Respectively is a very useful word in scientific writing; however, we often see this word used incorrectly.

Here are some sentences that use the word “respectively” in the wrong way.

Can you identify what’s wrong with each...

Using the spellcheck tool of your word processing software is a good way of making sure there are no mistakes in your scientific manuscript. 

However, the spellcheck will miss words that are spelled correctly if they are very similar...

Generally, apostrophes indicate either two words that have been shortened into one word (e.g. isn’t) or indicate the relationship between two words (e.g. the boy’s ball). 

Words containing apostrophes are very common in...

Every researcher wants to tell the world they are the first to find out something new

Unfortunately, many journals’ instructions to authors specifically ask that you avoid using phrases like “we provide the first...

There is one phrase that you should leave out of your manuscripts:

 The results showed that……

This phrase repeatedly comes up in the papers we edit and our editors always delete it or change it....

Recently, I was editing a manuscript and found a sentence that reminded me of the importance of avoiding “double negatives” in scientific writing.

The patient had no abnormal blood glucose or insulin levels.

...

In this post, I’m going to provide a quick overview of the most common basic errors our editors see in scientific manuscripts.

1. Check for spelling mistakes

This is obvious, yet it is surprising how many spelling mistakes our...