History of Our Collaboration

We met for the first time when Paul, a neuroscientist and biomedical engineer, was a new assistant professor seeking his first NIH R01 grant and trying to get his first sole-author manuscript published. First submissions of both failed, and the critiques focused on unclear writing. Paul contacted a local university, looking for help with scientific writing, and he was directed to Sandra, a discourse linguist with expertise in technical writing and scientific English. After a 2-month, intensive one-on-one training program, he resubmitted both documents. The grant was funded and the manuscript was accepted. Since then, Paul and Sandra have maintained a close relationship, both professionally and as friends. They began a study of narratives to grant proposals that continues to this day.

Fifteen years later, when Paul became the head of his research institute, he hired Sandra as a full-time scientific writer and editor. In 3 years, 21 of the 22 faculty members had at least one NIH R01, and the institute became the second best-funded department in the university.

Sandra and Paul decided to put what they had learned from studying narratives and helping investigators write and revise narratives into book form in order to share this experience with other researchers. This book is the result of that effort.