounds of private financing, from Weiss Peck & Greer, Pacific Venture Group, InnoCal, Vantage Point Venture Partners, and Piper Jaffray Ventures; last year Intel added to its health care investments with an undisclosed handout. Other funders did not disclose their amounts either.
And what about an "exit strategy" in this frothy market? "At this stage, I don't want to predict whether the next step will be an IPO or an acquisition or what. We're all certainly open to all those," Ledecky said of LifeMasters, which is unprofitable on top of scant, and undisclosed, revenue.
LifeMasters' key rival, Cardiac Solutions, is less enamored of the Internet. The company serves roughly 10,000 chronically ill patients, most of them suffering from heart failure.
Jean Fultin, head of marketing for Cardiac Solutions, said the company plans within the next year and a half to incorporate some aspects of Internet technology into its programs.
"We'll incorporate technology where it makes sense," Fultin said. "One pitfall of technology is that with some disease states commingled (diabetes and congestive heart failure, for instance), lots of human intervention is needed to pick up on subtle questions."
search: PERSONALIZED SERVICES
Source Citation
Moran, Susan. "Making House Calls Via Home Computers." Internet World 3 May 1999: 44. General OneFile. Web. 5 Mar. 2012.
Document URL
http://go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CA54613008&v=2.1&u=22054_acld&it=r&p=GPS&sw=w
Gale Document Number: GALE|A54613008
Online disease management programs help the chronically ill closely monitor their conditions
IT'S BEEN THREE MONTHS since Shirl Hutton received a free personal computer from LifeMasters, a disease management company, and began using the Internet to track and monitor her heart condition. At 76, she feels more aware and in control of her health thanks to the Internet, but less in control of her new habit: Web surfing and e-mailing her children and grandchildren.
"Being on the Internet is great, but it cut into my reading time, so I've cut hack." said the energetic woman in a recent interview in her sunlit home facing the Pacific ocean in Santa Cruz. Calif. After years of taking medication for a weak heart valve, Hutton. a trim and stylish swimmer and walker, suffered a heart attack a year and a half ago.
LifeMasters, based in Newport Beach and South San Francisco, Calif., was founded in 1994 but just started marketing its programs about a year ago. Initially it is working with its HMO customers to serve patients with congestive heart failure (CHF) and diabetes, but it plans to eventually include those with lung disease and other chronic conditions.
The company appears to be the first player in the field to introduce an Internet component--thanks to an investment by Intel Corp.--to its disease management programs. Some rivals, including Cardiac Solutions, based in Buffalo Grove, ill., are planning to follow suit.
Physicians whose patients enroll in a LifeMasters program lay out a treatment program, and the company's nurses teach patients to monitor their health at home between office visits.
For those who have never used a computer or the Internet, LifeMasters' technical staff offers computer training to get them started. (Beyond the specific Intel-funded pilot programs, LifeMasters does not plan to give away PCs to patients.)
Then, like Ms. Hutton, patients log on daily from home to their password-protected, customized Web site, designed by LifeMasters, and take a few minutes to measure and report their vital signs and answer a few questions regarding their illness.
Patients are assigned a personal LifeMasters nurse (whom the company likens to a personal trainer for weightlifters), who calls them whenever they answer "yes" to the final question or report any aberration.
Nurses also call their patients every week to discuss their health in detail, including their medications and any visits they have made or might need to make to their physician.
LifeMasters executives are betting that, of the estimated 100 million chronically ill patients in the United States, the large percentage who are not in critical condition are healthy enough to use a computer and thereby take more control of their medical care.
Most of the patients it targets are over 50, and many are in their 70s and 80s.
Intel knows well that the elderly are taking to the Internet in droves. That means the promise of more Intel-inside computers, and more internet-aided LifeMasters SelfCare programs in U.S. households down the road.
According to market research firm Jupiter Communications, 14.8 percent of people over 50 have an online account. That number is expected to rise to 33.6 percent in 2003.
Hutton is one of about 150 CHF patients in Santa Cruz whom LifeMasters has enrolled in a pilot study, largely funded by Intel, through Physicians Medical Group.
A third of the patients were randomly selected to use computers to track their disease; another third are using an automated telephone system, and the rest are a control group, receiving daily calls from staff nurses.
Chris Selecky, president and chief executive officer of LifeMasters, said it's too soon to tell if patients using the company's Web-based program are making doctor or emergency room visits with less frequency, but they are clearly entering their vital data at least as regularly as they would using the more conventional interactive voice response (IVR) method.
"Our philosophy is to do whatever it takes to make patients successful," Selecky said. "That's why we use multiple systems--the phone, IVR, the Internet, and eventually paging devices. The Internet is the most cost-effective means."
The advantage of using Internet technology, she said, is that it already exists, it's flexible, it's nearly ubiquitous, and it offers the opportunity for community.
For community-building measures, LifeMasters provides bulletin boards and chat rooms for its Web-connected patients, and it encourages them to contact each other directly and to access health-related Web sites.
Selecky said managed-care companies and agencies have begun embracing the disease management concept in the past six months, partly out of a "huge backlash in public opinion" against HMOs and demands for better care, especially for the chronically ill. As part of that trend, she said, "there's been a real sea change [by health organizations] to incorporate the Internet as a tool."
Rich Jacobsen, an investment banker at Bear Steams who follows the health care industry, said LifeMasters' foray into cyberspace is well timed. With HMOs trying to cut costs, and with doctors less willing to assume the risks they might have accepted a couple of years ago, HMOs are looking for outside vendors such as disease management companies to help them improve care while curbing costs, he said.
"In general, disease management companies are offering the prospect of higher-quality care at lower cost," Jacobsen said. "LifeMasters is ahead of the game, in general, in its move to an Internet-based strategy."
The Internet strategy has helped woo investors, too. LifeMasters has received three rounds of private financing, from Weiss Peck & Greer, Pacific Venture Group, InnoCal, Vantage Point Venture Partners, and Piper Jaffray Ventures; last year Intel added to its health care investments with an undisclosed handout. Other funders did not disclose their amounts either.
And what about an "exit strategy" in this frothy market? "At this stage, I don't want to predict whether the next step will be an IPO or an acquisition or what. We're all certainly open to all those," Ledecky said of LifeMasters, which is unprofitable on top of scant, and undisclosed, revenue.
LifeMasters' key rival, Cardiac Solutions, is less enamored of the Internet. The company serves roughly 10,000 chronically ill patients, most of them suffering from heart failure.
Jean Fultin, head of marketing for Cardiac Solutions, said the company plans within the next year and a half to incorporate some aspects of Internet technology into its programs.
"We'll incorporate technology where it makes sense," Fultin said. "One pitfall of technology is that with some disease states commingled (diabetes and congestive heart failure, for instance), lots of human intervention is needed to pick up on subtle questions."
search: PERSONALIZED SERVICES
Source Citation
Moran, Susan. "Making House Calls Via Home Computers." Internet World 3 May 1999: 44. General OneFile. Web. 5 Mar. 2012.
Document URL
http://go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CA54613008&v=2.1&u=22054_acld&it=r&p=GPS&sw=w
Gale Document Number: GALE|A54613008
United States Judo Association - USJA
Saturday, September 17, 2011
Returning to Myron.
"Lost Books" is a weekly series highlighting forgotten books through the prism of Tablet Magazine's and Nextbook.org's archives. So blow the dust off the cover, and begin!
Remember Me To God, Myron Kaufmann's debut novel, came out 54 years ago this month. As Josh Lambert noted on the 50th anniversary of the novel's publication, the book has fallen out of favor, though it had been initially heralded by the likes of Norman Mailer and Alfred Kazin and appeared on New York Times bestseller lists. "Even excellent books fall into obscurity all the time," Lambert explained, "no matter how popular they've beenparticularly when, like Kaufmann's, they spill out over nearly 700 pages of fine print."
The novel tells the story of a Jewish family, the Amsterdams, in 1941, a year during which the older son, Richard, manages to ascend the social ranks at Harvard and earn a coveted spot on The Harvard Lampoon and induction into the Hasty Pudding Institute. His subsequent proposal to a Radcliffe-attending society girl (named Wimsy Talbot, no less) wreaks the expected havoc within his familymaking the novel, in Lambert's comparison, the emotional equivalent of an excruciatingly slow-motion car wreck, and inspiring Jewish leaders in the late 1950s to denounce the book as a literary documentation of Kaufmann's own Jewish self-hatred.
Yet, Lambert argues, it actually offers a thorough analysis of the phenomenon of Jewish self-hatred, rather than simply serving as an example of it. "It is as an unusually evenhanded entry into this rich tradition that Remember Me to God deserves to be remembered," Lambert wrote, "and as a finely wrought triumph of midcentury realism so precise in its observation that it captures perfectly the incline of streets in Harvard Square and the musty smell inside the Lampoon castle."
Read Regatta Land, by Josh Lambert
Stephanie Butnick
Source Citation
Butnick, Stephanie. "Returning to Myron." Tablet Magazine 9 Sept. 2011. Religion and Philosophy Collection. Web. 17 Sep. 2011.
Document URL
http://go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?&id=GALE%7CA266607064&v=2.1&u=22054_acld&it=r&p=GPS&sw=w
Gale Document Number: GALE|A266607064
United States Judo Association - USJA
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