Acoe 2010 presentation

How to write a manuscriptGet your paper accepted
Asian Conference on Organic Electronics
Seoul National University
Daniel Broaddus, PhD
Senior Editor and Trainer, Edanz Group
November 5, 2010

Presentation
Introduction
Section One: Preparations before writing
Section Two: Manuscript structure
Section Three: Tips for successful publishing
Edanz Group | 2

Why publish?
To share your research findings and opinions with the international research community
To better your understanding of your own findings, by explaining them to outside researchers
To create a full review of a field, so that the acquired knowledge it represents can be more easily taught to a new generation of scientists
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Increased competition
Relative growth from 1990
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Section One Preparations before writing
How to identify hot topics
Study design
What do journal editors want?
How reviewers assess manuscripts
Choosing an appropriate journal
Ethical issues
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How to identify hot topics
Read the literature, including related fields
Attend international meetings
Look for clues— unexplained findings, controversies
Greater interest = Greater competition
Identify your advantages and use them
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Study design Get it right first time
Have an hypothesis or research question
Use appropriate methods and controls
Ensure sample sizes are large enough
Use appropriate statistical tests
Remove investigator/researcher bias
Comply with ethical requirements
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What do journal editors want?
Good quality science
Positive peer review outcome
Well designed and executed original research
Findings of interest to the journal’s readership
Work in an active research area (=citations!)
Work that advances the field in some way
Compliance with ethical regulations
Clear, concise writing
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Reviewers What do they look for?
Is the manuscript sufficiently novel?
Is the manuscript of broad enough interest?
Aims and Scope
Impact Factor
Novelty
Significance
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Reviewers About the manuscript
Are the rationale and objectives defined?
Is enough background given to understand the rationale?
Could a capable researcher reproduce the experiments?
Are the results clearly explained and in the best format?
Are the findings described in context?
Are the limitations discussed?
Are the conclusions supported?
Is the literature cited appropriate?
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Journal Selection
Can be the difference between success and rejection
What is the main focus of your research and who will be interested in it?
What are its strengths and weaknesses?
How significant are your findings?
Are your findings preliminary or are they sufficient to make a story?
How widely will your research appeal? To researchers in the same field or to the broader scientific community?
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Journal Selection what are the differences?
Edanz Group | 12

Edanz Group | 13

Publication ethics
Unethical behavior could lead to rejection and a possible ban from a target journal.
Multiple submissions
Referees often review for similar journals
Redundant publications
Plagiarism
Data fabrication and falsification
Improper author contribution
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Section Two Manuscript structure
The ‘ Yin’ and ‘Yang’
Title
Abstract and keywords
Introduction
Materials and Methods
Results and Discussion
Display items
Conclusions
References
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The Yin and Yang
Reading
Writing
Edanz Group | 16

The Taegeukgi태극기
Edanz Group | 17

The Taegeukgi태극기
Reading
Feedback
Peer Review
JournalSelection
Design
Methods
Background
References
Introduction
Title
Abstract
Writing
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The importance of your title
World Class
Physics Manuscript
Hook to catch
readers
Relevant readers increase citations
Introduces your manuscript to the editor
Journal editors like citations
Everybody likes citations
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A good title
Convey the main findings of the research
Be specific and concise without focusing on only one part of the content
Avoid jargon, non-standard abbreviations and unnecessary detail
Comply with character limits
Try writing three titles and picking the best
Edanz Group| 20

A good title
Poor
Generation of few-cycle optical pulses at high-glass-transmission wavelengths using a low-cost Er3+-amplified carbon nanotube laser system via two-stage broadening and compression for research and applications in high-speed telecommunications, Part I: System design
Good
Generation of few-cycle optical pulses at telecom wavelengths via a low-cost carbon nanotube laser system
Too long
Short and easy to understand contents
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Abstract
Many researchers will only read the abstract so must be able to ‘stand alone’
Must give an accurate summary of your research, and enough information so that readers can understand:
What you did
Why you did it
What your findings are
Why your findings are useful and important
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Abstract
General rules for abstracts:
Within the word limit
Avoid technical jargon
Avoid abbreviations unless necessary
Avoid references
Should the abstract be structured?
Always consult the target journal’s Guide for Authors to determine allowable length, style and abbreviations
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Keywords
Abstracts are often followed by a list of keywords selected by the authors.
Choosing appropriate keywords is important for indexing purposes.
Your manuscript can more easily identified, read and cited.
Keywords should be specific to your manuscript
General terms should be avoided.
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Keywords
Manuscript title:
Direct observation of nonlinear optics in a isolated carbon nanotube
Poor keywords:
molecule, optics, lasers, energy lifetime
Better keywords:
Single-molecule interaction, Kerr effect, carbon nanotubes, energy level structure
Too general
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Introduction
Briefly present research question and/or hypotheses and how they were addressed
Give the reader enough background information to put your work into context
Do not write a comprehensive literature review of the field
Do cite reviews that readers can refer to if they want more information
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Introduction
Define technical and non-familiar terms
Present “the problem”, research question and/or hypotheses to explain the rationale for the study
Briefly explain how you addressed this problem and what was achieved (1–2 sentences for each)
Citations must be balanced, current and relevant
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Temporal-imaging system with simple external-clock triggering
D. H. Broaddus, M. A. Foster, O. Kuzucu, A. C. Turner-Foster, K. W. Koch, M Lipson, and A. L. Gaeta
The demand for ultrafast-pulse characterization and waveform-generation techniques has driven research for high-bandwidth characterization systems. This has led to the development of temporal-imaging and dispersion-based techniques that exploit the space-time duality of electromagnetic fields.
Background
Recent implementations [of temporal-imaging systems] based on a four-wave mixing (FWM) time-lens require synchronized pump and signal pulses.
Statement of the problem
This is achieved by extracting the pump and the signal from the same source by spectral filtering. Conversely, using a separate mode-locked fiber laser would provide the necessary bandwidth for ultrafast temporal imaging, but would require repetition-rate locking using a feedback loop to achieve synchronous operation. Ultimately, either of these schemes is restricted by the types of signal that can be measured. Therefore, it is desirable to develop a system in which high bandwidth pump pulses can be produced on-demand via a simple external trigger.
Rationale
In this paper, we propose and demonstrate a fully-triggerable temporal-imaging system. We base our system on a time-lens-compressed picosecond pulse source. The output of the pulsed time-lens source is then spectrally broadened in non-zero dispersion-shifted fiber through self-phase modulation (SPM), which provides the pulses with sufficient bandwidth for ultrafast temporal imaging with high temporal resolution. We…
What was done
© 2010 Optical Society of America
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Materials and methods What you did
Clear subheadings for methods/materials
Describe methods in the past tense
Novel methods must be described in sufficient detail for a capable researcher to reproduce the experiment
Give manufacturers/suppliers and their locations
Describe any statistical tests used
Established methods can be referenced
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Materials and methods
Reference to save space
Materials described
3. Experiment
In order to create a suitable, triggerable pump pulse, we used a time-lens-compressed picosecond-pulse source [20,21,26]. Unlike conventional ultrafast laser sources, the time-lens source derives its repetition rate from an input RF signal rather than an oscillator cavity. This makes the source ideal for synchronization, since the laser can be synchronized to a clock signal from any source as its input. While it is true that this system can not be driven at an arbitrarily low repetition rate, a harmonic between 5–10 GHz that will allow for optimal operation of the system while still providing a synchronized pump pulse for every signal pulse can be selected. At repetition rates above 10 GHz, electronic filtering can be used to generate a suitable drive signal from the input clock. We obtained the clock signal from a…
3.2. Operation
Achieving fine resolution and long record lengths in temporal imaging systems requires sufficiently high pump bandwidth. At the output of the time-lens source, the pulses had a bandwidth of 1 nm centered at 1546 nm. To increase the bandwidth, we added a spectral broadening stage to the pump source after the time-lens compression stage. After passing the pulses through another EDFA, we sent them through 250 m of CorningVascade LS+ fiber (Corning Inc., NY). The pulses underwent SPM and saw an increase in bandwidth from 1 nm to 100 nm. We filtered a spectrally flat off-center section of the output roughly 10 nm in bandwidth at 1559 nm to serve as the pump pulse. After the broadening stage, we noted a large amplitude noise at the output for high input intensities [27]. In order to maintain a suitable pump output, we limited the pulse energy at the input of the CorningVascade LS+ fiber to 2 nJ.
Detailed information given
Suppliers and locations
Clear subheadings
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Results and Discussion What did you find?
Often results and discussion are combined to help assemble your findings in a logical order to ‘tell a story’
Present your findings in subsections (the same as those in your methods section)
Present complementary evidence when possible
Describe results in the past tense
Refer to figures and tables in the present tense
Discuss implications
Do not duplicate data among figures, tables and text
Show the results of statistical analyses in the text
Put findings in perspective
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Combined Results and Discussion section
3. Results and discussion
We characterized our system’s single-shot performance by temporally resolving the output of a bandpass filtered mode-locked fiber laser, and by varying the delay on the signal showing 1.5-ps resolution over a record length of 220 ps. In addition, we calculate magnification factor to be 113×. Figure 7 shows a composite oscilloscope trace showing the timing of the signal pulse as it is varied over the entire record length. Figure 8 shows a blow-up of a single signal pulse demonstrating the temporal resolution of the system. Limited only by the signal repetition rate and magnification factor, the single-shot record length could easily be increased to the full 530 ps by frequency de-multiplexing the output into three channels [30]…
In addition, we characterized the small time-scale jitter over 2 s. The experimental configuration allowed for high frame rates, which provided the ability to characterize consecutive pulses [30]. We used this ability to analyze the timing of 77 consecutive pulses from the fiber laser utilizing the sync out for the fiber laser as a timing reference. We found that the root-mean-square (RMS) value of the timing jitter was 0.27 psover a 2-s measurement period. The histogram in Fig. 8(b) showed the variation in pulse-to-pulse timing. The low RMS value of the jitter suggested that resolution could be further improved. We suspect that reducing phase aberrations from higher-order dispersion and the SPM broadening stage would likely yield the desired result.
Graphics used to show data with only brief descriptions in text
Present tense to refer to table
Past tense to describe results
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Display items Tables and figures
Figures and tables are the best way to present your results
Data shown in figures and tables must be easy to interpret — use separate panels if necessary
Avoid redundancies or duplication
Clearly label all components
Show trendlines, scale bars and statistical significance
Captions must be able to ‘stand alone’: write them in the present tense (except when describing methods)
Comply with journal guidelines on display items
Edanz Group | 33

Display items Tables and figures
Some readers will only look at the figures and their legends
Which of these is stand alone?
Fig. 1. Calculated effective index.
Fig. 1. Effective indices of As2Se3 microspheres, silicon nanowires, and silica nanowires. (a) Effective index vs. sphere diameter for fundamental TE (red) and TM (blue) modes in an As2Se3 microsphere. (b) Effective index vs. material index multiplied by cross sectional area of silicon (red) and silica (blue) waveguides.
Edanz Group | 34

Display items
Clear, ‘stand alone’ caption
Multi-panel: sets of related data shown in a single figure
Fig. 9. The fringe period decreases with increasing separation. (a) 0.5 nm separation with movie showing phase procession between the lasers (Media 1). We believe the non-sinusoidal shape of these peaks arises from soliton effect compression in the amplifier before the temporal imaging stage [31]. (b) 1.5 nm separation, and (c) 2.5 nm separation. (d) The phase slip between the two lasers, which are not phase-locked, washes out the fringes when averaged over multiple shots.
Complicated data separated into simpler components
Axes clearly labeled
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Conclusions
Restate key findings and their significance
Propose future studies that might follow on from your current study
Give the reader a ‘take-home’ message
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Conclusions
Be humble
Don’t overstate the importance of your results
Our findings prove that…
Our findings show that…
Our findings suggest that…
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Conclusions
Conclusion
We demonstrated a completely triggerable temporal-imaging system. We characterized the system’s performance in both multi-shot and single-shot time-lens-based schemes.
We showed 1.4 ps resolution with 530 ps record length using time-to-frequency conversion. We demonstrated 1.5-ps resolution and 220-ps record length in a single-shot temporal magnification system. We characterized the short-term timing jitter present between our pump and signal pulses and showed it to be 0.27 ps, which corresponds to 18% of the temporal resolution.
This suggests that sub-picosecond resolution can be achieved in our system.
Finally, we illustrated the ability to perform complex waveform measurements by resolving the interference fringes between two frequency-separated laser pulses.
In addition to improving the resolution of the system, this system could be adapted to preform a combined phase and amplitude measurement. This would make the system more comparable with popular full-field characterization techniques such as FROG and SPIDER.
Restate the question/problem
Restate main findings
Use ‘suggests’ and ‘may’
Put in context of previous work
Future research plans
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Acknowledgments
Your chance to acknowledge anyone who has helped with the study:
Individuals who’s contributions did not warrant authorship
Any researchers that supplied materials or reagents
Anyone who provided technical assistance
Anyone who helped with the preparation of the manuscript or provided a critical assessment of it
Funding bodies
State why each individual is being acknowledged
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References
Serve as your network to past and future science
Convey your knowledge of the field
Give credibility to your work
Acknowledge contributions to the field by others
Help other researchers find your work = more citations
Use a reference manager like Endnote or Zotero. Makes it easy to edit, reformat, add or remove references
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References
Seminal work in your field (Papers that started the field)
All methods used
Physical phenomena discussed
Non-commercial materials used
Conflicting works
Outside areas  Applications!
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Section Three Tips for getting accepted
Your cover letter
Recommending reviewers
Language
Good writing
Submission
Post-referee revisions
Summary
Language Workshop
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Cover letters
Journal Editors receive hundreds of manuscripts each month
They don’t have time to read each manuscript
Society journal editors are especially busy, they are usually practicing researchers too
Your cover Letter is an opportunity
to get the journal editor’s attention
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Cover letters Getting the Editor's Attention
Summary of broader appeal
Helps journal editors expand readership
Highlights importance of research
Clarifies context
Brings in readers from outside fields
Required for Nature journals
Trying to explain your work to a broader audience help you understand it better
Big questions
Saving lives
Science fiction
Faster computing
Cheaper, cleaner energy
Popular science
Edanz Group | 44

Broader appeal Broader notice
Fiber-Optical Analog of the Event Horizon
Using an optical fiber and laser light, physicists have simulated a "white hole"--essentially a black hole working in reverse--as they report on page 1367 of this week's issue of Science. The model might soon mimic the "Hawking radiation" predicted to emanate from black holes.
“Scientists Make Fake Black Hole in a Phone Line”
– wired.com
“Scientists Make Black Hole in Fiber Optic Cable: World Doesn't End”
– gizmodo.com
Edanz Group | 45

Your cover letter
General rules for cover letters:
Address to the editor personally
Begin by giving your manuscript title and publication type
Give a brief background, rationale and description of results
Explain why your findings are important and why they would be of interest to the journal’s target audience
Consult the journal’s Guide for Authors for cover letter requirements (e.g.,disclosures, statements, potential reviewers)
Give corresponding author details
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Reviewers Recommendations and exclusions
Recommend
Your work supports their hypotheses and ideas
Your research builds on their work
International collaborators in the same field
Exclude
Researchers working on the same research question
Your study refutes their work
The findings in your manuscript are opposite to their findings or ideas
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Language screening
Introduction of language screening protocols to check submissions
Editors don’t want to send poorly written manuscripts for peer review
Editors receive enough well written submissions to reject poorly written manuscripts
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Language
Some journals are very clear about the need for high language quality in all of their articles…
ACS Nano Editorial
Rejecting without Review: The Whys the Hows
Language: If the writing is unclear or rife with grammatical errors, then we cannot send it out for review under any circumstances…
…If your manuscript looks sloppy, then everyone will assume that your science is equally sloppy.
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Scientific writing
Good scientific writing possesses the following three “C”s:
Clarity
Conciseness
Correctness (accuracy)
Key points:
Be as brief as possible without omitting essential details
Be as specific as possible
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Scientific writing Common problems
Avoid:
Spelling and grammatical errors
Insufficient detail/vagueness
Redundancy
Ambiguity
Inconsistency
They annoy editors, peer reviewers, and readers
Edanz Group | 51

Simple is best
Use simple language: it is often clearer, more precise and more concise than using more complex language
Simple Sentence Structure!
Say what you mean in as few words as possible
Avoid circular sentences, redundancies and repetition
One sentence: one idea
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Submission Final checks
Critically self-evaluate—could anything be done better?
Double-check the Guide for Authors
Are all files in the correct file format and of the appropriate resolution or size?
Is your spelling/grammar correct?
Do you have contact information for all authors?
Have you completed online registration?
Or have you prepared the requested number of print copies plus CD?
Have you written a persuasive cover letter?
Edanz Group | 53

Revisions Post-referee revisions
Only 1.5% of papers are immediately accepted without need for any revisions
Complete rejection
Rejection with major revisions
Journal editor decision
Rejection with minor revisions
Acceptance
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Rejection from journals is an important part of the publication process
It is not a negative experience
It exists to ensure that your paper is as scientifically correct and complete as possible before joining the ‘collective knowledge’ as part of the literature
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When revising your manuscript:
Address all points raised by the editor and/or reviewers
Describe the revisions in your response letter
Perform any additional experiments or analyses requested (unless you feel that they would not add to the strength of your paper: explain why not in your response letter)
Provide a polite and scientific rebuttal to any points or comments you disagree with
Differentiate comments and responses in your letter
Clearly show the major revisions in the text
Return revised manuscript and response letter within the requested time period
Edanz Group | 56

Summary Checklist for acceptance
Compliance with ethics guidelines
Novel and interesting results
Clear, concise, accurate writing
Compliance with the Guide for Authors
Significance of findings explained
Appropriate choice of journal

Thank you, from all of us!
Special thanks to:
Professor Kim
Professor Adachi

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