Scientific writing workshop
Eric Weeks, Emory University
• Overall ideas
• writing introduction, conclusion, etc
• Writing an abstract
• Bibliography software (www.citeulike.org)
• How to get yourself to write
Basic ideas
• Start with figures
• Consider your audience
• Tell a story
Parts of the paper
• Start with figures – it’s still good advice
• Introduction
• Explain background / prior work. Identify major
unsolved problem. Then state that you solve it.
what
we
know
Oh no! A big hole in
science! Don’t worry,
we fill this hole.
Parts of the paper
• Start with figures – it’s still good advice
• Introduction
• Explain background / prior work. Identify major
unsolved problem. Then state that you solve it.
• I like to include one pretty figure in introduction,
examples on next slides
Parts of the paper
• Introduction
• Methods:
• Need to be reproducible
• Can put boring details online or in appendix
• Or, write a ‘methods’ paper
• Results: based on figures
• Results from one figure can suggest a question. Next
figure answers question…. which leads to next question
• Conclusion: significance, summary.
• Most people write introduction, conclusions last
General advice
• “There are often details that are true and interesting, that
nonetheless do not belong in your paper” – Harry Swinney
• Use simple language
• : “This is more germane to the critical aspects of
building and sustaining traditional, and nurturing nascent,
sub-programs within the department.”
• : “This is more relevant to sustaining our department’s
current programs and building new ones.”
• Read other people’s papers. What did they do well? What
did they do poorly? (What parts are confusing, for example?)
• Spell-check
• Overall ideas
• writing introduction, conclusion, etc
• Writing an abstract
• Bibliography software (www.citeulike.org)
• How to get yourself to write
Writing an abstract
• We’re going to discuss this with a specific example
• You are going to work on an abstract for this example
• Would you like to hear about the example?
– Yes, you would.
You’re also going to think about titles,
so this is not a title.
• Ph.D. work of Dandan Chen, Emory University
Emulsion: oil
droplets in water,
added soap
Emulsion pumped through chamber
Note! Chamber is
thin, so droplets are
flat. Like pizzas.
Chamber is a ‘hopper’
flow
Droplets rearrange: “T1 event”
Neighbor
exchange:
two apart,
two together.
Time
~1 mm
t ~1s
Stress related to shape of droplet
(“deformation” D)
r
Deformation fluctuates as sample flows
t
(data from red-shaded region)
X0.033s
Larger fluctuations = when more T1
events happen
1.Stress rises before T1 event, falls after
2.Bigger effect closer to T1 event
distance to center of T1 event (center of 4 droplets)
Length scale  3 droplet diameters
(from analysis of below data)
distance to center of T1 event (center of 4 droplets)
Your task:
• Skim paper
– I suggest introduction, conclusions, figures
• Write a title for this paper
• Make list of five most important things to
mention in abstract, about this paper
specifically
• If time, write a good first sentence for abstract
• This is not a test of your internet skills 
Let’s discuss
Next slide has answer for the title
“Topological rearrangements and stress
fluctuations in quasi-two-dimensional
hopper flow of emulsions”
• Not my best title
• But paper did get published
Next slide has answer for abstract
We experimentally study the shear flow of oil-in-water emulsion droplets
in a thin sample chamber with a hopper shape. In this thin chamber, the
droplets are quasi-2D in shape. The sample is at an area fraction above
jamming and forced to flow with a constant flux rate. Stresses applied to
a droplet from its neighbors deform the droplet outline, and this
deformation is quantified to provide an ad hoc measure of the stress. As
the sample flows through the hopper we see large fluctuations of the
stress, similar in character to what has been seen in other flows of
complex fluids. Periods of time with large decreases in stress are
correlated with bursts of elementary rearrangement events (‘‘T1 events’’
where four droplets rearrange). More specifically, we see a local
relationship between these observations: a T1 event decreases the interdroplet forces up to 3 droplet diameters away from the event. This
directly connects microscopic structural changes to macroscopic
fluctuations, and confirms theoretical pictures of local rearrangements
influencing nearby regions. These local rearrangements are an important
means of reducing and redistributing stresses within a flowing material.
• Overall ideas
• writing introduction, conclusion, etc
• Writing an abstract
• Bibliography software (www.citeulike.org)
• How to get yourself to write
• Overall ideas
• writing introduction, conclusion, etc
• Writing an abstract
• Bibliography software (www.citeulike.org)
• How to get yourself to write
• Let’s look at this website
• Others exist (Mendeley is popular)
• Overall ideas
• writing introduction, conclusion, etc
• Writing an abstract
• Bibliography software (www.citeulike.org)
• How to get yourself to write
Strategies for getting it done
• Editing/revising easier than writing from
scratch
• How much outline to do?
• How to get work done
• How to get feedback