LAMDA-NeSy/Research-Starter-Kit

What is this?

Research-Starter-Kit (Chinese: 科研入门指南, "Research Entry Guide") is a free, open-source handbook that teaches beginners how to do academic research and write papers — from zero. It's a collection of practical guides, not a software tool.

Who made it and why?

It was created by Guo Lanzhe, an associate professor at Nanjing University's School of Intelligent Science and Technology, who supervises PhD students. He noticed that every year, new graduate students and undergraduates joining his lab ask the same basic questions: What is research? How do I find and read papers? How do I judge if a paper is good? How do I come up with an idea? How do I prepare my first submission? Some students also get little supervision and lack structured guidance. So he and his team wrote down their accumulated knowledge to give newcomers a reference guide.

Who is it for?

• Undergraduates, master's students, and PhD students just entering a lab or research group
• Anyone participating in a research project for the first time
• New members who want to systematically organize their research workflow and habits
• Advisors and senior PhD students who mentor newcomers

What's inside?

The handbook is organized into three sections, with each topic linking to a detailed document (hosted on Feishu, a collaboration platform):

1. How to do research

• How to find papers
• How to read papers
• How to come up with research ideas
• How to give academic presentations
• How to run effective meetings
• Good habits to develop

2. How to write papers — section-by-section guidance:

• Drawing figures for papers
• Writing the Abstract
• Writing the Introduction
• Writing Related Works
• Writing the Methods section
• Writing the Experiments section
• Writing References
• How to write a rebuttal (responding to reviewer criticism)

3. Miscellaneous

• Guide to attending academic conferences
• Scholarships you can apply for
• Tips for using AI to assist research

Current status

The project is early-stage and actively being built — the README says it will be continuously updated and improved. The author invites suggestions via comments or email, and asks readers to star the GitHub repository if they find it helpful.

Credits

The project acknowledges help from several students (Chen Yuyang, Ge Lingyue, Zhang Yikai) and draws on external resources, including an article by Zhou Zhihua (a well-known Chinese AI professor), a book on academic research by Ling Xiaofeng and Yang Qiang, a research-experience guide by Peng Sida at Zhejiang University, a rebuttal guide by Wei Xiushen at Southeast University, and a book on science research writing for non-native English speakers.

In one sentence

A growing, free, Chinese-language guidebook that walks research newcomers through the entire journey — finding papers, reading them, forming ideas, writing each part of a paper, and surviving your first submission.