How to write the abstract for a paper

[Moonbear]

OK Here is the abstract. What would an editor do after reading that?

Andre, I'll give you a quick and dirty commentary, but just from the abstract, I'd say it is nowhere near ready for publication. Since you've asked, I have no choice than to be blunt, it reads like a freshman lab report, not a scholarly thesis.

First, nearly every sentence includes the word "may" or "could," which means it reads as little more than hand-waving. The hypothesis statement is vague and wishy-washy, not to mention hard to find (the first paragraph where you say the hypothesis is contained does not actually contain what appears to be the crux of your hypothesis; it is buried and scattered among several of the later paragraphs). As has already been discussed, it is far too long. Beyond just being long, it rambles on without making any real point. The vast majority is unnecessary filler, and nothing is included to indicate you have any actual evidence or support for your hypothesis that will be discussed within the body of the manuscript. There are grammatical errors as well, but I'm not going to bother with those.

Venus’ planetary "design" (vague)[/color] and its likely[/color] complicated orbit and spinning interactions in the past may have[/color] caused one or more (if you're not sure how many times, how are you sure it happened at all?)[/color] breakouts of the planet’s inner core spinning axis in relation to the spin axis of the mantle. This may have[/color] happened about one billion years ago and may have[/color] had catastrophic results (such as?)[/color]. We intend to demonstrate (how?)[/color] that ]this hypothesis (what part of the above is the hypothesis? It's all "maybe this maybe that," with no testable statement of hypothesis)[/color] may generally explain all enigmatic features (all?)[/color] of Venus simultaneously.

The precession cycles and obliquity cycles of Venus may[/color] have been in a chaotic resonance interaction in the distant past. This may[/color] have caused extreme obliquity changes of the planet’s mantle. Also, precession cycles add up here (where?)[/color] to generate a high rate of change of the spin axis of the mantle of the planet (change of what? rotational velocity? angle? length?)[/color]. The planet’s solid inner core may[/color] not have been stabilized enough to follow these spin axis changes, and its own, individual spin axis may[/color] have departed from alignment with the mantle spin axis. This may[/color] have caused a dramatic braking effect where the spinning energy of the planet was converted to heat, reducing the spinning of the planet significantly. (This paragraph seems to contain more of your hypothesis statement than the introductory paragraph, but still presented too tentatively.)[/color]

(I'm going to stop doing a line-by-line commentary at this point and just hit a few main points...you should get the idea already.)[/color]
The surface of the planet shows several apparent signs of extreme heat, which has been attributed to runaway greenhouse gas effect. It is recognized however, that not all thermal features can be explained either by volcanism or by greenhouse gas effect therefore also radiogenic heating was introduced but there are no further indications for such a aberration from the Earth like composition. An extreme internal heat as caused by the internal braking of the inner core would explain these features far more easily. (But, do you have evidence this IS what happened? Nothing in the abstract suggests you do.)[/color] Also a significant volcanic activity in the early period that diminished gradually as the planet cooled, could also point in this direction.

The atmosphere of Venus contains carbon on about the same order of magnitude as the total Earth lithosphere. This could suggest that all Venus carbon is in its atmosphere, (No, it doesn't. Lack of any carbon in the core and crust would suggest it is all in the atmosphere...if that's true.)[/color] to be explained by a general heating of the complete planet, enough to reduce all limestone type of rocks in the crust to carbon dioxide and calcium oxides. Greenhouse models continue to pose several problems about the current thermal state of the planet. These problems cease to exist however with the notion that the heat is still residual from that the big brake.

Consequently, Venus’ current slow spin state, the extreme heat of the planet and its dense atmosphere, as well as its enigmatic geologic surface features could all be explained by a single mechanism: the big brake.

Most of what is written above does not belong in an abstract. Even without knowing the subject, I can tell you that. In an abstract, state clearly, with only about one to three sentences each: clear statement of hypothesis (1 sentence), approach or method of testing hypothesis (1-2 sentences), most significant results/observations (1-3 sentences), and conclusion (1 sentence).

 

[Andre]

Great, now we are getting somewhere, thanks for the help Moonbear, Monique. Let’s try a complete different approach

Terrestrial planets have a complicated multi-layered structure (there must be a better word) consisting of a solid inner core a fluid outer core and a mantle. The difference in gyroscopic behaviour (angular momentum) results in complicated reactions to orbital perturbations. Several factors like precession and obliquity resonance under influence of gravitation of the solar system can (will, could may) lead to break out of the inner core spinning axis. Here we show that this behavior has lead to the current spinning stop of the planet Venus. We content that not only the lack of spinning but also the high temperatures, the dense carbon dioxide atmosphere and the specific geologic history are the ultimate (logical) consequence of such (an) event(s).

 

[arildno]

This is far more to the point, Andre!
However, you should try to make it clear in your very first sentence what you are talking about.

As a first sentence example:

"We propose that several puzzling features of Venus is the outcome of a simple braking mechanism due to an initial difference in the angular momenta of the mantle and the inner core, respectively."


Don't regard my statements in any way as authorative, though..

 

[Monique]

Big improvement Andre! The purpose of an abstract is to draw a reader in; convince him that the article discusses subjects of interest to him, don't actually discuss anything in the abstract itself. Moonbear gave some great advise and I can see that you followed it. I haven't read your manuscript, but you should keep everything to the point and formal as well.

 

[arildno]

A few pointers with regards to an abstract (again, just my opinion):
1) Do not argue for your theory here, present the basic mechanism
2) State that this represents an advantage with respect to other theories, in that it is a single mechanism which explains several features (enumerate these) whereas other theories (REFERENCES!) can only explain some of these features


Arguments and doubts are to be given in the main text.

 

[Andre]

Ok, some collated comments compiled here:

"The main puzzling features of planet Venus have been attributed to several isolated, sometimes conflicting hypotheses. Here we show that a single mechanism can do better. The gyroscopic response differences of the solid inner core, fluid outer core and mantle to orbital perturbations can result into a break out of the inner core spinning axis. This behaviour has lead to the current spinning stop of the planet Venus. We content that this also explains the high temperatures, the dense carbon dioxide atmosphere and the specific geologic history."

I'll brush up the paper a little the next few days and then pm a link to it to whomever is interested including my kind advisors, of course, just for entertainment. Please don't feel obliged to review it. I'm not discouraging it, though.

Don't worry about references. Have to bring down the list from some 8 pages to something manageable.

 

[arildno]

Ok, some collated comments compiled here:

"The main puzzling features of planet Venus have been attributed to several isolated, sometimes conflicting hypotheses. Here we show that a single mechanism can do better. The gyroscopic response differences of the solid inner core, fluid outer core and mantle to orbital perturbations can results into a break out of the inner core spinning axis. This behaviour has lead to the current spinning stop of the planet Venus. We content that this also explains the high temperatures, the dense carbon dioxide atmosphere and the specific geologic history."

I'll brush up the paper a little the next few days and then pm a link to it to whomever is interested including my kind advisors, of course, just for entertainment. Please don't feel obliged to review it. I'm not discouraging it, though.

Don't worry about references. Have to bring down the list from some 8 pages to something manageable.

This is the way to go, Andre!
I'll just weed out some errors in grammar and spelling, plus something which might be better:
"The main puzzling features of planet Venus have been attributed to several isolated, sometimes conflicting hypotheses. Here we show that a single mechanism CAN BE SEEN RESPONSIBLE FOR ALL OF THEM.

The gyroscopic response differences of the solid inner core, fluid outer core and mantle to orbital perturbations can RESULT IN a break-out of the inner core spinning axis. This behaviour has lead to the current spinning stop of the planet Venus. We CONTEND that this also explains the high temperatures, the dense carbon dioxide atmosphere and the specific geologic history OF VENUS."

 

[Andre]

Thanks Arildno

Some questions of Moonbear.

caused one or more (if you're not sure how many times, how are you sure it happened at all?) breakouts of the planet’s inner core spinning axis in relation to the spin axis of the mantle.

We're talking about different spin axis directions where each spin axis follows a specific precession cone. This means that eventually the axes will realign until the next event. Such an event may have lasted 50,000 - 100,000 years projecting the Earth precession rate on Venus, without moon but closer to the sun. Think of a couple of thousand of such events in (several?) billion years.

An extreme internal heat as caused by the internal braking of the inner core would explain these features far more easily. (But, do you have evidence this IS what happened? Nothing in the abstract suggests you do.)

We are dealing with a lot of details, one of them is a strongly declining thermal gradient of the crust between the oldest tesserae terrains compared to the youngest formations and multiple signs of high temperature beyond the solidus of basalt like this:

http://gsa.confex.com/gsa/2003AM/finalprogram/abstract_60370.htm
(one of the "retrodictions")
Update: coming to think of it. The hypothesis was born in June 2003. That abstract is of November so it was actually a genuine prediction.

The atmosphere of Venus contains carbon on about the same order of magnitude as the total Earth lithosphere. This could suggest that all Venus carbon is in its atmosphere, (No, it doesn't. Lack of any carbon in the core and crust would suggest it is all in the atmosphere...if that's true.)

Interesting point and even that would not suffice as the temperature and pressure appear to be on a chemical equilibrium for CO2 and silicates to form compounds. So some CO2 may reenter the soil. However, none of the satellite analyses appear to have come up with carbonates.

BTW About the layman talk, I had reshaped the story into popular book form and changed all the "bicycles" to "bikes". But if we need bicycles, so be it.

Edit to add link

 

[Nereid]

To readers of this thread:

This has been split from an older thread ("Theory Development") that is still in the PF Feedback section. The editing (of the thread; no posts have been edited) is, necessarily, rather blunt.

However, there is (IMHO) some good advice on how to go about writing the abstract of a paper (and the paper itself, how to choose a journal, ...).

Suggestions on how to further edit the thread (not the content) to improve its value here in A&CG would be welcome.

 

[jma2001]

Wow, a thread that was actually upgraded from "theory development", how often has that happened?

But seriously, there is a lot of good advice in this thread and I am glad to see it moved to a more appropriate location. I will be very interested to hear how Zanket and Andre do with their journal submissions.

 

[matt grime]

Sure, we can shorten the abstract or perhaps enlarge it to be the first general overview article of the sequence.
About expressing doubt or be very positive.You could be right however I mimicked my http://www.technologyreview.com/articles/03/12/wo_muller121703.asp?p=2:
So what would be the best?

There's a difference between being cautious and admitting something is only a theory and not being convincing in your argument.

Changing the words a little, your abstract might read:

We may be the reincarnation of a dairy maid. We may have memories of a prelife, we may think other people also have undergone reincarnation, there may be some people who have interesting stories, and may have been involved in a plot to assassinate Catherine the Great...


So why not try something like: Explain you offer an alternative account of XXXXX (whatever it is you're talking about - I don't understand it at all). Briefly describe hypothesis, what may be deduced from it, and possibly indicate what this does that the established theory doesn't allow for.

 

[Gokul43201]

Wow, a thread that was actually upgraded from "theory development", how often has that happened?

This thread was titled "TD", but lived in the Feedback forum, not in TD itself.

The discussion on writing an abstract for a scientific paper is valuable enough to warrant dedicated attention.

 

[Moonbear]

Good Move!

This thread was titled "TD", but lived in the Feedback forum, not in TD itself.

The discussion on writing an abstract for a scientific paper is valuable enough to warrant dedicated attention.

Thanks to the mentors for splitting this out into a separate topic. This is a good exercise for anyone, to see where the abstract started out as something rather unweildy and unconvincing, and with just a few iterations of revisions, is already shaping up into something far more enticing.

Of course, I don't know the subject matter well enough to advise beyond stylistic points here (and if my stylistic suggestions alter the meaning because something has a specific technical usage in this field, then you'll have to judge which of my suggestions to ignore at this stage).

Andre, it's already looking MUCH better!

Working off arildno's revisions (my changes/suggestions in red):

The main puzzling features of planet Venus have been attributed to several isolated, sometimes conflicting hypotheses. Here we show that a single mechanism CAN (deleted:BE SEEN RESPONSIBLE FOR) (replace with: explain) [/color]ALL OF THEM.

The gyroscopic response differences of the solid inner core, fluid outer core and mantle to orbital perturbations can RESULT IN (would it be correct to change that to "...have resulted in..."? Is this something that you have experimental evidence for...yours or a review of others' prior papers...that you will describe within the body of the paper?)[/color] a break-out of the inner core spinning axis. This behaviour has led[/color] to the current spinning stop (not sure what that phrase means: "current spinning stop"...please clarify or reword...depending what you mean, this sentence may need to be reworked a bit more)[/color] of the planet Venus. We CONTEND that this also explains the high temperatures, the dense carbon dioxide atmosphere and the specific geologic history OF VENUS.

 

[arildno]

Moonbear certainly improved my suggestion.

I agree that it would be best to delete the "responsible"-bit, but here's why I chose not to use "explain":

Can a physical mechanism "explain"?
I would say that a theory "explains", whereas a mechanism "accounts for"
(I was unsure about the English here..)

 

[ZapperZ]

Consistent with being the ogre that I am (no smart comment from you, Moonbie dear!), I will say that I'm very weary about what's going on here.

Initially, the issue what was being addressed for the FORMAT of the abstract. I know that I was addressing just that. Why? Because it is meaningless to address the CONTENT of the abstract without first reading the whole paper AND understanding the main points that are being conveyed. One typically writes the outline of the paper (listing all the important points/figures/data to be highlighted), then the paper, and THEN, at the end, the abstract. One does this while keeping in mind the specific journals one is thinking of submitting. Notice I said JOURNALS, not journal, because often, one has a shortlist of a few journals that one has narrowed down.

Even after doing all this, things get changed, revised, and rewritten, especially when there is more than one author, which in my case, is all the time. But the point I'm trying to get across is that one very seldom can make content judgement of an abstract to be submitted till one has (i) read the whole paper and (ii) read the FINAL version of the paper.

There is one thing that I find rather puzzling. In doing something like writing a research paper, one presumably had to do a lot of reading of other previous publications in peer-reviewed, scholarly journals. After all, one doesn't cite the parameters of Venus based on what one read off the pages of the NY Times, or the astrology pages from The National Enquirer (only a quack would do something like this). So I expect someone writing such a paper to have read not one, not two, not even three, but several research papers cross many different scholarly journals. So my question is, didn't one pay any attention to the format, structure, and "quality level" of those papers being published by those specific journals? I mean, these things that are being mentioned here shouldn't be new, or surprising, should it?

Just exactly what papers and journals you are using as references in this paper you're writing? Have you paid any attention to the format and content level of these papers? Are you aware that many journals have their own templates that authors can use to produce almost a typeset quality of their manuscript as a guide in terms of formatting and length? The Physical Review journals even have their own LaTex format call RevTex that anyone can use as a document definition.

I am fully aware that anyone starting to write such a thing will need to learn stuff on how to do this and do this well. I am just puzzled why we have to go this far back, considering that there is already many available guidelines, presumably already seen by anyone who has done any considerable "research" work or any literature search on sources. There is seldom a clearer lesson than looking at an EXAMPLE of one.

Zz.

 

[Monique]

There is seldom a clearer lesson than looking at an EXAMPLE of one.

I completely agree with you here, and I have given the same advice. When writing my first manuscript I downloaded papers similar in content and followed the style of those, hardly any comments came back from the co-authors.

As for the abstract, you are right that there is no way that we can judge the value of the content of the abstract, when the content of the paper is unknown. But you must admit that the style of the abstract has changed considerable to one that is acceptable. There are some lessons to be learned, such as following the style of hypothesis, approach of testing hypothesis, results/observations and conclusions. And all the other advise that has been given.

 

[Andre]

). So I expect someone writing such a paper to have read not one, not two, not even three, but several research papers cross many different scholarly journals. So my question is, didn't one pay any attention to the format, structure, and "quality level" of those papers being published by those specific journals? I mean, these things that are being mentioned here shouldn't be new, or surprising, should it?

You may have noticed that the transformation of the abstract took little time. Unfortunately we had decided to write the "book" more in layman style, including the abstract. Reworking a bit now.

A small selection of the papers that we studied:

Schaber, et al 1992. Geology and distribution of impact craters on Venus—what are they telling us? J. Geophys. Res. 97, 13257–13301.

Shen, M., Zhang, C.Z., 1989. Dynamical evolution of the rotation of Venus. Earth, Moon, Planets 43, 275–287.

Stevenson, D,J, 2002 Planetary magnetic fields Earth and Planetary Science Letters Volume 208, Issues 1-2 , 15 March 2003, Pages 1-11

Williams, G.E., 1989. Tidal rhythmites: geochronometers for the ancient Earth–Moon system. Episodes 12 (3), 162–171.

Williams, G.E., 1993. History of the Earth’s obliquity. Earth Sci. Revi. 34,

Hunten, R.J. Philips (Eds.), Venus II: Geology, Geophysics, Atmosphere, and Solar Wind Environment, University of Arizona Press,
Tucson, pp. 1087–1124.

Zahnle, K.J., Kasting, J.F., Pollack, J.B., 1988. Evolution of a steam atmosphere during Earth’s accretion. Icarus 74, 62–97.

 

[ZapperZ]

You may have noticed that the transformation of the abstract took little time. Unfortunately we had decided to write the "book" more in layman style, including the abstract. Reworking a bit now.

I don't mean to be a pain in the rear end here (or maybe I do), but maybe you can explain something to me or correct my wrong impression.

1. I am guessing that you haven't published anything in this subject area.

2. I am also guessing that, from (1), that your "idea" hasn't appeared anywhere else and that this is the first introduction of it.

3. What I don't understand is, given (1) and (2), shouldn't you first "test" it out in a shorter paper or two just to establish a foothold in the appropriate scientific community before trying to publish a "book"? How often have you found one single paper that contains ALL the "revolutionary" ideas? Even Special Relativity, General Relativity, QM, etc. had to take baby steps along the way into their current form.

4. Very seldom is the "complete" idea is born in a single, initial paper. Most things aren't this easy. What commonly happens is that a small part of an idea is presented first, and presented with convincing evidence that it is valid for some particular application or example. Then it is generalized and made even more applicable to other systems in subsequent papers, etc. This allows for people to gradually be convinced of its validity. It will also tell you if you're on the right track, because if your initial paper encountered any "show stoppers", you won't have wasted time pursuing it. Maybe you have to make major revision to the model etc... but at least you know certain things have to be adjusted, as any model should. Thinking what you came up with the first time is correct and has got to be correct is usually a fatal attitude.

Zz.

 

[Andre]

1. Yes
2. Yes it has run in a couple of forums, including: http://www.badastronomy.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?p=242070
3. I don't know. It happened literally like this: thinking about the Venus, why is it not spinning and why is it so hot and why all those extinc volcanoes. I was already studying the enigmatic coupling of Earth inner solid core outer fluid core and the mantle during geomagnetic reversals that was explained as turbulent chaotic flow in the outer core. Then the simple tought: spinning energy converted to heat. Just a flash: cause: inner core spin axis break out due to precession differences. That's the whole hypothesis in a nutshell. It was only then that the real study started, fitting all the pieces together. That was an incredible experience. It just all made sense all of a sudden.

Almost annoying to see the stumbling around in the dark. One explorer proposes the extreme ancient heat to be explained by excessive radiogenic 40K decay but fails to see that the amount and and ratio of 40Ar is not supporting that as well as the strong thermal gradient of the last million years.

We have the missing oxygen that as bystander correctly had put, could never have been taken up (oxydizing) by the lithosphere due to the dense CO2 atmosphere acting as a strong fire extinguisher.

Correia needs a dense atmosphere for the slow down of the spinning but Kasting takes it away for formulating his moist greenhouse hypothesis.

and so on

Of course you could stop at formulating the hypothesis and then suggest further testing it against the literature. But would that be enough to convince anybody that such a scenario would even be remotely possible to continue research? Leaving all those -almost amusing- controversies to others to find out? And as I said I'm only exploring level2, items 1.1 to 5.5 I'm not even starting to dream of modeling the braking mechanism. So there is still a lot of studying ahead.

 

[Andre]

Ok another version of the abstract. I have attempted to answer to Moonbears questions. I also believe that the size would be limited to 100 words for many journals. So, including the word "abstract". We managed to do that.

ABSTRACT.

The main puzzling features of planet Venus have been attributed to several isolated, sometimes conflicting hypotheses. Here we show that a single mechanism can explain all of them.

The gyroscopic response differences of the solid inner core, fluid outer core and mantle to orbital perturbations can result in drifting away of the inner core spinning axis from alignment to the main spin axis. This behaviour has contributed significantly to the current slow retrograde spinning of the planet Venus. We contend that this also explains the high temperatures, the dense carbon dioxide atmosphere and the specific geologic history of Venus.

I'm presently condensing the 15 pages about the spinning pecularities like precession cycles, obliquity cycles, interaction, the composition of as planet and the dynamics of all those elements combined in the big brake hypothesis. I wonder how many PhD theses could result from that when descending into the details. The first question is of course what to explain and what not. If I explain too much I may insult the specialists but if I would explain too little I risk loosing the biologists, palynologists, climatologists, etc. Whatsay?

 

[Moonbear]

Consistent with being the ogre that I am (no smart comment from you, Moonbie dear!), I will say that I'm very weary about what's going on here.

Meh, that will be temporarily treated by Saturday. And your comments were atypically un-ogrish.

Initially, the issue what was being addressed for the FORMAT of the abstract. I know that I was addressing just that. Why? Because it is meaningless to address the CONTENT of the abstract without first reading the whole paper AND understanding the main points that are being conveyed. One typically writes the outline of the paper (listing all the important points/figures/data to be highlighted), then the paper, and THEN, at the end, the abstract. One does this while keeping in mind the specific journals one is thinking of submitting. Notice I said JOURNALS, not journal, because often, one has a shortlist of a few journals that one has narrowed down.

Agreed. Without ever having read the manuscript, I have no idea if our comments are on track at all with what is actually being presented, so we have to limit discussion here to stylistic points and as an exercise for illustration. Andre, don't rely solely on our advice, which is based only on your former version of the abstract. If there is a problem that makes it inconsistent with the text, then our advice is going to be useless for the actual abstract you need to write, but should give you some pointers of how your thoughts can be condensed and organized better into an appropriate format.

But the point I'm trying to get across is that one very seldom can make content judgement of an abstract to be submitted till one has (i) read the whole paper and (ii) read the FINAL version of the paper.

Yes, the abstract is always the LAST thing to write. There's no point writing it if you don't know what direction the paper has taken yet.

There is one thing that I find rather puzzling. In doing something like writing a research paper, one presumably had to do a lot of reading of other previous publications in peer-reviewed, scholarly journals.

Agreed. And those would also be the best indicators of the stylistic requirements for the journals in that particular field.

I have to disagree to some extent about submitting manuscripts formatted according to the journal typesetting though. Perhaps that is done in physics, but I'd send back a manuscript sent to me in that format. In my field, manuscripts are always double spaced, numbered lines, 1 inch margins, 12 pt font. Reviewers want room to jot notes to themselves as they read. The only thing that needs to conform to the final formatting requirements are figures if the journal doesn't reduce them themselves (those requirements vary considerably from journal to journal).

I am fully aware that anyone starting to write such a thing will need to learn stuff on how to do this and do this well. I am just puzzled why we have to go this far back, considering that there is already many available guidelines, presumably already seen by anyone who has done any considerable "research" work or any literature search on sources. There is seldom a clearer lesson than looking at an EXAMPLE of one.

There is a difference between realizing your format doesn't fit the "norm" and knowing how to write it so it does. I'm not sure what is the case here. If you read a lot of articles, as you must have if you are at the stage of writing up your ideas, then you must see what the style requirements are (and if you aren't sure, pick up the latest issue of that journal and flip through it). But, certainly it's typical for a student to look at their own work and say, "How can I possibly fit all of what I want to say into only 2500 characters?!" First versions of abstracts by a novice writer are either overly long and need a good deal of condensing, or are incredibly brief and lacking in sufficient detail. I've seen both extremes and both are common novice mistakes. However, that is why students don't write papers without an advisor to point out the mistakes and guide them toward the correct path.

Oh, and not only do you need to have read papers to write a paper, you need to have read tons of articles before you even choose the project you're going to work on! How do you know what has and hasn't been done for you to find your own work to do if you haven't read a good chunk of literature before starting?

 

[ZapperZ]

I have to disagree to some extent about submitting manuscripts formatted according to the journal typesetting though. Perhaps that is done in physics, but I'd send back a manuscript sent to me in that format. In my field, manuscripts are always double spaced, numbered lines, 1 inch margins, 12 pt font. Reviewers want room to jot notes to themselves as they read. The only thing that needs to conform to the final formatting requirements are figures if the journal doesn't reduce them themselves (those requirements vary considerably from journal to journal).

Oh, no. I mean the typesetting capability is useful only for the AUTHORS, not the referees. The editors of the Physical Reviews will reformat the manuscript into the double-spaced, single-column documents before sending it to the referees (usually electronically). They never send those in the Journal typeset format.

The reason why they make available the typeset format is so the authors can roughly judge how long the paper will be. This is useful especially for PRL where there is a 4-page limit, and in cases where the authors need to know roughly the publication charges. In case where the paper is very long even when there's no page limit, the editors may suggest to the referee to judge if the length can be reduced.

Zz.

 

[Andre]

Now, would this make sense as the introduction of the short paper of some four pages?

Introduction

Venus is spinning slowly backwards or “retrograde”. This awkward condition was discovered in 1962 using radar measurement (Smith, Goldstein, Carpenter). A total true rotation around its axis (sidereal day) would take 243 days whilst the orbit of the planet takes only 225 days. This combination results in a solar day length of some 117 Earth days. This unusual situation has lead to numerous studies investigating the spinning of Venus. Possible scenarios include an original prograde spinning of the planet followed by some dragging mechanism as a result of spinning perturbations and atmospheric tidal drag. This could have caused the spinning to slow down and then reverse or alternately the planet to flip over, also effectively causing the spinning to reverse. (Go1dreich & Peale 1970, Yoder 1995, Neron de Surgy & Laskar 1997 Correia & Laskar 2003-referred to as the CL03 model). However these scenarios lead to a rather small exchange of angular momentum. Consequently the initial spinning rate of Venus could not have exceeded 3,5 days per revolution (CL03) to reach the current state within the time constrain of the lifespan of the solar system.

Alternately the planet could have been born retrograde, assuming that the spinning direction would be at random, following a multiple impact scenario of planetesimals (Hartmann & Vai11986, Lissauer & Safronov 1991, Dones & Tremaine 1993, Lissauer et al 1995,2000). These hypothesis seem not to be completely matching the earlier dust cloud model, slowly forming planets, which spin prograde as a consequence of the conservation of momentum. This scenario would have given Venus an initial prograde spinning rate of some 18 hours (MacDonald 1967).

Here we propose a mechanism, that would be compatible with such an initial spinning condition, considering Venus initially having similar orbit and spinning characteristics like Earth, however without moon. It is actually a (major) modification of the CL03 model, assuming that the spinning axis of the solid inner core of Venus would not follow the spinning perturbations of the planets mantle.

A secondary consequence of such a scenario would be a high braking effect, dissipating the spinning energy into heat. We propose that this heat can account for the present enigmatic features of the planet

 

[Gokul43201]

Here's my critique of the opening portion :

Introduction

Venus is spinning slowly backwards or “retrograde”. This awkward condition (1) was discovered in 1962 using radar measurement (Smith, Goldstein, Carpenter)(2). A total true rotation around(3) its axis (sidereal day)(4) would take 243 days whilst the orbit of the planet takes only 225 days. This combination results in a solar day length of some(5) 117 Earth days. This unusual situation has lead to numerous studies investigating the spinning of Venus. Possible scenarios(6) include an original prograde spinning of the planet followed by some dragging mechanism as a result of spinning perturbations and atmospheric tidal drag. ...

(1) - stylistic - A theory can be awkward if it predicts results not seen in experiment. Can a well quantified phenomenon be awkward ? I would say the condition was 'unusual' or 'unexpected', not 'awkward'.

(2) - convention - If this is a citation of a published work, provide the reference in the conventional format (ie: include the year of publication within brackets or include a reference number or whatever is the accepted convention in the field).

(3) - scientific language - Physicist specifically talk of rotation about an axis. I would imagine the same is true of celestial dynamics.

(4) - necessity - Anyone in the field is aware of the definition of a siderial day/period. Try to minimize how often you want to state the obvious.

(5) - colloquialism - "Some" is definitely a no-no. First off, is there doubt about the actual length of the solar day (accurate to 1 solar day) ? If there is, use 'about', rather than 'some'. If not, do not indicate that there is uncertainty about this number.

(6) - language, style , content - The start of the sentence promises multiple "scenarios", but the rest of it provides only one. Is this scenario your claim, or is it from previously published works (by others) ? If this is the accepted mechanism (as far as the community is concerned) acknowledge this. Do not cast doubt upon it unless you follow it up with something that justifies the need for this doubt.

 

[NileQueen]

Good advice Gokul.

(4) - necessity - Anyone in the field is aware of the definition of a siderial day/period. Try to minimize how often you want to state the obvious.

Perhaps Andre is specifying that it is a sidereal and not a solar day.

 

[Andre]

Thanks Gokul, for those valuable hints. Indeed NQ it's the question of balance between the obvious for specialists and clarity for the others. However when I was actualisating the core mantle interaction part, I had a most pleasant surprise. I had mailed Prof Vanyo a couple of years or so ago with some questions about that in relation of a possible core break out. His kind reply was that he was retired and he could not judge that.

http://www.me.ucsb.edu/dept_site/vanyo/vanyo_vita.htm

2004, Vanyo, Core-mantle relative motion and coupling. In press, Geophys. J. Int.

Core motion induced by luni-solar precession of the mantle is analyzed and compared to experiments and to Earth observations. A first-order motion has the core axis lagging the mantle axis in precession by a small angle. This misalignment of the axes results in core mantle relative velocities and dis placements over the core-mantle interface as second order flow. A third-order flow ..etc

Consequently, I need to study a bit again but it's looking very good. The less I have to invent myself, the better.

 

[arildno]

I would strongly advise you to get in touch with Vanyo again (after you've read his paper); perhaps your questions sparked off some ideas of his resulting in that article.
Hence, he might be receptive to open up a dialogue with you.

 

[Andre]

Right I was thinking the same.

http://www.me.ucsb.edu/dept_site/vanyo.htm are the papers.

http://www.me.ucsb.edu/dept_site/vanyo/computational.pdf sends goosebumps down my spine:

J. P. Vanyo (2003) Computational difficulties with precessional energy and motion, Mechanical Engineering and Geological Sciences University of California, Santa Barbara Presented at the: UCLA Mathematics NSF Workshop, August, 2003
...
Energy obtained by a ‘growing’ inner core is limited by the known small size of the inner core. Energy available from this model has a maximum near the minimum 10^11 W needed for a geodynamo. Precessional energy is obtained from Earth rotational kinetic energy and is limited by known estimates of secular deceleration by lunar and solar torques. Estimates of days/year from 850 Ma ago and 360 Ma ago of 435 (10,11) and 397 (12) , respectively, all compute to ~ 3.5x10^12 W average continuous loss of rotational kinetic energy. Although this energy also powers other phenomena (lunar orbit changes, oceanic and solid Earth tides), even 10% placed into core energy is three times the minimum of 10^11 W needed...

Check that growing inner core. If an occasional spin axis break out has occurred in Earth due to loss of stability due chaotic outer core flow associated with geomagnetic events (flips and excursions) then the heat from drag would have decreased the radius of the inner core again and the energy bill would be completely different.

 

[arildno]

For some unfathomable reason, I deleted my earlier response, but Vanyo might well be the scientist you can approach on this to get some in-depth comments on your work.

 

[NileQueen]

Well, maybe you got him thinking about it, and he has been researching...