sciwrite plugin
Six skills for scientific writing: edit research prose, structure an IMRaD manuscript, run the writing process, handle peer review and publication ethics, draft grants and letters, and write for general audiences.
How to install the sciwrite plugin
Run both commands inside Claude Code. The first adds the marketplace once; the second installs the plugin.
/plugin marketplace add dvdsosa/scientific-writing-skills
/plugin install sciwrite@scientific-writing-skillsWhat's inside sciwrite
6 parts read from the plugin's own files.
Skills 6
Claude loads it when the task matches- sciwrite-manuscript
Structure a scientific paper section by section — tables and figures, Results, Methods, Introduction, Discussion, Abstract — following Stanford's Writing in the Sciences. Use this skill whenever someone is writing, drafting, planning, restructuring or reviewing any part of a research paper, journal article, conference paper or thesis chapter: "help me with the introduction", "how do I structure the discussion", "is my abstract missing anything", "my results section is too long", "what order should I write the sections in", "does this table look right", "where should the limitations go". Also use it when someone asks what belongs in a given section, or which verb tense a section takes. Use it together with sciwrite-prose, which handles sentence-level editing once the structure is settled. Do NOT use it for grant proposals or review articles (sciwrite-proposals) or for lay summaries and press material (sciwrite-outreach).
- sciwrite-outreach
Communicate science to non-specialists: lay summaries, plain-language abstracts, press releases, science news stories, talking to journalists, presenting risk numbers honestly, interviewing a scientist, and using social media. Based on Stanford's Writing in the Sciences. Use this skill whenever someone needs to explain research to a general, non-expert or non-technical audience — "write a lay summary", "plain language summary", "my funder wants a public abstract", "a journalist has contacted me", "I have a press interview", "draft a press release", "explain this paper to my family", "write a blog post about our results", "how do I tweet about this paper", "make this accessible" — or when they are writing about someone else's research for a general readership. Also use it when presenting risk or probability to non-specialists. Do NOT use it for writing the paper itself (sciwrite-manuscript).
- sciwrite-process
Plan and run the writing process for a scientific paper or thesis chapter — pre-writing and organisation, drafting fast without perfectionism, revision, and the final pre-submission checklist — following Stanford's Writing in the Sciences. Use this skill whenever someone is stuck, procrastinating, or asking how to approach a piece of writing rather than asking about the text itself: "I don't know where to start", "I've been staring at this for weeks", "I'm about to write chapter 3", "how do I stop rewriting the same paragraph", "how long should this take", "what should I check before I submit", "my draft is a mess and I don't know why". Also use it when someone asks how to organise sources and notes before writing, or wants a revision strategy for a finished draft. Do NOT use it for editing prose (sciwrite-prose) or for what belongs in each section, or the order in which to write the sections (sciwrite-manuscript).
- sciwrite-proposals
Write the documents an academic career runs on besides papers: narrative review articles, grant and fellowship applications (specific aims, research plan), letters of recommendation, and personal statements. Based on Stanford's Writing in the Sciences. Use this skill whenever someone mentions writing or reviewing a grant, a fellowship application, a research proposal, a specific aims page, a research plan or strategy, a review article or literature review, a letter of recommendation or reference letter, a personal statement, a motivation letter, or an application essay for a PhD programme, postdoc, scholarship or residency. Also use it when someone asks how to ask for a recommendation letter, how to narrow a review topic, what reviewers of a fellowship are actually scored against, or how to respond to reviewers of a grant or fellowship application. Do NOT use it for research papers (sciwrite-manuscript) or for sentence-level editing alone (sciwrite-prose).
- sciwrite-prose
Edit and tighten scientific or technical prose at the sentence and paragraph level, using the method taught in Stanford's Writing in the Sciences. Use this skill whenever someone asks you to review, edit, tighten, clean up, polish or improve any piece of research writing — a paper, thesis chapter, abstract, grant paragraph, cover letter or report — and whenever they say a passage "sounds wrong", "reads badly", "is too long", "is too dense", or needs to fit a word limit. Also use it for targeted requests: fix the passive voice, cut the clutter, kill the jargon, check acronyms, make the terminology consistent, fix parallelism, or shorten an abstract. Use it proactively when you are asked to write scientific prose yourself, so the draft follows the same rules. Do NOT use it to judge whether the science is correct, to restructure a whole manuscript into IMRaD sections (use sciwrite-manuscript), or to plan the writing process (use sciwrite-process).
- sciwrite-publish
Navigate publication: choosing a journal, the submission process, responding to reviewers after a revise-and-resubmit, performing a peer review yourself, authorship decisions and order, plagiarism and self-plagiarism, and spotting predatory journals. Based on Stanford's Writing in the Sciences. Use this skill whenever someone mentions submitting a paper, a decision letter, reviewer comments, a rebuttal or response letter, "revise and resubmit", "my paper was rejected", being invited to review a manuscript, who should be an author or in what order, whether a passage counts as plagiarism, reusing their own text from a previous paper, an unsolicited invitation from a journal or conference, or whether a journal is legitimate. Also use it when someone asks how to choose where to submit. Do NOT use it for writing the manuscript itself (sciwrite-manuscript) or for grant applications or responding to grant or fellowship reviewers (sciwrite-proposals).
Using sciwrite in Claude Code
Skills need no command. Claude reads them when your request matches what they describe.
Update, turn off or remove
- Update the plugin (shell)
- claude plugin update sciwrite@scientific-writing-skills
- Refresh the marketplace
- /plugin marketplace update scientific-writing-skills
- Turn it off for now
- /plugin disable sciwrite@scientific-writing-skills
- Remove it
- /plugin uninstall sciwrite@scientific-writing-skills
Skills in sciwrite
- sciwrite-manuscriptdvdsosa/scientific-writing-skills
Structure a scientific paper section by section — tables and figures, Results, Methods, Introduction, Discussion, Abstract — following Stanford's Writing in the Sciences. Use this skill whenever someone is writing, drafting, planning, restructuring or reviewing any part of a research paper, journal article, conference paper or thesis chapter: "help me with the introduction", "how do I structure the discussion", "is my abstract missing anything", "my results section is too long", "what order should I write the sections in", "does this table look right", "where should the limitations go". Also use it when someone asks what belongs in a given section, or which verb tense a section takes. Use it together with sciwrite-prose, which handles sentence-level editing once the structure is settled. Do NOT use it for grant proposals or review articles (sciwrite-proposals) or for lay summaries and press material (sciwrite-outreach).
5 files35stars - sciwrite-outreachdvdsosa/scientific-writing-skills
Communicate science to non-specialists: lay summaries, plain-language abstracts, press releases, science news stories, talking to journalists, presenting risk numbers honestly, interviewing a scientist, and using social media. Based on Stanford's Writing in the Sciences. Use this skill whenever someone needs to explain research to a general, non-expert or non-technical audience — "write a lay summary", "plain language summary", "my funder wants a public abstract", "a journalist has contacted me", "I have a press interview", "draft a press release", "explain this paper to my family", "write a blog post about our results", "how do I tweet about this paper", "make this accessible" — or when they are writing about someone else's research for a general readership. Also use it when presenting risk or probability to non-specialists. Do NOT use it for writing the paper itself (sciwrite-manuscript).
5 files35stars - sciwrite-processdvdsosa/scientific-writing-skills
Plan and run the writing process for a scientific paper or thesis chapter — pre-writing and organisation, drafting fast without perfectionism, revision, and the final pre-submission checklist — following Stanford's Writing in the Sciences. Use this skill whenever someone is stuck, procrastinating, or asking how to approach a piece of writing rather than asking about the text itself: "I don't know where to start", "I've been staring at this for weeks", "I'm about to write chapter 3", "how do I stop rewriting the same paragraph", "how long should this take", "what should I check before I submit", "my draft is a mess and I don't know why". Also use it when someone asks how to organise sources and notes before writing, or wants a revision strategy for a finished draft. Do NOT use it for editing prose (sciwrite-prose) or for what belongs in each section, or the order in which to write the sections (sciwrite-manuscript).
2 files35stars - sciwrite-proposalsdvdsosa/scientific-writing-skills
Write the documents an academic career runs on besides papers: narrative review articles, grant and fellowship applications (specific aims, research plan), letters of recommendation, and personal statements. Based on Stanford's Writing in the Sciences. Use this skill whenever someone mentions writing or reviewing a grant, a fellowship application, a research proposal, a specific aims page, a research plan or strategy, a review article or literature review, a letter of recommendation or reference letter, a personal statement, a motivation letter, or an application essay for a PhD programme, postdoc, scholarship or residency. Also use it when someone asks how to ask for a recommendation letter, how to narrow a review topic, what reviewers of a fellowship are actually scored against, or how to respond to reviewers of a grant or fellowship application. Do NOT use it for research papers (sciwrite-manuscript) or for sentence-level editing alone (sciwrite-prose).
4 files35stars - sciwrite-prosedvdsosa/scientific-writing-skills
Edit and tighten scientific or technical prose at the sentence and paragraph level, using the method taught in Stanford's Writing in the Sciences. Use this skill whenever someone asks you to review, edit, tighten, clean up, polish or improve any piece of research writing — a paper, thesis chapter, abstract, grant paragraph, cover letter or report — and whenever they say a passage "sounds wrong", "reads badly", "is too long", "is too dense", or needs to fit a word limit. Also use it for targeted requests: fix the passive voice, cut the clutter, kill the jargon, check acronyms, make the terminology consistent, fix parallelism, or shorten an abstract. Use it proactively when you are asked to write scientific prose yourself, so the draft follows the same rules. Do NOT use it to judge whether the science is correct, to restructure a whole manuscript into IMRaD sections (use sciwrite-manuscript), or to plan the writing process (use sciwrite-process).
12 files35stars - sciwrite-publishdvdsosa/scientific-writing-skills
Navigate publication: choosing a journal, the submission process, responding to reviewers after a revise-and-resubmit, performing a peer review yourself, authorship decisions and order, plagiarism and self-plagiarism, and spotting predatory journals. Based on Stanford's Writing in the Sciences. Use this skill whenever someone mentions submitting a paper, a decision letter, reviewer comments, a rebuttal or response letter, "revise and resubmit", "my paper was rejected", being invited to review a manuscript, who should be an author or in what order, whether a passage counts as plagiarism, reusing their own text from a previous paper, an unsolicited invitation from a journal or conference, or whether a journal is legitimate. Also use it when someone asks how to choose where to submit. Do NOT use it for writing the manuscript itself (sciwrite-manuscript) or for grant applications or responding to grant or fellowship reviewers (sciwrite-proposals).
6 files35stars
sciwrite plugin questions
How do I install the sciwrite plugin?
In Claude Code run /plugin marketplace add dvdsosa/scientific-writing-skills, then /plugin install sciwrite@scientific-writing-skills.
What does the sciwrite plugin include?
sciwrite bundles 6 skills.
How do I update or remove the sciwrite plugin?
Update it with claude plugin update sciwrite@scientific-writing-skills in your shell, or from the Installed tab of /plugin. Remove it with /plugin uninstall sciwrite@scientific-writing-skills.
What license is the sciwrite plugin under?
MIT, as stated in the plugin's manifest.