The Research Reporter is an organisation of researchers, journalists, media, and communication experts. Our work features stories about research undertaken by universities, government, and private institutions in South Africa with the intention of creating debate on national issues and improving the lives of people, in keeping with our mission statement: ‘Research is the mother of innovation.’ Our research stories are generated by using high-quality processes of collecting and interpreting or translating complex research findings into a language, format and context that non-experts can understand. We have established that researchers in universities, government departments and private institutions are conducting important research on various issues. However, they often only communicate the results to other researchers. We believe it is our duty to move this research on issues of health, law, sciences, humanities, commerce, engineering and the built environment from the laboratories, research journals, policy briefs, dissemination meetings, research reports, and academic conferences into the hands of people and organisations that can put it to practical use to improve the lives of others. The aim of the Research Reporter is to communicate evidence-based information that will empower ordinary citizens to become involved in the debate around critical issues from an informed perspective.