literature-review

name	literature-review
description	Plan, conduct, evaluate, and write rigorous literature reviews, scoping reviews, systematic review drafts, annotated bibliographies, evidence maps, and research syntheses. Use when the user asks for literature search strategy, paper screening, inclusion/exclusion criteria, PRISMA-style workflow, evidence tables, thematic synthesis, gap analysis, research background sections, related work sections, citation quality checks, or review of medical, scientific, technical, product, policy, or academic literature.
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Literature Review

Use this skill to turn a broad research question into a traceable review process with explicit search logic, screened evidence, and defensible synthesis.

Workflow

1. Define the review question.

   • Convert vague topics into a focused question using PICO, SPIDER, PCC, or a simpler topic-scope-outcome frame.
   • State population/domain, intervention or concept, comparator if any, outcomes, timeframe, geography, and document types.
   • If the user has not provided scope, make conservative assumptions and label them.

2. Plan the search.

   • Use references/search-strategy.md when designing queries, databases, source types, or grey literature searches.
   • Build query blocks from concepts, synonyms, acronyms, variant spellings, standards/regulations, and product or method names.
   • For current, medical, legal, regulatory, or safety-sensitive topics, browse and cite primary or authoritative sources.

3. Screen sources.

   • Use references/screening-and-extraction.md for inclusion/exclusion criteria and extraction fields.
   • Prefer peer-reviewed papers, guidelines, standards, systematic reviews, official regulatory sources, and primary datasets.
   • Exclude weak or irrelevant sources explicitly when they could otherwise bias the synthesis.

4. Extract evidence.

   • Capture citation, year, jurisdiction/context, study type, sample/data, method, outcomes, limitations, and relevance.
   • Preserve URLs, DOI/PMID/arXiv IDs, publication dates, and access dates when available.
   • Do not overstate claims from abstracts alone; flag when only an abstract or secondary summary was available.

5. Assess quality and bias.

   • Use references/evidence-synthesis.md for study-quality prompts and synthesis structure.
   • Match appraisal to source type: randomized study, observational study, qualitative study, guideline, standard, review, dataset, or technical report.
   • Separate evidence strength from volume of publications.

6. Synthesize and write.

   • Organize by themes, chronology, methods, mechanisms, jurisdictions, outcomes, or evidence strength.
   • Highlight consensus, disagreement, gaps, uncertainty, and practical implications.
   • Include a source table for substantial reviews unless the user asks for prose only.

Output Patterns

For quick reviews, provide:

• Search scope and assumptions
• Key findings
• Evidence table
• Gaps and caveats
• Sources

For formal reviews, provide:

• Research question
• Methods and search strategy
• Inclusion/exclusion criteria
• Screening summary
• Evidence extraction table
• Thematic or quantitative synthesis
• Limitations
• References

For related-work sections, provide polished prose plus a short table showing how each cited work supports the narrative.

Quality Rules

• Cite sources for factual claims about papers, guidance, standards, regulations, current evidence, or market/clinical state.
• Prefer primary sources over blogs and tertiary summaries.
• Distinguish "no evidence found" from "evidence of no effect."
• Do not invent citations, DOIs, study details, sample sizes, or findings.
• Mark low-confidence claims and explain what would verify them.
• When the topic is medical, regulatory, legal, or financial, keep recommendations informational and source-grounded.

References

• references/search-strategy.md: Query construction, source selection, and search logging.
• references/screening-and-extraction.md: Criteria, extraction tables, and evidence matrix fields.
• references/evidence-synthesis.md: Quality appraisal, synthesis structures, and final review checklist.