GUIDE TO TECHNICAL PAPER WRITING

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GUIDE TO TECHNICAL PAPER WRITING

• EPH7112 Research Methodology

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CONTENTS

• The Writing Process Flow
• Research Planning K Chart
• Paper Writing The Philosophy
• Contents of a Paper
• Constructing the Title
• Writing the Abstract
• Writing the Introduction
• Writing the Main Body
• Writing the Conclusion
• Conclusion

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1. THE WRITING PROCESS FLOW

• Research Planning
• Obtaining results
• Organizing results
• Planning for publication
• Writing the title
• Writing the abstract
• Writing the introduction
• Writing the main contents
• Theory
• Simulation/ Experiment
• Results and Discussion
• Writing the conclusion
• Pre-submission reviewing and editing
• Submitting
• Correcting

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2. RESEARCH PLANNING

• Macro level planning Gantt Chart
• Micro level planning K-Chart

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Factors Influencing the Performance of Motor
Vehicles
GENERAL TITLE
Vehicles
SYSTEM
Sub Issues 1 App. based
Land
Sea
Air
Sub Issues 2 Types based
Motorcycles
Cars
Trucks
Vans
Sub Issues 3 Types based
Mini
Sedan
Wagon
ELEMENTS
Engine
Body
Tire
METHODOLOGIES
Simulation
Experiment
Theory
Survey
Lab. Tests
Field Tests
Lab. prototype
Eng. prototype
Commercial prototype
Meas. Techn.1
Meas. Techn.2
Meas. Techn.3
RESULTS Performance Parameters
Speed
Acceleration
Fuel consumption
Design Parameters
Pressure
Tire Width
Tire Height
Tire Pressure
Tire Width
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3. PAPER WRITING THE PHILOSOPHY

• A paper contains a report on (new) findings
  and/or solutions. The purpose of the write-up is
  to convince the reader that your
  findings/solutions are important and better (than
  the existing solutions). The write-up describes
• What you are doing, What problems you want to
  solve/reduce, Why is it important, What have you
  achieved, How you achieved it, and How much
  better is it?

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IN SHORT.

• State your claims clearly,
• Support and prove your claims beyond doubts

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4. CONTENTS OF A PAPER

• Title
• Abstract
• Introduction
• Main Body
• Theory
• Simulation/Experimental Design
• Results and Discussion
• Conclusion
• References
• Other information
• Authors, Acknowledgements, Index

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IN OTHER WORDS

• A paper contains
• Three Summaries,
• An Introduction,
• The Actual Works and Findings,
• A list of References

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5. CONSTRUCTING THE TITLE(1ST SUMMARY)

• A title should indicate
• The systems you are working on
• The problems you are solving
• Your achievements
• Your methodology
• State each point in one or two words

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SAMPLE TITLES

• A widely tunable hybrid brillouin-erbium ber
  laser (BEFL) System Mohamad K. Abdullah, Suhairi
  Shaharudin, Mohd Adzir Mahdi, and Rosdisham Endut
  
• Stability Robustness Analysis of Multiple Time-
  Delayed Systems Using Building Block
  ConceptHassan Fazelinia, Rifat Sipahi, Nejat
  Olgac
• Broad Beamwidth and Cross Polarization Free
  Dipole Antennas With Reactive Loaded
  MonopolesKazushi Nishizawa, Hiroaki Miyashita,
  Shigeru Makino, Kunio Sawaya
• A New Family of Optical Code Sequences for
  Spectral-Amplitude-Coding Optical CDMA Systems
• S. A. Aljunid, M. Ismail, A. R. Ramli,
  Borhanuddin M. Ali, and Mohamad Khazani Abdullah
  
• Broadband Dielectric Resonator Antenna With Metal
  CoatingTze-Hsuan Chang, Jean-Fu Kiang
• A Synchronous Digital Hierachy Based Dynamic
  Error Correction Technique For Wavelength
  Division Multiplexing Networks CL Cheah, BM Ali,
  MA Mahdi, MK Abdullah

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6. WRITING THE ABSTRACT(2ND SUMMARY)

• An abstract elaborates the same items as
  indicated by the Title
• The systems you are working on
• The problems you are solving
• Your achievements,
• Your methodology
• Elaborate each point in 1 or 2 sentences

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SAMPLE ABSTRACT 1

• We experimentally demonstrate a simple method for
  generating a multiwavelength Brillouin comb by
  utilizing a linear cavity of hybrid Brillouin
  erbium ?ber lasers (BEFLs). The optimization of
  Brillouin pump wavelength, power, and erbium gain
  played a signi?cant role in determining the
  maximum number of Brillouin Stokes signals
  generated. Simultaneous and stable
  multiple-wavelength laser output of 22 lines with
  10.88-GHz channel spacing has been obtained with
  good ?atness. Various parameters such as 980-nm
  pump power, Brillouin pump wavelength, and
  Brillouin pump power that affect the performance
  of a multiwavelength BEFL system have been
  investigated. An analysis of the tuning range of
  the system is presented.

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SAMPLE ABSTRACT 2

• A new code structure for spectral-amplitude-coding
  optical code-division multiple-access system
  based on double-weight (DW) code families is
  proposed. The DW code has a ?xed weight of two.
  By using a mapping technique, codes that have a
  larger number of weights can be developed.
  Modi?ed double-weight (MDW) code is a DW code
  family variation that has variable weights of
  greater than two. The newly proposed code
  possesses ideal cross-correlation properties and
  exists for every natural number. MDW code is
  shown here to provide a much better performance
  compared to Hadamard and modi?ed
  frequency-hopping codes.

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7. WRITING THE INTRODUCTION

• Introduction section should clearly describe
• The scope of area of research
• Motivation factor The importance of the area of
  research
• Problem Statement The specific problems you
  attempt to solve
• Critical Review Weaknesses of existing solutions
• The achievements (main results)
• The methodology (in brief)

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SAMPLE INTRODUCTION

• Optical spectrum code-division multiple-access
  (OSCDMA) is a multiplexing technique adapted from
  the successful implementation in wireless
  networks. In OSCDMA systems, each user is
  assigned with a sequence code that serves as its
  address. An optical code-division multiple-access
  (CDMA) user modulates its code (or address) with
  each data bit and asynchronously initiates
  transmission. Hence, this modi?es its spectrum
  appearance, in a way recognizable only by the
  intended receiver. Otherwise, only noise-like
  bursts are observed 1,2.The advantages of
  OSCDMA technique over other multiplexing
  techniques such as time-division multiple-access
  and frequency-division multiple-access are
  numerous 3,8.Many codes have been proposed
  for OSCDMA such as optical orthogonal codes
  (OOCs) 4,prime codes, and modi?ed
  frequency-hopping (MFH) codes 5.However, these
  codes suffer from various limitations one way or
  another. The codes constructions are either
  complicated (e.g., OOC and MFH codes), the
  cross-correlation are not ideal (e.g., Hadamard
  and Prime codes), or the code length is too long
  (e.g., OOC and Prime code). Long code lengths are
  considered disadvantageous in its implementation
  since either very wide band sources or very
  narrow ?lter bandwidths are required. Table I
  shows the code length required by the different
  codes to support only 30 users. For example, if
  the chip width (?lter bandwidth) of 0.5 nm is
  used, the OOC code will require a spectrum width
  of 182 nm and prime code will require 480.5 nm,
  whereas, modi?ed double weight (MDW) only
  requires 45 nm. Hadamard and MFH codes show
  shorter code lengths than that of MDW and this
  will be discussed further in more detail in this
  letter. It will be shown that the transmission
  performance of MDW codes is signi?cantly better
  than that of Hadamard and MFH codes. This is
  achieved through theoretical calculation and
  software simulation.

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8. THE MAIN BODY

• THEORY
• METHODOLOGY SIMULATION and/or EXPERIMENTAL
  DESIGNS
• RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS

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WRITING THE THEORY

• Compulsory if your results involve modification
  of the existing theory/model, Optional otherwise
• Provide the main equations relating to the
  parameters you are presenting
• Describe how you have modified/improved the
  equations suiting to your design
• Show the derivation sufficiently

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WRITING THE SIMULATION/EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN
(SET-UP)

• Describe how the design works i.e the working
  principle of the design
• Describe the components used especially the
  important ones
• Describe how the design is different from others
  (existing ones)
• Highlight the design advantages i.e in terms of
  simplicity, cost etc.
• Provide the specification of the system
  design/set-up in running texts or in tabular
  forms.
• Describe the assumptions made (sometimes,
  certain devices are used to simulate real
  environments)

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WRITING THE RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS

• Present and analyze using
• Characterization curves / analysis
• Comparative curves/ analysis
• Optimization curves/ analysis
• Two angles of analyses
• Analysis of trend
• Analysis of reason

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CONTINUE

• Justify if any of your results is inferior to
  others
• Highlight your better results
• Explain why and how the better results are
  achieved
• Relate the explanation to the theory
• Substantiate every claim (conclusive statements)
  made through the results and/ or referencing
  9except for the obvious, well known facts)

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9. WRITING THE CONCLUSION(3RD SUMMARY)

• Elaborate the items in the Abstract a little
  further focusing on the results (achievements),
  and your advantages

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SAMPLE CONCLUSION 1

• A thorough experimental analysis of the
  characteristics of a new technique for generating
  stable multiwavelength laser sources by using the
  linear cavity of a hybrid BEFL system has been
  presented. The requirement of internal feedback
  to generate cascaded Brillouin gain for
  multiple-wavelength operation was achieved by the
  proposed linear cavity design. Experimental
  results were used extensively in discussing the
  effects of EDF pump power, Brillouin pump power,
  and Brillouin pump wavelength on the performance
  of the BEFL system. The optimization of these
  parameters is critical for achieving the maximum
  possible number of Stokes signals. The operation
  of 22 stable output laser lines with 0.088-nm
  10.88-GHz spacing was obtained at a 980-nm pump
  power of 100 mW, a BP power of 1.1 mW, and a BP
  wavelength of 1557.5 nm that was at the peak of
  erbium gain. Lower cavity loss in the resonator
  and more available pump power from the 980-nm
  pump power could increase the number of lines to
  a speci?c maximum number. Further, it was found
  that the number of Stokes signals decreased as
  the BP increased in the highest region of erbium
  gain. The number of Stokes signals was
  proportional to the intensity of BP power outside
  this wavelength range, however. The incremental
  numbers of Stokes signals with increasing BP
  power has its limit, whereby gain suppression (at
  other wavelengths) will prevent the generation of
  more Stokes signals. The value of this limit
  depends on the location of the injected BP
  wavelength from the peak of erbium-doped ?ber
  gain. We found that both the BP and the EDF pump
  powers affected the tuning range. At a ?xed EDF
  pump power the Stokes signal can be tuned wider
  at higher BP power, whereas higher EDF pump power
  produced a smaller tuning range.

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SAMPLE CONCLUSION 2

• In this letter, we have proposed a new family of
  optical code structure for amplitude-spectral
  encoding optical CDMA system. It has been shown
  that the MDW code performs better than the system
  encoded with Hadamard and MFH codes. The
  advantages of the proposed code are numerous,
  including easy and ef?cient code construction,
  simple encoderdecoder design, existence for
  every natural number , ideal cross-corre-lation
  , and high SNR. The simulated result of one of
  the four MDW coded carriers running at 10 Gb/s
  over a communication-standard ?ber shows a good
  quality transmission at the BER of 10-12.

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WRITING THE REFERENCES

• Ensure that all references are quoted in the text
• More references in Introduction, and Results and
  Discussion
• Normally, at least 5 references
• Avoid URL-sites
• Follow formats
• The later the better

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10. CONCLUSION

• Writing technical papers require proper planning
  from early on
• It is important to understand the structure of a
  paper
• The main focus is on the Introduction and the
  Main Body
• Clarity in the research leads to easy paper
  writing
• Skills require practices