AI, Ethics, & Academics

Research Assistance

Use AI to clarify concepts, generate new ideas, narrow or expand a topic, suggest outlines that you can then edit and expand upon. Ask questions for clarification and greater understanding. Explore diverse perspectives. Get feedback on ideas.

Simply put, AI generated text is a collection of words and phrases pieced together by algorithms, trained to recognize language patterns and context, resulting in responses that are coherent and contextually relevant.

Academic Honesty and Plagiarism

The use of AI in academic research requires honesty and accountability. Most writing and citation styles ( e.g., APA, MLA, Turabian) require disclosure of AI assistance for transparency and to avoid plagiarism. For style recommendations and guidelines see the following

APA Style - opens new windowHow to cite ChatGPT
MLA Style - opens new windowHow do I cite generative AI in MLA style?
CSE Style - The Council of Science Editors recommends treating AI-generated content as personal communication. See the Citations page for citation details.

Always follow your professor's instructions on the scope of using AI in your course.

Selected AI Tools for Biological Research

Be aware that AI functionality in the platforms listed below may overlap. Prior to your research assignment, explore features and functionality to identify the most useful AI tools for your research. Always fact-check and verify the accuracy of information.

ChatGPT
opens new windowhttps://chatgpt.com/

AI question and answer, conversation generating tool.

- Large language model that generates text, answers questions, engages in conversation and provides assistance with various topics.
- Uses information from books, articles, websites, and other publicly accessible texts available up to January 2022.

  • Use natural language to key in an idea or topic and ask for a lists of keywords, subject headings, databases to search, Boolean search strings, or important scholars relevant to a topic.
  • Key in a prompt to get a sample outline or to expand your research idea.
  • Key in a prompt to clarify a complex biological concept, theory, or your research question.
  • Based on your prompt, get feedback on various sections or logical progression of your research paper.
  • Continue to build and extract information using effective prompt engineering.

NOT effective for gathering research articles, creating citations, or reference lists.

v3.5 is Free.
elicit
opens new windowhttps://elicit.com/

Machine learning platform for extracting and analyzing text data from more than125 million academic papers through 2021. Specializes in natural language understanding (NLU) and aids researchers in text analysis.

Highlights:
- Provides literature review assistance, identifying articles and research papers in the biological sciences. 
- Summarizes, in paragraph form, the first four research paper abstracts.
- Offers various data extraction and summarizing options, including main findings, methodologies interventions, outcomes measured and limitations. Includes options to sort, filter and export.
- Can analyze a research manuscript and recommend possible journals for submission.

  • Use natural language to ask a research question.
  • Create new columns of selected data to categorize and summarize research articles.
  • Generate summaries of selected research articles.

See: opens new windowElicit Tips and Best Practices, opens new windowElicit Credits: How Credits Work

Free
Consensus AI
opens new windowhttps://www.consensus.app/

AI Research Assistant and search engine with integrated blockchain technology. Consensus uses AI to get conclusions and find answers by searching more than 200 million peer-reviewed scientific research papers. Researchers can access individual and organizational datasets within the decentralized network

Highlights:
- Aggregates information from multiple sources for a comprehensive view of a topic.
- Provides a "Study Snapshot" that includes population, sample size, methods, and outcomes.
- Identifies articles type and quality indicators, such as RCT, Large Human Trial, or Systematic Review. Identifies Highly Cited articles.
- Provides summaries, responses, answers, and overviews on various topics.
- Provides diverse perspectives to gain a deeper understanding of a biological concept

  • Ask a research question using natural language, do a keyword search, or key in a thesis topic
  • Use the "Synthesize" option to get an analyzed summary of several research papers.

See: opens new windowHow to Search & Best Practices

Free
Research Rabbit
opens new windowhttps://www.researchrabbit.ai/

AI tool that that searches through academic literature up to January of 2022 and helps you discover relevant scholarly resources.

Highlights:
- Provides visualizations of papers and co-authorships.
- Visualizations show subfields, geographical distribution of research articles, key researchers, research collaboration, and threads within the research literature.
- Filter results by citation count or journal impact factor.

  • Add your papers to a collection for a various visualization.
  • Search a keyword or key concept to get a list of related articles.
  • Filter results by date for a list of research on recent advances.
  • Search for articles authored by specific researchers or published in a specific journal
 
Semantic Scholar

AI tool that is an academic search engine focusing on high-quality scholarly literature, including peer-reviewed articles, dissertations, theses, and other scholarly material.

Highlights:
- Utilizes natural language.
- Provides summaries of research papers.
- Provides tools for citation analysis.
- Provides advanced search options to refine searches.

  • Use natural language to search and explore author profiles to identify experts in a field and other relevant relevant research.
  • Use the "Related Papers" feature to discover more closely related papers to your topic.
Free

Combine AI Tools:

  • Use Research Rabbit to find relevant research articles and studies, then aggregate the information in Consensus AI for a comprehensive overview or to identify common patterns on a topic.

The key to maximizing AI program usability and performance is effective prompt engineering, which is crucial to ensure effectively obtaining desired results. For assistance, contact Professor Myra Bloom or set up an opens new windowappointment.

Articles

Abdellatif, H., Al Mushaiqri, M., Albalushi, H., Al-Zaabi, A. A., Roychoudhury, S., & Das, S. (2022). Teaching, Learning and Assessing Anatomy with Artificial Intelligence: The Road to a Better Future. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 19(21). opens new windowhttps://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph192114209