"longtime partner"

[Arnold M. Zwicky]

from the NYT Science Times of 6/13/05, Denis Overbye's "Found:
Earth's Distant Cousin (About 15 Light-Years Away)", p. D3, on the
discovery of "the smallest planet yet outside the solar system" by a
team including "Dr. Geoffrey Marcy of the University of California,
Berkeley" (the focus of the story), plus "Dr. Paul Butler of the
Carnegie Institution of Washington, Dr. Jack Lissauer of NASA's Ames
Research Center and Dr. Eugenio Rivera of the University of
California, Santa Cruz":

-----
This is the 107th score for Dr. Marcy and his longtime partner, Dr.
Butler.
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i'm guessing, from the context, that overbye was referring to a
research partnership, though i would have said "longtime
collaborator".  and i certainly had to think for a moment whether
overbye might be talking about a domestic (but long-distance)
partnership.

arnold