34 Science Research Writing 1.4.1 Vocabulary for the Introduction 1. ESTABLISHING SIGNIFICANCE (a) basic issue economically important (a) central problem (has) focused (on) (a) challenging area for a number of years (a) classic feature for many years (a) common issue frequent(ly) (a) considerable number generally (a) crucial issue (has been) extensively studied (a) current problem importance/important (a) dramatic increase many (an) essential element most (a) fundamental issue much study in recent years (a) growth in popularity nowadays (an) increasing number numerous investigations (an) interesting field of great concern (a) key technique of growing interest (a) leading cause (of) often (a) major issue one of the best-known (a) popular method over the past ten years (a) powerful tool/method play a key role (in) (a) profitable technology play a major part (in) (a) range (of) possible benefits (a) rapid rise potential applications (a) remarkable variety recent decades (a) significant increase recent(ly) (a) striking feature today (a) useful method traditional(ly) (a) vital aspect typical(ly) (a) worthwhile study usually Introduction — Vocabulary 35 (an) advantage well-documented attracted much attention well-known benefit/beneficial widely recognised commercial interest widespread during the past two decades worthwhile Here are some examples of how these are used: • A major current focus in population management is how to ensure sustainability of... • Numerous experiments have established that ionising radiation causes... • Low-dose responses to radiation have generated considerable recent research interest. • Analysis of change in the transportation sector is vital for two important reasons: ... • PDA accounts for over 95% of all pancreatic cancers. • It is generally accepted that joints in steel frames operate in a semirigid fashion. • Nanocrystalline oxide films are attracting widespread interest in fields such as... • The importance of strength anisotropy has been demonstrated by... • Convection heat transfer phenomena play an important role in the development of... • For more than 100 years researchers have been observing the stress-strain behaviour of... • Much research in recent years has focused on carbon nanotubes. 36 Science Research Writing 2. VERBS USED IN THE LITERATURE REVIEW TO PRESENT PREVIOUS AND/OR CURRENT RESEARCH AND CONTRIBUTIONS achieve develop obtain address discover overcome adopt discuss perform analyse enhance point out apply establish predict argue estimate present assume evaluate produce attempt examine propose calculate explain prove categorise explore provide carry out extend publish choose find put forward claim focus on realise classify formulate recognise collect generate recommend compare identify record concentrate (on) illustrate report conclude implement reveal conduct imply revise confirm improve review consider incorporate show construct indicate simulate correlate interpret solve deal with introduce state debate investigate study define measure support demonstrate model suggest describe monitor test design note undertake detect observe use determine prefer utilise Introduction — Vocabulary 37 Here are some examples of how these are used: • This phenomenon was demonstrated by... • In their study, expanded T-cells were found in... • Initial attempts focused on identifying the cause of... • Weather severity has been shown to... • Early data was interpreted in the study by... • The algorithm has been proposed for these applications... • The results on pair dispersion were reported in... • Their study suggested a possible cause for... • An alternative approach was developed by... Note: You can recycle these verbs at the end of the Introduction when you say what you plan to do in your paper (see 4 below) 3. GAP/QUESTION/PROBLEM/CRITICISM This is often signalled by words such as however, although, while, nevertheless, despite, but. ambiguous (the) absence of computationally demanding (an) alternative approach confused (a) challenge deficient (a) defect doubtful (a) difficulty expensive (a) disadvantage false (a) drawback far from perfect (an) error ill-defined (a) flaw impractical (a) gap in our knowledge improbable (a) lack inaccurate (a) limitation inadequate (a) need for clarification incapable (of) (the) next step incompatible (with) no correlation (between) incomplete (an) obstacle inconclusive (a) problem inconsistent (a) risk inconvenient (a) weakness incorrect 38 Science Research Writing ineffective (to be) confined to inefficient (to) demand clarification inferior (to) disagree inflexible (to) fail to insufficient (to) fall short of meaningless (to) miscalculate misleading (to) misjudge non-existent (to) misunderstand not addressed (to) need to re-examine not apparent (to) neglect not dealt with (to) overlook not rep eatable (to) remain unstudied not studied (to) require clarification not sufficiently + adjective (to) suffer (from) not well understood not/no longer useful few studies have... of little value it is necessary to... over-simplistic little evidence is available poor little work has been done problematic more work is needed questionable there is growing concern redundant there is an urgent need... restricted this is not the case time-consuming unfortunately unanswered uncertain unclear uneconomic unfounded unlikely unnecessary unproven unrealistic unresolved unsatisfactory unsolved unsuccessful unsupported Introduction — Vocabulary 39 Here are some examples of how these are used: • Few researchers have addressed the problem of... • There remains a need for an efficient method that can... • However, light scattering techniques have been largely unsuccessful to date. • The high absorbance makes this an impractical option in cases where... • Unfortunately, these methods do not always guarantee... • An alternative approach is necessary. • The function of these proteins remains unclear. • These can be time-consuming and are often technically difficult to perform. • Although this approach improves performance, it results in an unacceptable number of... • Previous work has focused only on... • However, the experimental configuration was far from optimal. Note: Some of these words/phrases express very strong criticism. A useful exercise is to put an asterisk (*) next to those you think you could use if you were talking about the research of your professor or supervisor. You can also alter them to make them more polite (i.e. instead of unsuccessful, which is quite a strong criticism, you could write may not always be completely successful). (to) attempt (is) organised as follows: (were/are) able to (to) compare (is) set out as follows: accurate/accurately (to) concentrate (is/are) presented in detail effective/effectively (on) (our) approach efficient/efficiently (to) conclude (the) present work excellent results (to) describe (this) paper innovation (to) discuss (this) project new (to) enable (this) report novel method (to) evaluate (this) section powerful (to) expect (this) study practical 40 Science Research Writing 4. THE PRESENT WORK (to) facilitate (this) work simple (to) illustrate begin by/with straightforward (to) improve close attention is paid to successful (to) manage to here valuable (to) minimise overview (to) offer aim (to) outline goal (to) predict intention (to) present objective (to) propose purpose (to) provide (to) reveal (to) succeed Here are some examples of how these are used: • This paper focuses on... • The purpose of this study is to describe and examine... • In order to investigate the biological significance... • In this paper we present... • New correlations were developed with excellent results... • In the present study we performed... • This paper introduces a scheme which solves these problems. • The approach we have used in this study aims to... • This study investigated the use of... • In this report we test the hypothesis that... • This paper is organised as follows:... Note: In a thesis or a very long research paper, you use these to say what each chapter or section will do. Don't rely on one-size-fits-all verbs such as discuss; some chapters/sections do not 'discuss' anything, and even if they do, their main purpose may be to compare things, analyse things or describe things rather than to discuss them.