writing-in-the-sciences

name

writing-in-the-sciences

description

Guide scientific, technical, and other evidence-backed writing tasks using the Stanford Writing in the Sciences workflow. Use when Codex needs to draft, revise, or review manuscripts, abstracts, review articles, grant sections, specific aims pages, recommendation letters, personal statements, reviewer responses, peer reviews, lay summaries, or science-news style explanations that clearly fit the course. Defer when the request is general business writing, generic documentation, marketing copy, fiction, or another writing task outside the course's scientific and evidence-backed scope.

Writing in the Sciences

Use this skill for writing tasks that clearly fit the Stanford course in this repository:

• scientific manuscripts and manuscript sections
• review articles
• grant sections and specific aims pages
• academic recommendation letters
• research-oriented personal statements
• peer review and reviewer responses
• lay summaries and science-news style explanations of scientific work
• general revision of scientific or technical prose

If the request does not clearly fit scientific, technical, or evidence-backed writing, defer to a better-matched skill.

Classify the Task

Classify the request into one or more of these modes before drafting:

• scientific manuscript section work
• review article
• grant or specific aims
• recommendation letter
• personal statement
• peer review or reviewer response
• lay summary or media explanation
• science news story
• general scientific or technical revision

Then load the references that match the mode.

Confirm the Inputs

Before drafting or revising, confirm or extract:

• source text, notes, facts, or reviewer comments
• whether any key examples, labels, numbers, or wording live in screenshots, figures, tables, or slide images
• target genre
• audience
• desired take-home message
• section, length, or format constraints
• what evidence is complete versus missing

Do not invent missing evidence. Surface gaps, assumptions, or unsupported claims explicitly. Do not emit bracketed template markers, unfinished markers, or unsupplied citations in user-facing output. If key inputs are missing, either ask for them or keep the draft tightly bounded to the supplied material and list the missing inputs separately. If the supplied material includes screenshots, figures, tables, or slide images, inspect both the visual asset and its surrounding text before summarizing. Treat nearby bullets, captions, and example framing as part of the source context.

Workflow

Follow the course-derived workflow in this order.

1. Pre-writing

• identify the main take-home message first
• organize facts, claims, and support before polishing prose
• group like ideas together
• build a rough outline or roadmap
• separate known facts from missing evidence and open questions

2. Drafting

• keep one main idea per paragraph
• put the punch line early when possible
• prefer direct sentences with visible actors and actions
• optimize structure before sentence-level polish

3. Revision

Run these passes:

1. clutter
2. verbs and active voice
3. paragraph flow
4. jargon and audience fit
5. consistency and overclaiming

4. Final Checks

Check:

• internal consistency
• image-derived wording, labels, and numbers verified against both the image and the surrounding source context
• numerical consistency
• reference and source alignment
• audience fit
• claims staying within supplied evidence
• no unresolved template markers or fake specifics

References To Load

• Read references/core-style.md for sentence-level and paragraph-level editing.
• Read references/process-and-revision.md for planning, drafting, revision, and final checks.
• Read references/manuscript.md for manuscripts and abstracts.
• Read references/publishing-and-peer-review.md for peer review, reviewer responses, and publishing constraints.
• Read references/review-articles.md for review articles.
• Read references/grants-and-specific-aims.md for grants and specific aims.
• Read references/recommendation-letters.md for recommendation letters.
• Read references/personal-statements.md for personal statements.
• Read references/broader-audiences.md for lay summaries, media explanations, and science news.

If a summary reference is not enough, load the matching raw course note mirror from the relevant assets/Unit xx - .../source-unit-*.md file before inventing anything. When a raw course note contains embedded image references such as ![](Images/12.png), read the surrounding lines and open the matching file from the local Images/ folder whenever the example depends on wording, labels, layout, before/after editing, or other visual evidence. Treat screenshots, figures, tables, and slide images as source material, not decorative assets.