{"title":"The Serendipity of Discovery: Life of a Geochemist.","authors":"Willard S Moore","doi":"10.1146/annurev-marine-050823-103645","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>My strategy for writing this autobiography is to use examples of how working on seemingly different projects can often lead to outcomes more important than originally envisioned. Serendipity is a happy accident-specifically, the accident of discovering something useful without directly looking for it. This often occurs when two research projects converge unexpectedly. The main text contains examples of how serendipity has led me to important discoveries, including (<i>a</i>) finding surprisingly high 228Ra activities in the ocean; (<i>b</i>) developing a means of rapidly and quantitatively extracting radium from seawater; (<i>c</i>) devising a rapid, sensitive method of measuring 224Ra and 223Ra; (<i>d</i>) realizing the scale and biogeochemical importance of submarine groundwater discharge; and (<i>e</i>) conceiving a method to estimate the total flux of submarine groundwater discharge to the Atlantic Ocean. The <b>Supplemental Material</b> fleshes out details of these discoveries and places them in the context of my other investigations.</p>","PeriodicalId":55508,"journal":{"name":"Annual Review of Marine Science","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":14.3000,"publicationDate":"2024-08-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Annual Review of Marine Science","FirstCategoryId":"89","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-marine-050823-103645","RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"地球科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"GEOCHEMISTRY & GEOPHYSICS","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
My strategy for writing this autobiography is to use examples of how working on seemingly different projects can often lead to outcomes more important than originally envisioned. Serendipity is a happy accident-specifically, the accident of discovering something useful without directly looking for it. This often occurs when two research projects converge unexpectedly. The main text contains examples of how serendipity has led me to important discoveries, including (a) finding surprisingly high 228Ra activities in the ocean; (b) developing a means of rapidly and quantitatively extracting radium from seawater; (c) devising a rapid, sensitive method of measuring 224Ra and 223Ra; (d) realizing the scale and biogeochemical importance of submarine groundwater discharge; and (e) conceiving a method to estimate the total flux of submarine groundwater discharge to the Atlantic Ocean. The Supplemental Material fleshes out details of these discoveries and places them in the context of my other investigations.
期刊介绍:
The Annual Review of Marine Science, published since 2009, offers a comprehensive overview of the field. It covers various disciplines, including coastal and blue water oceanography (biological, chemical, geological, and physical), ecology, conservation, and technological advancements related to the marine environment. The journal's transition from gated to open access through Annual Reviews' Subscribe to Open program ensures that all articles are available under a CC BY license, promoting wider accessibility and dissemination of knowledge.