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A Template for Producing Research Papers in the AI Lab

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Concisely express the problem in one sentence or two. ... Accept only if light editing is necessary. No time for major overhauls ... – PowerPoint PPT presentation

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Title: A Template for Producing Research Papers in the AI Lab


1
  • A Template for Producing Research Papers in the
    AI Lab

Byron, Dan, Zan, and Jennifer Acknowledgement
Hundreds of meetings with Dr. Chen
Disclaimer Use this advice at your own risk. If
we already knew how to do it, it wouldnt be
research, and we would already have
tenure! Disclaimer 2 This presentation is filled
with student perceptions of what Dr. Chen said or
meant, and spiced with our own commentary. These
views may or may not accurately reflect Dr.
Chens position when you turn in a paper or give
a presentation.
2
Agenda
  • Notes on the Title
  • Abstract
  • Introduction
  • Background and Literature Review
  • Research Questions
  • Research Testbed, System Design
  • Research Design
  • Experimental Results
  • Discussion
  • Conclusions and Future Directions
  • References
  • Some additional suggestions
  • Reviewing papers

3
Notes on the Title
  • A good title should reflect the entire contents
    of the paper, avoid using cute titles.
  • Should be less than 8-9 words.
  • Complete sentences are not necessary, use colons
    if needed.
  • Acronyms
  • If needed, select meaningful acronyms that convey
    the meaning of the work/project (e.g., COPLINK,
    GeneScence).
  • Acronyms help in branding a system/project.
  • Do not forget acknowledging the funding agencies
    on title slides of presentations!

4
Abstract What is in it?
  • One of the most important parts of the paper.
  • Concisely express the problem in one sentence or
    two.
  • Mention why the work is important (if the goal of
    the research was accomplished, what good thing
    would happen )
  • Describe methodology
  • Highlight the most important results
  • Gives the reviewer a reason to continue reading
    the paper
  • Should consist of short sentences
  • Dont invent new words!
  • Slides do not generally include an abstract

5
Abstract Our Abstract
  • Publish, Publish, Publish (or Perish!)
  • Although many different methodologies can lead to
    an accepted publication, these principles should
    be particularly useful to you in the AI Lab
    environment.
  • We will present our view of how to get papers
    past Dr. Chen and out for publication.
  • The content is presented in the form of a
    template.

6
Introduction What is in it?
  • The Introduction hooks the reader.
  • What is the motivation for the work?
  • What is the context?
  • Big picture, how did we address the problem?
  • What will the rest of the paper look like?
  • Introduction should be 3-5 paragraphs
  • A four page introduction is not a good
    introduction
  • The last paragraph always points to the structure
    of the paper

7
Introduction Motivation/Context
  • PhD students want to learn to be productive
    researchers.
  • A number of research approaches are effectively
    employed by various researchers and research
    groups.
  • The model used here in the AI Lab has a strong
    track record of producing work publishable in top
    tier journals.

8
Introduction The Big Picture
  • To be productive we need to be
  • Doing the right research,
  • Doing the research right, and
  • Packaging the research appropriately for
    distribution.
  • Missing any of these elements substantially
    reduces the chance that your work will be
    published.

9
Doing the Right Research
  • Criteria for choosing a research project that
    might eventually be funded.
  • Does it advance Science? Choose work that makes a
    contribution to some scientific body of
    knowledge. Implementing an effective system is
    not enough the methodology and techniques are
    important.
  • Does it have potential impact? Do work that will
    improve important real-world processes. Thus, we
    emphasize domain-specific applications and
    completing a line of work in a user study.
    Caveat Making an impact with one paper is tough.

80
20
10
Doing the Research Right
  • Research should be publishable.
  • Strong methodology is vital. Are the experiments
    rigorous and valid?
  • Precise hypotheses
  • Ideally, hypotheses are based on previous
    literature or established theories
  • Appropriate statistical tests
  • Even if the contribution is small, good
    methodology can get a paper over the top.
  • Methodological flaws give reviewers an excuse to
    reject your work.

11
Right Research for Junior Faculty
  • The should be publishable, not necessarily suited
    for funding.
  • Extend your current work, dont go down an
    entirely different path. Choose wisely in your
    Ph.D.
  • Use your methodology on other collections and
    different contexts.
  • Define an area, so people know you for your work.

12
Appropriate Packaging
  • Even solid work will be rejected if it is not
    appropriately packaged.
  • Main ideas of good packaging
  • Be concise
  • Be professional
  • Target the journal or conference
  • Be persuasive

13
Appropriate Packaging
  • Good Slides
  • Force you to organize concisely and clearly,
  • Allow Dr. Chen to present the work to keep the
    coming, and
  • Reduce the time needed to write a good paper.
  • Good writing
  • Describes previous work in a digested form
  • Does not distract the reader
  • Makes a coherent argument
  • Employs good examples to illustrate difficult
    techniques or concepts
  • The transition from good slides to a good paper
    is 2-3 weeks.

14
Introduction Looking Ahead
  • In future sections we will
  • Review the main points Lit Review
  • Present our Research Questions
  • Describe important environmental issues Research
    Testbed
  • Discuss methodology Research Design
  • Present our Results
  • Discuss the implications
  • Draw Conclusions and look to Future Work

15
Agenda
  • Abstract
  • Introduction
  • Background and Literature Review
  • Research Questions
  • Research Testbed, System Design
  • Research Design
  • Research Findings
  • Discussion
  • Conclusions and Future Directions
  • Additional Suggestions
  • Reviewing Papers

16
Literature Review What is it?
  • One of the most important parts of a paper
  • The lit review frames the work.
  • Connection between introduction and research
    questions
  • Introduction points out the motivation
  • Literature review provides more evidence of the
    limitations in previous studies
  • Following this logic flow, lit review leads to
    specific research questions
  • What to do? e.g., new algorithm, performance, etc.

Although, a paper is sometimes accepted largely
because of a strong lit review that summarizes
and organizes an area of inquiry
17
Literature Review Key Idea
  • The literature review presents digested
    material
  • Taxonomies/Frameworks are good
  • A taxonomy of 24 dimensions
  • Know all studies in the field and focus on
    relevant ones
  • Tell what previous work means
  • Choose the right/relevant subset of all the
    papers you could cite
  • Dont try to review everything, understand the
    audience of the paper

18
Literature Review Completeness
  • Different level of completeness depending on
    journal/audience
  • In general, a more comprehensive review
  • For special issues, not too big, more focused
  • Different focus depending on your research
    question
  • To propose a new task,
  • To compare performance, or
  • Etc.

19
Literature Review Tips
  • NOT
  • use too much tutorial,
  • educating the reader,
  • lose the seminal works,
  • making sure we mentioned everything (No laundry
    lists!), or
  • too critical to others work (Maybe he/she is
    the reviewer)
  • INSTEAD
  • Enough coverage
  • Be Comprehensive
  • Critiques (what are missing leads to your
    research questions)
  • Show why our approach makes sense
  • Provide a benchmark for comparing our results

Although, a paper is sometimes accepted largely
because of a strong lit review that summarizes
and organizes an area of inquiry
20
Agenda
  • Abstract
  • Introduction
  • Background and Literature Review
  • Research Questions
  • Research Testbed, System Design
  • Research Design
  • Research Findings
  • Discussion
  • Conclusions and Future Directions
  • Additional Suggestions
  • Reviewing Papers

21
Research Questions
  • The intro said why. The lit review set up the
    argument.
  • Research Questions
  • focus the work suggesting what we can measure,
  • follow logically from the lit review (address the
    critics in lit review and lead to your findings),
    and
  • should be answered by the experiment(s).

22
Research Questions
  • Have 2-5 major research questions,
  • They should have clear scientific motivations
  • Innovation to basic science, and
  • potential impacts.

23
Agenda
  • Abstract
  • Introduction
  • Background and Literature Review
  • Research Questions
  • Research Testbed, System Design
  • Research Design
  • Research Findings
  • Discussion
  • Conclusions and Future Directions
  • Additional Suggestions
  • Reviewing Papers

24
Research Testbed
  • What data sets will be used in the experiment(s)?
  • Testbed should be interesting, relevant, and
    significant.
  • We have
  • Slides available from previous presentations
  • Published papers

25
System Design
  • Describe how the architecture works and its
    components
  • The basic publication flow

Write Grant Proposals
Topic Identification
Format and Submit
Prepare Initial Slides
Revise and Write Revision Letters
Experimentation
Final Slides
Presentations Conferences Funding Agencies
Write a Paper
26
System Design
  • Good diagrams help readers understand better and
    clarify our own thoughts.
  • Behavioral papers may have a methodology section
    instead of system design.
  • Algorithm papers discuss methodology and
    algorithm design (pseudo codes and diagrams are
    suggested) in this section.
  • Methodology needs to have a theoretical
    foundation.

27
Agenda
  • Abstract
  • Introduction
  • Background and Literature Review
  • Research Questions
  • Research Testbed, System Design
  • Research Design
  • Research Findings
  • Discussion
  • Conclusions and Future Directions
  • Additional Suggestions
  • Reviewing Papers

28
Research Design Whats in it?
  • Focus on the experiment (s).
  • Present hypotheses
  • Measurable
  • Address the research questions
  • Plan for statistical tests

29
Research Design Whats in it?
  • Is to validate your research.
  • Use credible experiments to verify the
    hypotheses.
  • Methodology
  • Quantitative measures such as accuracy and
    speed.
  • Qualitative measures explains the inside
    phenomena of the quantitative results.
  • Simulation is often used in system design arena.

30
Agenda
  • Abstract
  • Introduction
  • Background and Literature Review
  • Research Questions
  • Research Testbed, System Design
  • Research Design
  • Research Findings
  • Discussion
  • Conclusions and Future Directions
  • Additional Suggestions
  • Reviewing Papers

31
Research Findings
  • Tables and figures are critical.
  • Need to be consistent and neat.
  • Highlight interesting numbers.
  • In caption, you may use 3-4 sentences to describe
    more details about a figure or a table.
  • Use a small paragraph in text to explain the
    essence about a figure or a table.
  • You may group your findings in chunks, each of
    which starts with a bold summarizing sentence.

32
Agenda
  • Abstract
  • Introduction
  • Background and Literature Review
  • Research Questions
  • Research Testbed, System Design
  • Research Design
  • Research Findings
  • Discussion
  • Conclusions and Future Directions
  • Additional Suggestions
  • Reviewing Papers

33
Discussion
  • The discussion section gives meaning to the
    results.
  • Why did you get the results you got?
  • If some of the results were surprising, why?
  • What did you observe outside the measured
    information presented in the research findings
    section?

34
Conclusions and Future Directions
  • Can have some duplication with the abstract.
  • State the contribution, but dont overstate it.
    Dont form questions in the reviewers mind.
  • Dont mention trivial future directions.
  • Point to several promising directions.

35
References
  • Where has similar work been published?
  • What kind of articles are accepted by the target
    journal?
  • Remember who did previous work.
  • Know where it was published.
  • Try to reference related papers that were
    published in the target journal.
  • Must have 5-10 key journals, key conferences in
    the field
  • Number the references
  • Have a consistent format

36
Agenda
  • Abstract
  • Introduction
  • Background and Literature Review
  • Research Questions
  • Research Testbed, System Design
  • Research Design
  • Research Findings
  • Discussion
  • Conclusions and Future Directions
  • Additional Suggestions
  • Reviewing Papers

37
Professionalism
  • Eliminate typos and grammar errors
  • Consistent formatting
  • Clear figures and tables
  • Captions make the meaning of the figure clear
  • The layout should be clear and clean
  • Every figure/table must be referenced in the text

38
Presentations
  • Control your time 40 slides not 75!
  • Present with energy and enthusiasm
  • Listen to questions you can clarify before you
    answer
  • Dont avoid questions, especially if they ask for
    specific information.
  • Rehearse know what slides come next
  • Dont read from your slides

39
Be concise. Consider the flow
  • Be concise
  • Do you need this slide/sentence/word/paragraph?
  • Is the prose wordy?
  • Active sentences are better than passive.
  • Flow Why is this point here?
  • Present info in a logical, top-down flow
  • Good Therefore..
  • Bad Youll see why later.

40
An example of good flow (1 of 2)
  • What is the problem?
  • Why do we care?
  • How has it been addressed before?
  • What is the research gap?
  • How are you going to address the research gap?
  • It should be clear from previous material or
    input here why you chose each part of your
    solution.

41
An example of good flow (2 of 2)
  • How will you measure the results?
  • What were your results?
  • Were they statistically significant?
  • What did you learn?
  • Why is that important?
  • What will you do next?

42
More things to think about
  • If you vary from the template you should have a
    good reason.
  • Dr. Chen resists incomplete slides.
  • Multiple revisions improve your slides. Get
    through a couple of revisions before you show
    them to Dr. Chen.
  • Let your colleagues help.

43
A challenge
  • Be ready with a good set of slides 3 days ahead.
  • Practice presenting them.
  • Tighten and revise.
  • Have a final version no less than 24 hours in
    advance.
  • Practice presenting the slides!

44
Agenda
  • Abstract
  • Introduction
  • Background and Literature Review
  • Research Questions
  • Research Testbed, System Design
  • Research Design
  • Research Findings
  • Discussion
  • Conclusions and Future Directions
  • Additional Suggestions
  • Reviewing Papers

45
Reviewing Papers
  • Be professional
  • Pretend everyone will see your review
  • Be accurate
  • Be specific
  • Be critical
  • Of the methodology

46
Reviewing Papers
  • Read similar papers
  • Summarize the paper
  • Separate major and minor comments
  • Your review becomes your reputation
  • Dont rewrite the article

47
Journal Reviews
  • 1-3 pages (never less than ½)
  • Include high level
  • Summary
  • Strengths
  • Weaknesses
  • Selection Categories
  • Accept as is
  • NEVER choose this one
  • Indicates laziness (Yours!)
  • Minor revisions
  • No methodology problems
  • Findings are interesting

48
Journal Reviews
  • Selection categories cont
  • Major revisions
  • Paper can be fixed through a new experiment
  • Needs significant clarification
  • Is incomplete
  • Rejection
  • Wrong methodology/implementation
  • Findings are trivial/uninteresting
  • Have I learned something new?
  • Wrong Journal
  • Suggest a different journal
  • Not substantial enough, recommend as a short note
  • Complete Journal Reviews in 2-3 months

49
Conference Review
  • ½-1 page
  • Accept only if light editing is necessary
  • No time for major overhauls
  • Is research and methodology interesting?
  • Complete conference reviews in 2-4 weeks
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