Principles of Scientific and Technical Writing

Scientific writing is technical writing of scientific research findings typically by scientists targeting peers, researchers and scientists chiefly as audience. As knowledge will be lost without proper documentation, scientific writing is very important and should be clear, simple and well organized to meet the needs of publication. It encompasses types or genres such as peer-reviewed articles, technical reports and grant proposals, each serving a specific purpose and audience. Hence scientific writings leading to publications are imperative for both career advancement as well as for attracting research grants from funding bodies. Chapters 1-3 are compilations representing the importance and integrity of scientific writing in today’s world while Chapters 4-5 focus on the general methodologies employed to improvise scientific writing. Strategies to write the various sections of a scientific paper for e.g. Introduction, Abstract, Conclusions, References, etc. are elucidated in Chapters 6-9. In Chapter 10, special attention is given to Plagiarism, a common pitfall by scientific or technical writers, and the various strategies to address it. Furthermore the scope of this book has been extended to biomedical as well as neuropsychological field of research in Chapters 11 and 12 respectively. As writing proposals for acquiring grants has paramount role in a research group, strategies for a successful grant application are produced in Chapters 13-14. Chapter 15 aims to examine the effect of blending virtual communities on writing apprehension and how can virtual communities facilitate meaningful communication. Chapters 16-17 provides an overview of the scientific and technical writing field as well as how technical writers are utilized by software development companies In Chapter 18, an exploration of the scientific writing experience of nonnative English speaking doctoral supervisors and students using a phenomenographic approach is presented and a novel approach to support scientific writing with a tool called SciFlow is presented in Chapter 19. Succedingly, Chapter 20 aims to investigate how weblogs as well as microblogs can be used to enhance traditional lectures in Higher Education. A randomized controlled trial comparing standard, and on-line instruction and fundamental principles of scientific writing that also include a “style and grace” component are reviewed in Chapters 21 and 22 respectively. Chapter 23 responds to text clumping for technical intelligence and last Chapter aims to describe the Web application Manuscript Architect, designed to assist virtual interdisciplinary groups in the writing of scientific manuscripts. This book will be a useful resource of materials to amateurs as well as professionals who want to pursue a career in scientific or academic line. It will guide scientists as well as academic scholars to enhance the quality of their manuscripts, in communicating effectively, in publishing higher impact factor journals as well as to write grant proposals for the economic survival of research institutions.