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Opinion
Nature 389, 1 (4 September 1997) | doi:10.1038/37816
Obstacles of nomenclature
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Abstract
Most disciplines know how to handle the naming of newly discovered objects. Not so the molecular biologists, whose profligate and undisciplined labelling is hampering communication.
There is nothing that impedes comprehension as much as unfamiliar words, but when things are discovered they need to be named. Time was when discoverers were rewarded by the incorporation of their own names into the language of science: the ampere, the dalton, Le Chatelier's principle, and so on.
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