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Pop quiz: Which of these sentences is more interesting?

1. We did the experiment, and it was a vivid example of the power of broccoli to make kids gag.

2. We performed the experiment, which vividly demonstrated the power of broccoli to make kids gag.

You chose the second one, right?  (Please make my former English teacher heart happy and say you did.)  That’s the power of verbs other than “to be” and “to do,” my friends.

The Edge for Scholars’ favorite scientific editor, Hope Lafferty, has a video all about why you should think carefully about your choice of verbs and how to replace too-common, too-boring ones.  Grant reviewers and journal editors want to be excited by your work.  Help them out by making your writing exciting, too.

…But don’t go too far.  “If a variety of verbs is good, then surely a cornucopia of nouns is even better!”  Not really.  Nouns are your anchors.  Get too wild, and readers will lose track of exactly what you’re trying to say.  In a post about noun consistency, Hope writes, “In scientific writing, compliance and adherence are my two favorite examples. Clinical researchers might not see any problem with alternating these words for the same concept. Epidemiologists, however, would find the mixed use confusing. Some readers would too, especially if the terms keep switching in the text. We were talking about compliance. Now we’re talking about adherence. Did I miss something? Readers believe it’s their problem, when it’s really a problem with the writing.”

You can write crystal clear prose that still thrills your reader. Use consistent nouns and vary your verbs to talk about the same thing in exciting ways.

Sitting with a stack of 40 grants to review is a sure way to get focused on what makes a grant submission strong. The following pointers are from Dr. Chris Eischen, a multi-R01 funded cancer investigator and Associate Professor at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. Listen up.  As a grantsmanship heavy hitter and NCI study section member, she knows what she is talking about:

1. Make sure you are asking an important question for the field, and also make sure it is not an incremental advance.
2. Provide preliminary data to support each aim.
3. Write for a general audience, but make sure there are some details that only experts will know; in other words, do not assume experts in your field will review it, but if they do, you need to look like you have a depth of knowledge.
4. Be clear and concise throughout and provide logical, understandable lines of thought for what you are proposing and why you are proposing it.
5. Emphasize the importance of the research proposed to humans.
6. Start writing a new grant months ahead of time to allow time for ideas to simmer and to obtain input from others. Have multiple people (inside and outside field) at least a month before planning on submitting critique your application.
7. Propose interesting experiments with at least some cutting-edge technology.
8. Apply to both federal and private grant agencies, but need to write differently for each.
9. When responding to grant critiques, be positive and appreciative and not angry or irritated; answer all points.
10. For the parts of the grant you lack expertise, make sure you line up collaborators and/or consultants (to help write, critique, and/or just help with experiments if funded).