Writing and Editing

Biosketches are used more and more in NIH internal reports. Participants will learn how to create a Biosketch with efficiency. Participants will also learn the appropriate components needed to put their best foot forward.

Choosing a quality journal to publish in can be a daunting task. In this class, participants will become familiar with the available resources and tools to assist in targeting quality journals, as well as ways to recognize questionable or predatory journals. Additional topics include tips to avoid a predatory conference, evaluating invitations to serve as a peer review or editorial board member, preprint servers, and what to do if you published with a questionable journal will be covered.

This class will help authors navigate the legal and ethical issues surrounding copyright and plagiarism, identify and avoid potential copyright infringement issues, and ensure the integrity of their work as a component of their publishing process. This is part of NIH LIbrary's writing and publishing class series that supports writing, publishing, and scholarly communication.

This session focuses on defining the scope of your review by applying techniques to formulate a workable research question. The class introduces various frameworks used for developing a research question, and presents the requirements and steps involved in conducting the literature search for the systematic review. Useful resources are introduced throughout the session.

The effective use of grammar and punctuation is essential in crafting compelling and concise research papers. This class provides a refresher of grammar and punctuation rules that are sure to help make your writing clearer. Participants will brush-up on common grammar issues including subject-verb agreement, verb tense, and use of articles. Participants will also gain knowledge about helpful writing and editing resources, as well as effective proofreading tips.

Gray literature is not controlled by commercial publishers and usually is not peer reviewed. However, gray literature can help identify useful information outside the published, peer reviewed articles through reports, dissertations, conference abstracts, official documents, research-in-progress, and clinical trials. It might get you information you would never find in traditional sources. This workshop will focus on how to find credible gray literature for your research topic or for part of a systematic review.

Peer-review journals are gradually requesting that a graphical or visual abstract is submitted with the manuscript for publication. This one-hour webinar explains what a graphical or visual abstract is, how it is being used, information that should be included when developing one, and how to create one. Sample abstracts will be shared with participants and access to an abstract template will be provided. Participants will leave this introductory webinar with a better understanding of this new submission component and know how to create one that best reflects their research. 

This class is the first session in a two-part series of classes on the nuts and bolts of writing a research paper. Participants will gain knowledge about writing each section of a research paper and submitting a manuscript. Participants will also receive tips for selecting an appropriate journal for publishing and understanding open access obligations. This class is intended for individuals new to writing and publishing, or for those who would like a refresher.

This class is the second session in a two-part series that aims to assist researchers in writing a research paper. This second session will cover the process after a manuscript has been submitted to a journal and best practices on responding to reviewer comments. Participants will become familiar with the peer review process and how to respond appropriately to a journal’s decision. Additional topics that will be discussed are open access requirements for manuscripts and data sharing. Throughout the class, best practices and suggestions to make the process easier will be shared.

Research abstracts are an important element of manuscript and poster presentations. In this session, participants will learn the key components of an abstract including its structure and tips to write them succinctly. This session is a short introduction appropriate for new authors or a refresher for experienced authors.

EndNote 20 is a reference management tool that tracks citations and formats them as you write your manuscript. This introductory session covers how to: download the latest version of EndNote from the NIH Library; import records into EndNote; create, manage, and share EndNote libraries; and insert formatted citations into a Word document using the "Cite While You Write" feature.

EndNote Desktop provides access to EndNote records allowing the user to collect and organize references and insert them into a manuscript. This introductory session provides hands-on learning including importing records into EndNote, creating, managing, and sharing EndNote libraries, and inserting formatted citations into a Word document using the “Cite While You Write” feature.

This class is designed for those who want to extend the basics of R Markdown and apply those skills in Quarto. Quarto is an open-source scientific and technical publishing system that offers multilingual programming language support to create dynamic and static documents, books, presentations, blogs, and other online resources.

Conducting a systematic review can be time consuming and challenging. This class provides an overview of the different steps in the comprehensive process of conducting a systematic review. At the completion of the class, participants will be able to identify each step of the systematic review process and know where to access valuable resources.

You aren’t sure which type of literature review would best match your research question, or maybe you didn’t realize there were so many kinds of reviews. Join us for an overview of literature review types and their purposes. By the end of this session, attendees will be able to describe the purpose of a literature review, differentiate among five types, and select the right review for your research goals.

Spend 30 minutes with the NIH Library over your lunch break and learn how to cite data. In this session, we discuss the importance of data citation, identify key components of a data citation, and locate style guidelines for data citations. Participants should come prepared with a data set they would like to cite as a working example for this session.

This class complements NIH Library trainings on FAIR Data Principles and Resources for Finding and Sharing Research Data.

This short training session introduces attendees to the best practices for making PowerPoint slides accessible. By the end of this training participants will be able to identify four areas of PowerPoint accessibility: alt text, reading order, color, and tables.

Please note that the PowerPoint Accessibility Checker will be taught in Lunch and Learn: Using the PowerPoint Accessibility Checker.     

Learn how you can promote your scholarly output using ORCiD, from creating an ORCiD iD that is a permanent identifier for researchers, to using the full site to help track your publications and your peer review work for journals. NIH encourages everyone who is engaged in research, grants, and research education to create an ORCiD identifier. Using ORCiD enables researchers to highlight their scholarly work more effectively.

This class is designed for those who want to extend the basics covered in the Introduction to Quarto for Scholarly Publishing class. In this class you will learn how to format tables, work with LaTeX equations, customize code blocks, and insert images. 

Upon completion of this class participants should be able to create tables, customize code-blocks, create LaTeX equations, and insert images into a markdown document. You must have taken Introduction to Quarto for Scholarly Publishing to be successful in this class.

This class is designed for those who want to extend the basics covered in the Introduction to Quarto for Scholarly Publishing to Formatting class. This class uses Quarto to render formatted citations and bibliographies included in a journal article, report, or presentation.  This class also discusses the Zotero API, which is supported in RStudio. Zotero is a free, easy-to-use tool to help you collect, organize, annotate, cite, and share research.

This class will provide an overview of databases and author profile websites to help locate experts in a research field. During this session, the instructor will review how to use tools to locate authors related to a specific topic, find algorithmically generated author profiles, and how to find author-maintained profiles. The instructor will also share how to identify additional citation and publication metrics for authors using InCites, including international and industry collaborations, first and last author positions, number of publications in high-impact journals, and more.

This class will define retractions and discuss their effects on evidence synthesis products such as systematic reviews. Participants will explore the impact and consequences of retractions through a case study along with data from the literature. Additionally, participants will learn about how to incorporate identification of retractions into the evidence synthesis process. This class is recommended for anyone who wants a more in-depth analysis of retractions beyond what is covered in the Retractions: An Introduction class.

This class will define retractions and other corrections that revise scientific literature after publication. Participants will learn how to search for retraction notices in PubMed and other databases. They will also learn how other tools, such as citation management software, help identify retracted articles. This class is recommended for anyone who wants an overview of retractions and complements the Writing and Publishing series of classes.