Talk:Frederic M. Richards

Request for assessment/feedback
I've been extensively rewriting and expanding this article on Fred Richards, which was originally a stub and rather unbalanced. Since I have never done any assessment myself, and don't really have any feel at all about what the different quality class descriptions actually mean in practice, I'd really appreciate some feedback from those of you who understand the process better. We'll need such knowledge as the WikiProject Biophysics goes forward. Thanks in advance for whatever people can do! Dcrjsr (talk) 00:31, 14 May 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm rating it a C. The scientific biography is probably GA-quality but the article is short of personal details. For example, is anything known about his earlier life? Did he have a family? Where did he live? I have added an infobox and you can have a look at the empty fields for some other facts it would be nice to have (open the article in the editor). Also, the timeline doesn't have any citations. You might try getting some help at WikiProject Biography because some people there are very good at digging this kind of stuff up. RockMagnetist (talk) 04:50, 14 May 2012 (UTC)


 * Thank you very much! There's actually a lot more info available on both timeline and family, from the first 5 or 6 refs, so I'll work on adding things.  I'm also trying to get a free image of him. Should I include quotes from his retrospectives/obituaries? Dcrjsr (talk) 03:02, 15 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Sure. RockMagnetist (talk) 04:22, 15 May 2012 (UTC)
 * This is in pretty good shape now. I'm mainly waiting on permission from his daughter to use a photo, and perhaps something more should be added from his writeup about the Carlsberg lab visit.  Then I'll ask for another assessment.Dcrjsr (talk) 14:00, 30 May 2012 (UTC)

Request for further assessment
This now has the photo, more personal and other information, and the list of highly-cited papers has been updated. So I would be extremely grateful for further assessment from anyone willing to do that. - 152.16.223.249 (talk) 23:57, 15 June 2012 (UTC)
 * I don't have time to review it thoroughly, but I can offer a few quick comments. First, it probably qualifies for GA already, and at worst only needs a few minor tweaks. I have two comments:
 * In a GA review, you may be asked to convert the numbered list of research areas to a plain paragraph. Also, claims about some achievement being the first (e.g., point 1) should be supported by a third-party reference.
 * The citation to Web of Science in Important papers has the drawback that an account is needed to access it. Maybe you could cite a Google Scholar search as well.

RockMagnetist (talk) 18:49, 19 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Thanks very much for the good suggestions!
 * What is the rationale for preferring a paragraph structure? I'd originally written it that way and felt it was very hard to read and digest in that form, and that the list was more clear and understandable.  I can certainly change it back, but don't see the advantage.
 * I think I can document the "first" claim, but if not I'll remove it. Good point.
 * I'll try Google Scholar on documenting the citations. Web of Science provides the verifiability that was asked for, but I definitely see the issue about more open access. - 50.105.26.78 (talk) 03:17, 20 June 2012 (UTC)


 * The paragraph structure is just a guideline (see Prose versus lists), so if it's clearer that way you might as well leave it.RockMagnetist (talk) 04:33, 20 June 2012 (UTC)


 * Note that the references to the important papers can be linked. I have edited the first link to paper #1 to show how it is done. RockMagnetist (talk) 04:49, 20 June 2012 (UTC)


 * Linking the "paper #_" is a really good idea - thanks! I've tried Google Scholar, and it's not really suitable for this.  I expect the problem is that it doesn't go back far enough in years.  The upshot is that it sees only 5 papers >500 cites not 10 - e.g., it gives only 237 for the Richards box paper.  Should I put in some sort of note about this? - Dcrjsr (talk) 13:19, 20 June 2012 (UTC)


 * On second thought, the list may violate the original research policy. Not only does it require a search in a database, but you have to be aware that an article on a tumor-suppressor gene is by a different FM Richards even though Web of Science puts it in the same author set. I have looked at a few FA-class biographies (for example, Alfred Russel Wallace); most just call the section Selected papers and don't provide statistics. RockMagnetist (talk) 15:54, 20 June 2012 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the warning about this issue; I know I have problems keeping to NOR, but would not have anticipated such a stringent interpretation here. Actually it's not at all difficult to prune the list correctly - you don't get the tumor-suppressor guy if you just add "Yale" to the search, which I did after the first time. (I'm really looking forward to when ORCID goes live, and we'll be able to search on unique author IDs!)  In the other direction, I'm uncomfortable with calling it "selected", because that could well be entirely subjective.  How about I keep to the strict facts and call it a list of "highly cited papers"?  I'll take a look at Alfred Russell Wallace for guidance on content and style. - 69.105.233.23 (talk) 05:54, 21 June 2012 (UTC)


 * Sorry - I'm tired & forgot to log in first. - Dcrjsr (talk) 06:13, 21 June 2012 (UTC)


 * The Alfred Russel Wallace piece really is interesting and impressively complete. Fred Richards is not in at the same level of lay interest, controversy, and book-length documentation.  Do articles ever make it to FA without that high degree of notability?  I'm only used to featured pictures on Commons, which do not require it - but then, images have the visual appeal and technical quality aspect to judge.  I'll troll around at Biography and look for some FAs of recent scientists. - Dcrjsr (talk) 14:39, 21 June 2012 (UTC)


 * The article now has a good picture for the personal bio section, more information on the other research areas, and all refs with consistent format. Given how few good bios of contemporary scientists there are, I've upped its importance to WikiProject Biophysics to "High", and changed its quality class to B (it's most definitely at least that good). - Dcrjsr (talk) 15:53, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

I was really happy to see this wonderful biography on Fred Richards while gathering information for a review on validation of protein structure. This is a "Britannica" class entry useful for experts working in the field as well as lay readers.

Arguably Richards was the originator or at least most important champion of a "packing" perspective on the stability of folded proteins (though it draws heavily from Bernal's earlier work and was also developed by Kitaigorodski for organic crystals)  Also arguably, our current understanding of folded globular protein shape rests on three legs: (i)  the geometric packing perspective of Richards; (ii) the thermodynamic hydrophobicity doctrine of Kauzmann; and (iii) the evolutionary sequence dogma of Anfinsen.

Certainly this is George Rose's view as stated in the Richards biography at Pioneers in Biology. He says:"In contributions to theory, Fred has pioneered the use of surface area and volume to understand protein folding. More than others, this productive approach has been his creation. ... His 1977 review of these topics (F. M. Richards Ann. Rev. Biophys. Bioeng. 1977, 6: 151-176) is a durable masterpiece that spawned a field and, without exaggeration, influenced thousands of working biochemists. Later, with T. Richmond and F. Cohen, this geometric approach was extended to show that excluded volume limits folding to a remarkable degree."

One criticism: Richards' research contributions in (i) solvent accessible surface; (ii) mathematical descriptions of protein packing; (iii) rotamer libraries; (iv) protein engineering; and (v) pressure studies of protein structure are -- in the current article draft -- unpacked and scattered. I personally think that all these contributions are part of a broader "geometric packing perspective" on protein stability and function. This contribution was in my view greater than the sum its parts. So it might benefit from being gathered together.

Specifically in this vein, the word count for the solvent accessible surface -- though perhaps commensurate with the publication citation rating -- is in my view disproportionate to its actual scientific contribution. So this might be contracted. I think the development of rotamer libraries -- which was seen in conception as stepping stone to protein engineering -- is at least as important. So this might be expanded. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Prisant (talk • contribs) 17:39, 12 July 2012 (UTC)


 * Rewrite done, that incorporates nearly all of the suggested modifications above; it does seem better this way. Dcrjsr (talk) 05:01, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

Support re-nomination for FA once outstanding issues addressed
Hi Dcrjsr and Graham Beards,

I support re-nomatination and re-review of this article for Featured Article once the (IMHO) relatively minor issues from the previous Featured Article review have been addressed. In addition to not being sure if principal author meta:User:Dcrjsr supported the featured article nomination, it cited IMHO relatively minor stylistic and technical problems with the article. One of the first things mentioned was the technical error, which turned out to be a duplicate volume parameter that I have just now fixed. The other stylistic and citation issues seem very technical and straightforward to fix. The major concern seemed to be whether or not article principal article authormeta:User:Dcrjsr supported the nomination; given that this is noted professor Jane S. Richardson in real life it is perhaps not surprising that she may have greater concerns on her plate than an FA nomination. But this seems very close to being accepted (IMHO) so worth the effort to reach FA status and get Prof. Richardson's work here recognized. --Prot783 (talk) 16:19, 26 December 2015 (UTC)

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