I read an article in this past weekend’s Boston Sunday Globe about the importance of physical proximity in successful research. Drawn from a wide body of information, the story highlights the importance of day-to-day physical interaction between researchers in the biosciences. Researchers found that scientific articles by proximate first and last co-authors received more citations than others. Given our general desire for communication between colleagues, friends and mentors, it would be interesting to see this research extended to other scientific disciplines.
The article cited in the globe’s story is available on the PLoS ONE website.
