I’ve just finished my first article and submitted it for review at the DU Quark. My attention is now focused on finding a new topic for my second article that I’ll have finished by the end of November. Writing for a broader, potentially non-scientific audience has proven to be challenging, but enjoyable. I am increasingly aware of a need to be simple when translating language from a scientific study to my own article. Many of the concepts that are included in research have additional contexts and subfields that are very important to the research, but not pertinent to my own writing. I find that I frequently need to parse the language, locate the key points, and apply the results to my own topic. Though this is a basic aspect of the research process, I feel that it is sometimes overlooked in its significance. Writing cross-discipline mandates that the author be able to speak and respect the discourse of one field, and then successfully interpret this information for a different readership.
In learning about hydroponics and aquaponics, I’ve also begun to appreciate the subtleties of researching even more. I was surprised to find how many sources differed across search parameters for ‘hydroponics’ and ‘vertical farming.’ They aren’t the same thing, but they are similar enough that I thought they could be interchangeable. Nope. Each individual search results in a different set of articles showing. I’ve learned that vertical farming is a kind of applied hydroponics, and while vertical farming and hydroponic articles reference one another constantly, they are different for scientists. While preparing to write my next article, I will be cognizant of the many ways that a single concept can be represented and tailor my searches accordingly.
Building Bridges 