The NIH Catalyst Celebrates 30 Years

BY LAURA STEPHENSON CARTER

“Welcome to the first issue of The NIH Catalyst, a publication that we have designed for you, the intramural scientists at NIH,” the Deputy Director for Intramural Research (DDIR) Lance Liotta and editors of the publication announced in the February 1993 issue. “In each issue, this bimonthly newsletter will showcase the excellent scientific research being conducted here at NIH and serve as an interactive communication mechanism where ideas are exchanged, opinions voiced, and issues examined. The purpose is to create a forum that both allows scientists at all levels to advise policy development and promotes cross-fertilization of research insights and collaborations across institutes. Our goal: Extend the spirit of the NIH Research Festival throughout the year.”

The seed for the The NIH Catalyst was planted six years after the annual Research Festival began in 1986. In 1992, when then-NIH-Director Bernadine Healy was interviewing people for Deputy Director for Intramural Research (DDIR), she asked them to write an essay about what they would do in the job.

One of the candidates, John Gallin, who was at that time the Scientific Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), wrote that NIH needed a campus newsletter for intramural scientists and even suggested that it be called the Catalyst. Although Healy chose Liotta as DDIR, she liked Gallin’s idea so much that she encouraged Liotta to start a publication. He did, named it The NIH Catalyst, and invited Gallin to be Deputy Editor. Gallin later became the Director of the NIH Clinical Center and has held other leadership roles, but he has remained an Editor of The NIH Catalyst. (Read the interview with Gallin in this issue.)

In that first issue of the Catalyst, the editors reported on a new tenure-track policy, plans to renovate Building 41 so it could become a high-containment facility for research on multidrug-resistant tuberculosis, conclusions from a task force on the status of women to help improve the NIH environment for women scientists, and several science stories.

The NIH Catalyst has continued to cover stories about intramural researchers and their discoveries, announce scientific resources, and report other news. There were even cartoons in the 1990s: NCI postdoctoral fellow Alex Dent entertained readers with humorous comics depicting the challenges of being a postdoc and an NIH scientist. He’s now a Professor of Microbiology and Immunology at the Indiana University School of Medicine in Indianapolis. In 2020, the Editors found a cartoonist to create “Nine Types of NIH Zoom Callers,” in Dent’s style, published in the July-August 2020 issue (https://irp.nih.gov/catalyst/28/4/nine-types-of-nih-zoom-callers).

During this year, The NIH Catalyst will be highlighting some of the stories that appeared in the earlier years and compare them with what’s happening now. The Editors may ask for your help in describing how things have changed at your institute or center since the Catalyst was launched in 1993. We hope you also join the conversation on Twitter using the hashtag #NIHCatalyst30.

The Back Story

The People

In 1994, Michael Gottesman took over as Publisher of The NIH Catalyst when he became the new DDIR, succeeding Lance Liotta, who had returned to the National Cancer Institute (NCI) as Chief of the Laboratory of Pathology. Liotta remained as one of the Editors until he left NIH in 2005. Gottesman returned to his NCI lab full-time as Chief of the Laboratory of Cell Biology in 2022. He hasn’t cut his ties with the Catalyst, however—he’s joined the Editorial Advisory Board. Nina F. Schor is the new DDIR…and Publisher of The NIH Catalyst.

The Catalyst’s Editorial Advisory Board began in 1993 with first two and then a dozen members (Gottesman was one of the original members and so was current board member Bernard Moss of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases). The Editorial Board has 16 members today, including a postdoctoral fellow. In addition, other Editors have included Scientists Emeriti—the late Henry Metzger, Paul Plotz, and Richard Chadwick, who’s a current Editor. (See the whole list of past and current editors, staff, and interns below; current staff and Editorial Board members are listed at https://irp.nih.gov/catalyst/about-the-nih-catalyst.)

Core staff at The NIH Catalyst has included a Scientific Editor (Celia Hooper, who served from 1993-2006)); Managing Editors—Seema Kumar (1993-1994), the late Rebecca Kohlberg (1994-1996); Fran Pollner (1996-2008), and Laura Stephenson Carter (2009-2023); Director of Communications for the Office of Intramural Research—Christopher Wanjek (2007-present); Senior Science Writer-Editor Michael Tabasko (2021-present); Copy Editors Darcie Johnson (1993), Cynthia Allen (1993-1997), and Shauna Roberts (1998-present); and editorial assistants and interns. Most of the articles today are written by postdocs and postbacs, who are coached by Catalyst staff to become effective science communicators. Some have switched careers from the bench to jobs in policy, communications, and outreach. And a few postbacs have enrolled in journalism school.

The Production

The look of The NIH Catalyst has changed from a simple two-color print-only newsletter with black and white photos, to today’s more sophisticated four-color publication. In 1994, the website was launched, but it was only accessible within NIH and only featured two-color pdfs. In 2007, Christopher Wanjek arranged to make the Catalyst accessible to the public; in 2008, he converted the website version of the publication to full color although the print issue was still being produced in two-color with black and white photos. The print issue was redesigned by The NIH Catalyst Managing Editor Laura Stephenson Carter and NIH Medical Arts so it would be full color. In 2011, in collaboration with the Intramural Research Program web team, the Catalyst website was redesigned so it could host web pages as well as pdfs; it’s been updated several times since.

In the early 1990s, the publication process involved the use of mail, phone, and faxes for reviewing manuscripts.

“At one time, I received…the pages in layout form by fax, and they were hard to read,” said Shauna Roberts, who’s been the Catalyst Copy Editor since 1998. “Now editing is simpler because I receive the articles [in manuscript form] by email and send them back the same way.”

In the 1990s, the editors saved the Catalyst to disks that a courier from the printing company picked up; the printer brought back a blueline (proofs made from film onto paper with a bluish tint) for the editors to review and correct. Bluelines were replaced by color proofs. Today, files are uploaded to the printer’s website and pdfs of each issue are emailed back to the editors for approval.

You’ll find current and past issues of the Catalyst on its website. Issues from 1993 to 2011 are merely posted pdf versions of the print editions. From 2011 to today, individual articles are posted on web pages, and pdfs of the print issues are also posted online.

INTERESTING FACTS

• Feb 1993—first issue of The NIH Catalyst
• May/Jun 1995—contributing writers list began
• Nov/Dec 2008—first full-color issue of The NIH Catalyst (online only)
• May/Jun 2010—photographers and illustrators listed for first time
• Sept/Oct 2010—redesigned The NIH Catalyst (also first color issue in print)
• Jul/Aug 2011—new web design (Drupal 7)
• May/Jun 2020: first COVID-19 timeline published (for Jan/April 2020)
• Nov/Dec 2022: website updated with new version of Drupal (Drupal 9)

Publishers

• Michael Gottesman (Mar 1994-Jul/Aug 2022)
• Nina F. Schor (Sep/Oct 2022-present)

Editors

• Lance Liotta (Jan 1993-May/Jun 2005)
• John Gallin (Deputy Editor, Jan 1993-Mar/Apr 2023)
• Christopher Wanjek, Director of Communications, OIR (Jan/Feb 2007-present)

Editors (Scientist Emeritus)

• Henry Metzger (Mar/Apr 2006-Mar/Apr 2015) [died November 20, 2018]
• Paul Plotz (May/Jun 2015-May/Jun 2019)
• Richard Chadwick (Jul/Aug 2019-present)

Managing Editors

• Seema Kumar (Jan 1993-Sep/Oct 1994)
• Rebecca Kohlberg (Nov/Dec 1994-Sep/Oct 1996) [died February 10, 2023]
• Fran Pollner (Nov/Dec 1996-May/Jun 2008)
• Laura Stephenson Carter (Feb 2009-Mar 31, 2023; Editor-in-Chief in Jan 2018)
• Jennifer Harker (NIEHS), Acting Managing Editor (Feb 2023-Jun 2023)

Scientific Editor

• Celia Hooper (Apr 1993-Mar/Apr 2006)

Editorial Assistants (some overlap)

• Loma Heartley (May/Jun 1993-Sep/Oct 1996)
• Beverly Stuart (Sep/Oct 1996-Sep/Oct 1997)
• David Ehrenstein (May/Jun 1997)—then writing intern in Jul 1997)

Senior Science Writer-Editor

• Michael Tabasko (May/Jun 2021-present)

Copyeditors

• Darcie Johnston (Feb 1993)
• Cynthia Allen (Apr 1993-Nov/Dec 1997)
• Shauna Roberts (Jan/Feb 1998-current)

Photographer

• Ralph Isenberg (Jul/Aug 1996-Jan/Feb 1997)

Cartoonist

• Alex Dent (Jan 1994 through the 1990s)

Interns

• Katie O’Brien (May/Jun 1995-Sep/Oct 1995)
• Jennifer King (Mar/Apr 1996-Jul/Aug 1996)
• David Ehrenstein (Jul/Aug 1997)
• Janet Yee (Jul/Aug 1997-Sep/Oct 1997)
• Lee Mack (Nov/Dec 1997-Mar/Apr 1998)
• Margaret Coulombe (Sep/Oct 2000-Jan/Feb 2001)
• Peter Kozel (Jul/Aug 2003-Nov/Dec 2003; contributing writer Jan/Feb 2004)
• Heather Dolan (Jan/Feb 2012-Sep/Oct 2012)
• Tonia Lombo (Nov-Dec 2012-Mar/Apr 2013)
• Jennifer Sargent (Jul/Aug 2013-Jan/Feb 2014)
• Soma Chowdhury (Nov/Dec 2014-Sep/Oct 2015)
• Victoria Tong (Jul/Aug 2022; returning in summer 2023)