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Social media is the rage these days and, by all accounts, the things that are driving it popularity are making business connections, job hunting and the opportunity to meet/connect with others on a pe

Social media is the rage these days and, by all accounts, the things that are driving it popularity are making business connections, job hunting and the opportunity to meet/connect with others on a personal/romantic level. While scientists are generally perceived as being less social than others, I believe that we, like most people, primarily join social networks for two reasonsjob hunting and career development or dating and sex.

With this in mind, a quick perusal of social media sites reveals that there is no shortage of social networks specifically designed for scientists for job hunting and career development. Surprisingly, there is a dearth of sites that enable scientists to connect with one another on personal or romantic levels. This doesnt make sense to me as someone who spent 12 years as a graduate student and postdoc. Lets face it, we scientists generally work long hours, dont get out of the laboratory much and generally find it hard to meet prospective mates. That is, outside of the people who we work with daily. And as I learned the hard way, workplace romances can be very tricky and uncomfortable to manage at times. But, not to worry! Yesterday, I discovered an interesting website called Science Connectionmaintained and run by the Scientist.comwhich was specifically designed as a the meeting place for single science professionals and others with an interest in science or nature. I guess you can call it match.com for scientists!

From what I could glean from its website, Science Connection was started way back in the early 1990s by erstwhile biologist Anne Lambert, with help and advice from friends who were also biologists, birders, or science types, and with the essential involvement of her friend Roy Smith, who did the original programming. The site boasts about 15,533 members and provides some cool stats on the number of matches, relationships, marriages and even children that resulted from members who joined the network. Most of SciCons members are from the United States and Canada, with small numbers from other countries and regions of the world. The scientific disciplines of its members run the gamut from physical, natural, medical and social/behavioral sciences to computers and information technology. And, some of SciCons members arent scientists but lawyers, teachers, business people, musicians and artists (science fetish?).

But, before you take the SciCon plunge, you ought to know that the average age of male members is about 49 years and for women almost 46 years. However, those averages are misleading because they were calculated from the roughly 500 members who listed their ages on their profiles. There are roughly equal numbers of men and women and the age of its members ranges from 20 to 89 years. Many members are into natural history (birding, etc.) and participate in outdoor activities. Finally, SciCon is not a free site and annual membership is $65 (~ 18 cents/day). The $65 annual fee buys you a list of all members of the opposite sex (what about same sex individuals?) and a monthly newsletter, which has mini-profiles, discussion forums and a place where members can announce get-togethers in their area. Member Polylogue includes in-depth analyses of cyber romance, the perils of over-50 dating and friendships that bud into romance. If the $65 annual fee is too steep a price to pay for love, then you might want to consider a three month membership which costs only $30 (~33 cents/day). However, as stated on the website, the $65 annual membership represents the the best value.

While I had never heard of the Science Connection before, the network has been reviewed many times in the past by a variety of media outlets that include: NPR, Newsweek (2006), Discover (2007), Forbes Magazine and others. In general, the site gets favorable reviews. That said, if I wasnt married (my wife is lawyer) I might consider joining Science Connection. After all, it certainly beats sitting around the lab on Friday and Saturday nights analyzing sequence datanot that there is anything wrong with that!