name: review-paper-writing
description: |
Literature review paper writing assistant — guides you through the full lifecycle:
(1) Systematic search using PICO/Boolean/MeSH frameworks across arXiv, Semantic Scholar, OpenAlex, CrossRef & PubMed;
(2) DOI & arXiv ID validation with cross-source conflict detection;
(3) Multi-format citation output (APA 7th, MLA 9th, IEEE, BibTeX, RIS, Markdown);
(4) Auto-generated structured literature review with timeline, keyword extraction & source-quality tagging.
Use when drafting a review article, survey paper, or thesis background chapter — or when given a topic to compile references for.
This skill helps you write a thorough, well-structured literature review — from topic definition and systematic search to formatted citations and a polished markdown draft. It covers:
python3 scripts/lit_search.py "large language model education" -n 20 --sources arxiv openalexpython3 scripts/lit_search.py "machine learning" --validatepython3 scripts/lit_search.py "BERT" -n 10 -f apa # APA 7th
python3 scripts/lit_search.py "transformer" -n 10 -f bibtex # BibTeX
python3 scripts lit_search.py "attention" -n 10 -f ris # RIS| Flag | Effect |
|------|--------|
| --published-only | Exclude arXiv preprints |
| --preprint-only | Only arXiv preprints |
| --min-year 2020 | Earliest publication year |
| --min-citations 50 | Minimum citation count |
| --conflicts | Detect cross-source metadata conflicts |
Create papers.txt with one DOI/PMID/arXiv ID per line:
10.48550/arXiv.2303.08774
10.48550/arXiv.2205.11916
PMID: 34567890Then:
python3 scripts/lit_search.py file://papers.txt -f bibtexUse PICO to structure your research question:
| Element | Meaning | Example |
|---------|---------|---------|
| Population | Target group | high school students |
| Intervention | Treatment or method | motivational interviewing |
| Comparator | Control group | no intervention |
| Outcome | Measurable result | academic performance |
Convert to search terms:
P: student*
I: "motivational interviewing"
O: "academic achievement"
→ "motivational interviewing" AND student* AND "academic achievement"# AND: all terms must appear
"cognitive behavioral therapy" AND adolescent*
# OR: any term may appear
depression OR anxiety OR "mental health"
# NOT: exclude terms
animal NOT pet
# Parentheses for grouping
("cognitive behavioral therapy" OR CBT) AND adolescent*student* → student, students, student's, students'
wom?n → woman, womenbehavior N/2 change # "behavior" within 2 words of "change"
"stress" ADJ3 "coping" # same sentence"Motor Activity"[Mesh]
"Depression"[Mesh] AND "Therapy"[Mesh:Subheading]# PubMed
"motivational interviewing"[Title/Abstract]
("Anxiety"[Mesh] OR "Anxiety Disorders"[Mesh]) AND 2020:2024[dp]
# PsycINFO (OVID)
exp Motivational Interviewing/
motivation interview*.tw
# Web of Science
TS=("motivational interviewing" AND school*)
PY=2020-2024| Source | Type | API Key | Best For |
|--------|------|---------|---------|
| arXiv | Preprint | ❌ No | CS, ML, physics, stats |
| Semantic Scholar | Published + preprint | Optional | High-citation papers |
| OpenAlex | Published | ❌ No | Broad cross-disciplinary |
| CrossRef | Published | ❌ No | Authoritative DOI metadata |
| PubMed | Published (biomedical) | ❌ No | Medicine, health, biology |
Recommended combinations:
arxiv + semantic_scholar → preprints + high-impact papersopenalex + pubmed → comprehensive academic coveragearxiv + openalex + pubmed → full-spectrum search| Source | Peer Reviewed | Tag |
|--------|--------------|-----|
| arXiv | ❌ No | [arXiv] |
| Journal / Conference | ✅ Yes | [Published] |
| PubMed | ✅ Yes | [PubMed] |
⚠️ arXiv papers are preprints — not peer-reviewed. Treat conclusions as provisional.
| Format | Style |
|--------|-------|
| apa | APA 7th Edition |
| mla | MLA 9th Edition |
| ieee | IEEE |
| bibtex | BibTeX (for LaTeX) |
| ris | RIS (for EndNote/Zotero) |
| markdown | Markdown with source tags |
1. Define topic → PICO framework
↓
2. Build search blocks → synonyms, MeSH terms, wildcards
↓
3. Run multi-source search (parallel API calls)
↓
4. Deduplicate by DOI / arXiv ID
↓
5. Validate IDs (HEAD request → doi.org)
↓
6. Detect cross-source conflicts (title, year, authors)
↓
7. Filter → year, citations, source type
↓
8. Format → APA / MLA / BibTeX / ...
↓
9. Generate literature review (timeline, keywords, summary)Edit scripts/lit_search.py to add your Semantic Scholar API key:
API_KEYS = {
"semantic_scholar": "your-api-key" # Get: https://www.semanticscholar.org/api-keys
}Without a key, the free tier is used (1 req/sec). A key enables 1000 req/5 sec and avoids rate-limiting.
Markdown output (-f markdown):
[1] **Attention Is All You Need**
* Vaswani, A., Shazeer, N., Parmar, N., et al. (2017). *
arXiv: [1706.03762](https://arxiv.org/abs/1706.03762) [arXiv]
*Citations: 80000*
[2] **BERT: Pre-training of Deep Bidirectional Transformers**
* Devlin, J., Chang, M. W., Lee, K., & Toutanova, K. (2019). NAACL-HLT 2019*
DOI: [10.48550/arXiv.1810.04805](https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.1810.04805) [Published]
*Citations: 70000*Generated review section:
# Literature Review
## Statistics
- **Total Papers**: 20
- [arXiv]: 8
- [Published]: 10
- [PubMed]: 2
## Timeline
- 2024: 5 papers
- 2023: 8 papers
- 2022: 4 papers
- 2021: 3 papers| Problem | Solution |
|---------|---------|
| "Rate limit" from Semantic Scholar | Add API key, or switch to OpenAlex |
| No results | Try fewer / broader search terms |
| Too many results | Narrow date range, add AND filters |
| Invalid DOI | Check format; try CrossRef validation |
| arXiv ID not found | Use format YYMM.NNNNN (e.g., 2303.08774) |