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Reading and writing scientific papers
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reading_and_writing_papers.md

Reading and Writing Scientific Papers

Reading

In general, the steps to read and to understand a scientific papers are [1]:

  1. Read the introduction, not the abstract
  2. Identify the big question
  3. Summarize the background in five sentences or less
  4. Identify the specific questions(s)
  5. Identify the approach
  6. Read the methods section. Draw a diagram for each experiment, showing exactly what the authors did
  7. Read the results section. Write one or more paragraphs to summarize the results for each experiment, each figure, and each table. Don't yet try to decide what the results mean, just write down what they are.
  8. Do the results answer the specific questions? What do you think they mean?
  9. Read the conclusion/discussion/Interpretation section
  10. Now, go back to the beginning and read the abstract
  11. What do other researchers say about this paper?
  12. Go through the reference section to see what other papers the authors have cited

References

  1. How to read and understand a scientific paper: a guide for non-scientists
  2. How to Read a Scientific Paper
  3. How to Read a Scientific Article
  4. Reading Scientific Paper

Writing

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