It's incredible to see that one of our papers has exceeded 1,000 reads in just over a year, with more than 20 citations. This might seem like a small achievement for some, but for me, it means a lot. This paper holds special significance, as it was my first publication after completing my PhD, as the first and correspondence author. I remember the first paper I wrote during my PhD—it came back from my supervisor, Dr. Jian Zhao from UNSW Sydney, covered in red ink, with edits and corrections highlighting my weak writing skills. I took all of my supervisor’s feedback seriously, learning how to write properly and improving my discussions and the overall flow of my papers. Last year, this first PhD paper even became one of the top-cited papers in the International Journal of Food Microbiology.
Looking back on where I started and where I am, I can’t express enough gratitude to my PhD supervisor. So, please don’t panic if you’re in the early stages of your PhD or career and struggling with writing, especially if you’re not a native English speaker. Having a good supervisor is key to accelerating your skills. Unfortunately, my direct PhD supervisor Jian, isn’t on LinkedIn, so he might not see the progress of one of his students. But I still want to say thank you, Jian. Although you are not an author on this paper, this achievement could not have been accomplished without your earlier support. 🙏
