Eureka moments in science

Imagination is more important than knowledge. — Albert Einstein

Nature's Secrets by CanopyMegOlympians aim for gold medals; pro football teams strive to win the Super Bowl; some physical and medical science disciplines compete for Nobel Prizes; and actors aspire for Academy Awards. But what are the metrics of success for natural scientists? They are often defined as personal eureka moments after decades of field work, including the discovery of a new species, unearthing a new fossil, or identifying a pollinator after years of treetop observation.

Like adrenaline associated with the Olympics and Oscars, do field biologists even recognize the significance of their own eureka moments of discovery? Did Darwin jump for joy when he first saw the Galapagos finches? Did Rachel Carson take time out to drink champagne when she figured out the link between pesticides and declining songbirds? In natural sciences, most discoveries are not typically celebratory like the outcome of a Super Bowl, but require thousands of hours of data collection to produce a result — often defined as 90 percent perspiration and 10 percent inspiration.

Dr. Dan Ksepka, paleontologist at North Carolina State University, recently hit a proverbial home run in natural science circles, sharing two major discoveries. Ksepka was part of a team that uncovered the world’s largest penguin, a New Zealand fossil bird that stood over 4 feet tall back in the Oligocene period, approximately 27 million years ago. Several months later, Ksepka shared another spotlight with South American colleague Edwin Cadena to announce their discovery of the world’s largest turtle from a coal mine in Colombia. Billed as “larger than a Smart car,” this enormous freshwater turtle lived some 58 million years ago alongside 50-foot snakes and larger-than-life alligators.

Such fossil discoveries took several years to unearth and write up for publication, but now represent important puzzle pieces to reconstruct how animals in the fossil record dealt with changes in global temperatures. When asked about the emotion of these eureka discoveries, Ksepka said, “Nothing is more exciting than being the first person to lay eyes on a fossil. It starts a wellspring of a hundred questions: What species does this belong to? How much of the skeleton is in the rock below? Do we have something completely new?”

On a similar note, Cadena said, “Wow, this is really big! No one has reported a turtle this big for this period of time, and I am the first in to discover it. I was alone in that particular region of the pit and I started screaming, trying to bring the attention of the other geologists that were 100 meters away.” Both paleontologists had the unusual privilege of recognizing they had unearthed a major discovery, despite the fact that it took several years of sweat and toil to transport, measure, analyze and write up their research into the requisite peer-reviewed scientific journals.

Although not quite in the same league as the winners of the Super Bowl, these scientists experienced a spotlight after their discoveries, thanks to new technologies that now transmit information around the world in seconds. The giant penguin went viral on the Internet, creating a buzz on Twitter, Facebook and throughout blogs and other virtual journalism. In addition to exposure through social media, the giant fossil turtle was formally announced at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences multimedia theater, with its capacity to transmit scientific discoveries to millions via virtual connectivity.

Such new modes of communication may not quite achieve the hype of the Oscars, but they come closer to offering science a rightful spotlight to celebrate achievements, and when scientists share their discoveries with students using new technologies, they may create the aura of a science Super Bowl to inspire the next generation of scientists.

Meg Lowman, a longtime Sarasota-based scientist and educator, is chief of science and sustainability at the California Academy of Sciences.

Originally posted in the Sarasota Herald-Tribune.