10 tools you can incorporate into your academic workflow 😲

Good morning! ☕️ It’s July 9th, 2024, and did you know that on this day, The Office (UK) first graced our screens, bringing us awkward laughs and memorable moments —you will have seen that we at et al. love all their memes 😂 

It's proof that even in research, a bit of humor can go a long way—just like trying to explain your thesis after one too many cups of coffee!

We owed you this email a few days ago, but our ultimate goal is to deliver the best content to you—and here it is!

Repeat with us. AI is not about replacing jobs but about augmenting the capabilities of researchers and educators.

From TypingMind's intuitive interface for accessing multiple AI models to Consensus' streamlined literature search capabilities, we have curated a list of the top 10 AI tools you can incorporate into your academic workflow and make it more efficient and smoother.

If you want to know more about the way you can use them and which are some of their distinguishing features, keep reading 👇🏼

Shout out to Lennart Nacke, PhD and Vugar Ibrahimov, that inspired us to create this section!

1️⃣ Typingmind (better UI for ChatGPT)

Built by an indie hacker called Tony Dihn, this tool acts as a clean, user-friendly frontend to access APIs like Claude, ChatGPT, and Gemini, all in one place. It allows users to save and modify prompts, making it ideal for repetitive tasks in academic workflows.

Tip: There are many other alternatives to Typingmind out there, here's an extensive comparison if you're already an LLM ninja... 🥷🏽

2️⃣ Consensus

In a nutshell, Consensus is an academic search engine ideal for initial literature searches. It provides extensive references in an organized manner, offers quick summaries, and effectively organizes references, making it a valuable asset for researchers beginning their literature reviews.

Tip: It can serve as an excellent complement to tools like Elicit, this way you do not rely on a single AI tool 👀

3️⃣ Jenni

Jenni is an AI writing assistant that helps overcome “writer's block” by facilitating interaction with PDFs and integrating co-writing functionalities into a single editor. It aids in generating ideas, structuring content, and refining prose, making it particularly useful for creative writing, academic papers, and professional documents!

Tip: It allows you to export your draft to LaTeX, .docx, or HTML without any formatting loss ✨

4️⃣ Otter (write as you speak)

Although it is not a tool specifically for academics and researchers, Otter can be super helpful while conducting your research! It enables quick dictation and transcription with improved accuracy compared to traditional word processors. Imagine yourself doing interviews that can be long and tedious to transcribe, this tool can be a lifesaver for many…

Tip: Otter integrates seamlessly with Microsoft Word so… Clippy fans in the room, this tool is yours! 📎

5️⃣ Paperpal

A pretty famous app accessible both on the web and as through a Word add-in, it simplifies academic tasks like paraphrasing and integrates various functions under one roof.

Tip: Their plagiarism checker helps you produce high-quality, original writing by identifying missed citations or similar phrases 😬

6️⃣ Writefull (a worthy competitor to Grammarly?)

Writefull and Grammarly are similar tools, but with different use cases. Writefull is for students and anyone working in academia because the suggestions are more formal.

Tip: Their plagiarism checker helps you produce high-quality, original writing by identifying missed citations or similar phrases 😬 

Bonus tip: Also, their Abstract Generator can give you an abstract based on your paper's content!

7️⃣ Scite

On the surface, you can go to their landing and say... “okay, it does the citation thing…” 🥱 but Scite is a super powerful tool for academics and researchers and does so much more. Let's say that there is a source paper which makes a citation to a target paper. This tool will access the full-text articles of both papers, detect that the source paper makes a citation to the target paper, extract the text from the source where the citation happened and internally track all of the different source papers which cited it and the information around each citation.

Tip: This video by Dr. Andy Stapleton seems to be a must-watch for any Scite beginner 🎥

8️⃣ Perplexity (the new viral)

Pretty similar to a Google search but AI-based. As a researcher, you can efficiently search for relevant web pages, as every output of Perplexity is backed by several, mostly relevant, references. But keep in mind that Perplexity, as the above mentioned Elicit, rely on digital archives from Semantic Scholar, and those archives aren’t as comprehensive as Google Scholar or a college library 🙇🏻‍♂️

9️⃣ Audemic Scholar (best TTS for academic papers)

Reading and understanding papers should not be such a hard task. This tool, used by more than 38,000 researchers and PhD students worldwide, allows you to upload any PDF article from local or your Zotero library and listen to it in non-robotic voices.

Tip: They have specific functionalities for users with learning disabilities such as the read along function and they have just released a mobile App that synchronizes with the desktop version!

Use the coupon ETAL10 to enjoy a lifetime 10% discount on their annual plan!

🔟 Audemic Insights

Also built by the Audemic team, Audemic Insights summarizes research articles and reports from academic journals and organizations such as the World Bank and the United Nations into brief written and audio summaries also for non-academics.

Tip: Spotify but for knowledge? They have just released a feature called “Collections”, where they group various hot topics—ranging from the recent UK general election and nutrition and wellness myths to the European Football Championship—under the look and feel of a music playlist.

How to choose the right PI: red and green flags 👀

PI-PhD student success depends on similar aspects to a successful marriage: mutual respect, good communication, and aligned goals ❣️

Choosing the right Principal Investigator (PI) is one of the most crucial decisions you'll make in your academic career. Based on insightful discussions from a Reddit thread, we've compiled a list of green and red flags to help you navigate this process.

Drawing from real-life experiences of grad students and postdocs, this guide offers practical tips and candid advice on what to look for—and what to avoid—when selecting a PI. Whether it's ensuring the PI values student input or recognizing the subtle signs of a toxic lab environment, these pointers will equip you with the knowledge to make an informed decision for your future! 👇🏼

Green Flags

🟢 Easy to Talk to:

"Ask other grad students if the PI is easy to get hold of and how they react when things get stressful. It's a game-changer"

Example: “If the PI is cool with you knocking on their door or sending a quick email when you're stuck, that’s a big win…”

🟢 Hands-On vs. Hands-Off:

"Know if you need more or less guidance. Ask if the PI is more hands-on or hands-off and decide what works for you."

Example: "My current PI is hands-off, which is great for my independent projects, but my friend needs a PI who checks in weekly."

🟢 Student Success:

"Check how many students actually finish their PhDs and how long it takes."

Example: "A PI whose students finish on time and land good jobs is a good sign."

🟢 Lab Atmosphere:

"Labs where members enjoy working together and the PI cares about their mentorship strategies."

Example: "One lab I visited had students who seemed genuinely happy and collaborative. It felt right."

🟢 Reactions to Setbacks:

"Ask how the PI reacts when experiments fail."

Example: "If the PI is supportive and helps troubleshoot rather than blaming you, that's a green flag."

Red Flags

🔴 Feedback from Former Members:

"Talk to people who have left the lab. They have no reason to hold back and can give you the real scoop"

Example: “I spoke to a guy whose wife was in a lab I was considering. He straight-up told me to run. Dodged a bullet there.”

🔴 Controlled Interactions:

"If the PI never leaves you alone with current students, that's a bad sign."

Example: "I once met a PI who insisted on being present for all conversations with students. Major control freak vibes."

🔴 Unavailability:

"PI who is always in a rush and doesn’t spend time with students."

Example: "My previous PI would only give me a couple of minutes and was always too busy. It was frustrating."

🔴 Misalignment of Interests:

"PI's claimed research interests are different from their actual work."

Example: "I joined a lab for one research area but ended up doing something completely different. Total bait and switch."

🔴 Lab Environment:

"Messy, disorganized labs can indicate stress and low morale."

"Labs where students don’t help each other and are overly competitive."

Example: "A lab I visited was a total mess, and the students seemed burnt out and stressed."

🔴 Publication Gaps:

"Labs that wait 4+ years between publishing can be a red flag."

Example: "A lab that hasn't published in years might indicate poor productivity or internal issues."

Remember, it's important to weigh these flags based on what matters most to you. Every student and situation is different, so trust your gut and gather as much info as you can 💫

Applications are open for Harvard University free online courses 2024 🎁

Developed through a collaboration between HarvardX and the Institute for Healthcare Improvement, Harvard offers free courses online that are available to anyone and everyone.

These courses include purely academic as well as vocational courses. The course duration spans 7-12 weeks, and students must dedicate 4-6 hours a week to their studies. Here are some examples 👇🏼

PS: In case you want a certificate, you would have to pay a specified fee!

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Take your introductory knowledge of Python programming to the next level and learn how to use Python 3 for your research.

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What is happiness? What makes you happy? Can you get happier through study and effort? Maybe you have pondered these questions over the course of your life, but haven’t been able to come up with any definitive answers.

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You can also access the full catalog of free courses here 

Adapting a dissertation or thesis into a journal article ✍🏼

The original research in a dissertation or thesis can be adapted for journal submission using two main strategies: the multiple-paper approach or the conversion strategy. The American Psychological Association (APA) offers a comprehensive guide on how to proceed:

Multiple-paper strategy

The quickest strategy for converting (or “flipping”) a dissertation or thesis into one or more publishable articles is to use a multiple-paper format when initially writing the dissertation or thesis. This involves structuring the dissertation or thesis used to fulfill the requirements for a degree as a series of shorter papers that are already formatted for journal submission (or close to it).

These papers are usually each the length of a journal article, conceptually similar, and come from the same overarching project—but can stand alone as independent research reports.

🚨 We recommend you to consult your university’s editorial office to confirm that this is an approved format for your dissertation or thesis and to obtain the specific guidelines!

Conversion strategy

A second strategy is to reformat and convert a dissertation or thesis into a journal article after completing your dissertation or thesis defense to fit the scope and style of a journal article. This often requires adjustments to the following elements:

• Length: Brevity is an important consideration for a manuscript to be considered for journal publication, particularly in the introduction and Discussion sections. Making a dissertation or thesis publication-ready often involves reducing a document of over 100 pages to one third of its original length. Shorten the overall paper by eliminating text within sections and/or eliminating entire sections. If the work examined several research questions, you may consider separating distinct research questions into individual papers; narrow the focus to a specific topic for each paper.

• Abstract: The abstract may need to be condensed to meet the length requirements of the journal. Journal abstract requirements are usually more limited than college or university requirements (for instance, most APA journals limit the abstract length to 250 words).

• Introduction section: One of the major challenges in reformatting a dissertation or thesis is paring down its comprehensive literature review to a more succinct one suitable for the introduction of a journal article. Limit the introductory text to material relating to the immediate context of your research questions and hypotheses. Eliminate extraneous content or sections that do not directly contribute to readers’ knowledge or understanding of the specific research question(s) or topic(s) under investigation. End with a clear description of the questions, aims, or hypotheses that informed your research.

• Method section: Provide enough information to allow readers to understand how the data were collected and evaluated. Refer readers to previous works that informed the current study’s methods or to supplemental materials instead of providing full details of every step taken or the rationale behind them.

• Results section: Be selective in choosing analyses for inclusion in the Results section and report only the most relevant ones. Although an unbiased approach is important to avoid omitting study data, reporting every analysis that may have been run for the dissertation or thesis often is not feasible, appropriate, or useful in the limited space of a journal article. Instead, ensure that the results directly contribute to answering your original research questions or hypotheses and exclude more ancillary analyses (or include them as supplemental materials). Be clear in identifying your primary, secondary, and any exploratory analyses.

• Discussion section: Adjust the discussion according to the analyses and results you report. Check that your interpretation and application of the findings are appropriate and do not extrapolate beyond the data. A strong Discussion section notes area of consensus with and divergence from previous work, taking into account sample size and composition, effect size, limitations of measurement, and other specific considerations of the study.

• References: Include only the most pertinent references (i.e., theoretically important or recent), especially in the introduction and literature review, rather than providing an exhaustive list. Ensure that the works you cite contribute to readers’ knowledge of the specific topic and to understanding and contextualizing your research. Citation of reviews and meta-analyses can guide interested readers to the broader literature while providing an economical way of referencing prior studies.

• Tables and figures: Make sure that tables or figures are essential and do not reproduce content provided in the text!

Together with @PHDcomics