Query Letter for Extension Class

Just finished writing my Query Letter. Here it is. It's addressed to Scientific American.

“To Ms. Laura Helmuth, Editor in Chief, at Scientific American, If there’s nothing else on the world’s mind right now, it’s Covid-19. Toilet paper and hand sanitizer may have run out at Ralphs, but that doesn’t mean our sanity should. The numbers are staggering, yes, but I believe that the hubbub around the coronavirus is a great teaching moment for genetics. A story that could help quell people’s fear is understanding how scientists in research labs have researched the virus and test for it in hospitals. The story I want to pitch to Scientific American is a tale that tackles how researchers use genome sequencing and reverse-transcriptase polymerase chain reaction – RT-rtPCR for short - to bring the genetic background behind SARS-CoV-2 to light. Both of these two techniques sound like a mouthful, but I envision that my story can help clear up the science behind them. I plan to interview several bioinformaticians around UC San Diego and healthcare practitioners at UC San Diego Health to give some brief history of sequencing and some accounts of how RT-rtPCR has made it faster to diagnose new patients. I also want to take video of how doctors carry out RT-rtPCR to show what is behind the kits researchers use to check for Covid-19. I envision this story to be about 1000 words long. Genome sequencing can be somewhat of a mysterious black box to people, and since many citizens are already aware of genotyping from companies like 23andMe/Ancestry, this is the next step to get them to know just a little more science. I’m currently a staff research associate in the UC San Diego Biology Teaching Labs, but I also freelance write for the side. As a recent bioengineering/bioinformatics graduate from UC San Diego, I wrote around 20 articles for the UCSD Jacobs School of Engineering communications team, and I founded and ran a UCSD Bioengineering Department quarterly newsletter. I am interested in engaging my audience in the wonders of computational biology through my freelance writing and my full-time job. While we all bunker down in our homes with our loads of canned beans and soup, it is important to remind ourselves that scientists weren’t totally unprepared for working on this outbreak. Because of genomic advances, we can learn about the virus’s genome faster and use that to our advantage. I believe my story would be an excellent guide for your readership that they can then use to help other people around learn about genomics. Thank you very much for reading my pitch and let me know if you have any questions. I am happy to chat more at my email: kritinkarkare@gmail.com. Sincerely, Kritin Karkare "