Saturday, January 25, 2014

You shall not covet (PRLs)

Dear Diary,

Physical Review Letters is upping the difficulty to get in once again.  The premiere physics journal previously set the bar higher and is now doing so again to make itself more prestigious.

That's bad news for all of us in the group.  Kieron has declared that we should shoot for more papers in this journal before we graduate.  You know what they say, Diary:  When the submission criteria get tougher, the graduate students stay longer.  Kieron's really good at these things (look at the track record!), but I can't help but be tremulous.

Especially so since I just got rejected from the journal for my old research, and I'm due for another rejection on a second paper, shortly.  The reviews have seemed really...well, I thought I'd said very clearly we were in the opposite limit from what they wanted to compare...and sometimes they come right out and say mean things.  I'll try to stay positive, though, and remember the reviewers are just trying to do their job.  PRLs are supposed to be hard to get.  Maybe I can pick up a few tips on a thick skin from Kieron.

Anyway, I guess there's no point in doing bad work to get into a worse journal (one must graduate!). But even if you do good work, it has to sell...I guess...It could be that some papers with good work just can't be shortened into three pages.  Maybe we'll be able to bust out a better paper in some other journal with all the free space for every detail we want...

...well...I'll get back to it...I guess...Maybe I can make progress on that calculation Kieron wanted me to do.

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