🧭 1. General Principles

• 🔍 Seek broadly, filter wisely: Solicit advice from many sources; keep what aligns with your writing style and funding mechanism.
• 👥 No single “right” way—but clarity, logic, and readability are non-negotiable.
• ❌ Avoid non-standard acronyms; define necessary ones in bold on first use.
• ✂️ Use short, simple sentences (aim <20 words).
• 👁️ Write for non-experts. Emphasize accessibility and clarity above all.

🕒 2. Timeline & Preparation

• 🧪 Time preliminary data strategically; plan backup experiments to ensure you have supportive data by submission.
• ⏳ Start early— then start earlier.
• 🗣️ Talk to your mentor/sponsor about when the project and data are ready.

🗂️ 3. Outlining Your Proposal

• 📚 Create a structured outline before writing:
  • What we know
  • What we don’t know (the knowledge gap)
  • Question → Hypothesis → Significance
  • Preliminary data (lab + your contributions)
  • Each Aim: title, brief rationale, hypothesis, key experiments, controls, alternatives, Experimental Design and N
• 🧱 Use this outline to ensure logic, flow, and feasibility.

📊 4. Figures & Preliminary Data

• 🖼️ Make publication-quality figures—clear, readable, polished.
• 📊 Published data can be in a figure- don’t assume the reader will read a publishd paper.
• 👵 Design for an 85-year-old reviewer: large labels, clean spacing, readable fonts.