Publications, Metrics and Reputation

 Here is an email I sent to my students about publications and reputation based on a recent paper that just appeared online.  I have removed names to conceal the names of parties that might prefer to remain anonymous.

Dear all,

A conversation about publications often comes up between graduate students and their research mentors.  I know that we have talked about this multiple times.  A valid concern of many students is the strength of their publications record, which is used by future academic employers.  It is easy to count numbers of publications or metrics such as the h-index, but an individual’s reputation is based on substance not simplistic numbers.

First, the research itself must be interesting and useful to others.  There are many papers that wow me even if I never cite them in my own research, winning my highest respect for those who create such gems.  You should work hard and enjoy the process of making new discoveries, and then hold yourselves to the highest standards for the work that you produce.  This is what will open doors to future employment.

The email below from one of my colleagues serves as an example of the reputation that you should seek to build over time.  I hope that this kind of feedback motivates you to persevere through the next phase of your work.  I certainly look forward to all the new insights that we will gain.

To conclude, I congratulate you for your contributions to this work.  I know that some of you were frustrated having to rebuild experiments, repeat measurements, and rewrite the manuscript an endless number of times as we found errors in the calculations and problems with the apparatus.  But in the end, I am proud of the final product, which I believe will be of use to others.

Happy New Year!

 

Best,

Mark G. Kuzyk

Regents Professor of Physics

Washington State University

Pullman, WA 99164-2814

 

Phone: 509-335-4672

Fax: 509-335-7816

 

Web Page: www.NLOsource.com

 

From: [Colleague]
Sent: Wednesday, December 29, 2021 9:11 AM
To: Kuzyk, Mark G <kuz@wsu.edu>; Mark G. Kuzyk <mgk.wsu@gmail.com>
Subject: Fwd: [Applied Sciences] Manuscript ID: applsci-1500266; doi: 10.3390/app12010315. Paper has been published.

Dear Mark,

I forwarded this new paper to my group members. You never cease to amaze me with the thoroughness and rigor of your research. What an amazing piece this last report is! We have a lot to learn from you, indeed.

I will enjoy reading the paper. I hope we can meet up at some point to continue our discussions. [My senior student] will be graduating in January and he wants to pursue a career in the corporate world. I have another student who is a bright and enthusiastic, and we can consider sending him to your lab, if the things with the pandemic get better.

Take care of your health,

[Colleague]

---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: Applied Sciences Editorial Office <applsci@mdpi.com>
Date: Wed, Dec 29, 2021 at 5:02 PM
Subject: [Applied Sciences] Manuscript ID: applsci-1500266; doi: 10.3390/app12010315. Paper has been published.
To: Colleague
Cc: Applied Sciences Editorial Office <applsci@mdpi.com>, Keira Wang <keira.wang@mdpi.com>

Dear [Professor],

We are pleased to inform you that "Photothermal and Reorientational
Contributions to the Photomechanical Response of DR1 Azo Dye-Doped PMMA
Fibers" by Zoya Ghorbanishiadeh, Bojun Zhou, Morteza Sheibani Karkhaneh,
Rebecca Oehler, Mark G. Kuzyk * has been published in Applied Sciences as
part of the Special Issue Composite and Smart Materials: Theory, Methods and
Applications and is available online:

Abstract: https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.mdpi.com_2076-2D3417_12_1_315&d=DwIDaQ&c=slrrB7dE8n7gBJbeO0g-IQ&r=8Rjnp4aNhHPBrmgt9k4Q6f-pu3z01qzkXZBySmc4rd8&m=o0b_FSbvMnSOnSSq65_Iqvm2Lzwws_d1R8DePemMmvVRGF0JjKCizRgc6-aV4Ati&s=NKk5yL3BySXUrbhhOaPR0aUISAStEHsLXfIt9ZbVctk&e=
HTML Version: https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.mdpi.com_2076-2D3417_12_1_315_htm&d=DwIDaQ&c=slrrB7dE8n7gBJbeO0g-IQ&r=8Rjnp4aNhHPBrmgt9k4Q6f-pu3z01qzkXZBySmc4rd8&m=o0b_FSbvMnSOnSSq65_Iqvm2Lzwws_d1R8DePemMmvVRGF0JjKCizRgc6-aV4Ati&s=t6QVhD-mbZqQY846ZCCoE2JzF67xY6qSi5A7TOImY3k&e=
PDF Version: https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.mdpi.com_2076-2D3417_12_1_315_pdf&d=DwIDaQ&c=slrrB7dE8n7gBJbeO0g-IQ&r=8Rjnp4aNhHPBrmgt9k4Q6f-pu3z01qzkXZBySmc4rd8&m=o0b_FSbvMnSOnSSq65_Iqvm2Lzwws_d1R8DePemMmvVRGF0JjKCizRgc6-aV4Ati&s=KrUea9tNwtMeC4JC2sXiRHNYB_UMo3nUyRQqeZfdlq4&e=
Special Issue:
https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.mdpi.com_journal_applsci_special-5Fissues_composite-5Fsmart-5Fmaterials&d=DwIDaQ&c=slrrB7dE8n7gBJbeO0g-IQ&r=8Rjnp4aNhHPBrmgt9k4Q6f-pu3z01qzkXZBySmc4rd8&m=o0b_FSbvMnSOnSSq65_Iqvm2Lzwws_d1R8DePemMmvVRGF0JjKCizRgc6-aV4Ati&s=8xdNAgcPAFbBFvgIf7SzfgeGSZTqc2tWgqC4aTa4zB4&e=

New Insights into the Obvious

The number of posts I publish here tends to rise around the holidays, when demands on my time temporarily wane, giving me time to think about interesting topics and reflect on life.  I reread a post from a while back, which talked about my frustrations with the hectic nature of my job and my desire to spend more time on deeper thought.  Click here for that post.  My goal was to understand some of the deeper consequences of quantum mechanics and how it underpins thermodynamics/statistical mechanics.

I have approached this goal over the last half decade by rethinking the most basic foundations of quantum mechanics; those topics that students quickly leapfrog to progress to the next stage of solving real research problems.  I find the need to build my intuition by mulling over these basics, perseverating over them until the meaning infuses my brain.  Once it becomes second nature, I can build on these foundations.

In the process skimming through typical textbooks, I found that the connection between quantum mechanics and density operators is not well made.  So, I wrote a simple two-page manuscript with a simple example that illustrates the important facts and submitted it to the American Journal of Physics.  One of the reviewers stated, “Reading this very short and sweet manuscript taught me something about density operators that I did not appreciate before; something that seems vitally important for both students -and- the general interested physicist to understand…

“The main thing I learned by reading this manuscript is that the apparent classical mixture form of the density matrix -always- originates from a purely quantum effect - entanglement with the environment. I almost cannot believe that I did not appreciate that before - interaction with the environment is certainly presented as the main issue to be solved in any open quantum system textbook. But the formalism obscures this, and I think I had come away with the impression that at least in some cases, the density matrix was really just used to represent a classical mixture. The use of the simple example here makes it extremely intuitive and obvious, which I think is just as the authors intended. However, I suggest three changes that I think will make this manuscript even better...”

I find AJP a wonderful journal, authored and read by people who enjoy learning and appreciate new insights or an unexpected twist on a well-worn topic.

At the other extreme, we just had a paper accepted that developed two different models of how light can affect the mechanical properties of matter and used these models to interpret experiments to determine the underlying mechanisms.

This break I plan on continuing my work on a new project related to quantum computing, which is particularly exciting to me because it will require learning a lot of new material.

Stay tuned!