scholarly-writing-refiner skill

Scholarly Writing Refiner — Academic Paper English Polishing Knowledge Base

Helps users review and polish English papers paragraph by paragraph according to international academic journal standards. Covers grammar correction, academic word choice optimization, voice normalization, coherence strengthening, sentence variety, and more. Outputs revision suggestions along with the polished text.

Quick Start

Users only need to provide:

1. Text to polish: One or more paragraphs of English paper content
2. Paper type (optional): Journal article / Conference paper / Thesis or dissertation / Review article
3. Target journal/field (optional): e.g., Nature, IEEE, AAAI, Medicine, Computer Science, etc.
4. Polishing focus (optional): Comprehensive polish / Grammar only / Word choice only / Coherence only

Example:

"Polish this Introduction for me. The target venue is NeurIPS, and I'd like the language to sound more natural with better logical flow."

1. Review Dimensions Overview

Polishing is carried out across 5 dimensions. Each dimension is rated independently with specific revision suggestions:

2. Grammar Review Rules

2.1 Common Grammar Errors Checklist

2.2 Punctuation Rules

2.3 Tense Guidelines by Paper Section

3. Word Choice Optimization Rules

3.1 Colloquial → Academic Substitution Table

3.2 Vague → Precise Expression

3.3 Reducing Redundancy

4. Voice Guidelines

4.1 Active vs. Passive Voice Selection

4.2 Common Voice Issues

4.3 Academic Person Conventions

5. Coherence and Cohesion Rules

5.1 Intra-Paragraph Signaling Words

5.2 Inter-Paragraph Transition Patterns

5.3 Common Coherence Problems

6. Sentence Structure Optimization Rules

6.1 Strategies for Sentence Variety

6.2 Sentence Structure Problems to Avoid

7. Section-Specific Polishing Guide

7.1 Abstract

• Length: 150–300 words (follow the target journal's requirements)
• Structure: Background (1–2 sentences) → Problem/Motivation (1 sentence) → Method (2–3 sentences) → Results (1–2 sentences) → Conclusion/Significance (1 sentence)
• Tense: Past tense for describing the work, present tense for conclusions
• Avoid: No citations, no abbreviations without first defining them in full, no figure or table numbers

7.2 Introduction

• Structure (classic "funnel" approach): Broad context → Specific problem → Existing methods and their limitations → Proposed method/contributions → Paper outline
• Key points: Each paragraph must have a clear topic sentence; be objective when reviewing prior work — do not disparage
• Common patterns:
• "In recent years, ... has attracted increasing attention."
• "Despite significant progress, ... remains a challenge."
• "To address this issue, we propose..."
• "The main contributions of this paper are as follows:"

7.3 Related Work

• Strategy: Organize by theme (not chronologically); within each group, arrange chronologically
• Key points: Explain how each work relates to the current paper; avoid mere listing — provide commentary
• Transitions: Connect each group with transitional sentences
• Common patterns:
• "A closely related line of work focuses on..."
• "In contrast to these approaches, our method..."
• "Building upon the work of X, we extend..."

7.4 Methods

• Principle: Reproducibility — the reader should be able to replicate the experiment from the description alone
• Structure: Problem formulation → Overall framework → Detailed module descriptions → Training/optimization details
• Key points: Define all mathematical symbols upon first appearance; describe steps in execution order

7.5 Results / Experiments

• Structure: Experimental setup → Main results → Ablation studies → Analysis/Discussion
• Key points: Describe trends in text first, then reference tables/figures; avoid repeating numbers already shown in tables or figures
• Common patterns:
• "As shown in Table X, our method outperforms..."
• "We observe a consistent improvement of X% across..."
• "The ablation study reveals that..."

7.6 Discussion

• Content: Interpret the significance of results → Compare with prior work → Limitations → Future directions
• Key points: Do not shy away from limitations; the discussion should go beyond the results themselves and explore broader implications

7.7 Conclusion

• Length: Typically one paragraph, 150–250 words
• Structure: Summarize the method → Core findings → Significance/Contributions → Future work
• Avoid: Do not introduce new information or data; do not simply repeat the Abstract

8. Polishing Output Format

For each paragraph of text provided by the user, output in the following format:

### Original
[User's original text]

### Review

| Dimension | Rating | Key Issues |
|-----------|--------|-----------|
| Grammar | ✓ Good / △ Needs improvement / ✗ Significant issues | Brief description |
| Word Choice | ✓ / △ / ✗ | Brief description |
| Voice | ✓ / △ / ✗ | Brief description |
| Coherence | ✓ / △ / ✗ | Brief description |
| Sentence Structure | ✓ / △ / ✗ | Brief description |

### Detailed Changes
1. **Original**: "..."
   **Revised**: "..."
   **Reason**: [Specific rationale citing the rules above]

2. ...

### Polished Version
[Complete polished paragraph]

9. Domain-Specific Notes

Different disciplines have their own writing conventions. Respect field-specific norms when polishing:

10. Agent Behavior Guide

When the user submits text for polishing, follow this workflow:

1. Confirm details: Paper type, target journal/conference (if any), polishing focus
2. Identify the section: Determine which part of the paper the text belongs to and apply the corresponding section guidelines
3. Five-dimension review: Check systematically: Grammar → Word Choice → Voice → Coherence → Sentence Structure
4. Annotate sentence by sentence: Provide a reason for every change, citing the specific rule
5. Output the polished version: Deliver the complete polished text
6. Summarize recommendations: Highlight the main catego