How to Write an Introduction with AI: The Atomic Statement Method

Introductions in scientific papers consist of a set of ideas that tie into the larger narrative of your paper. They require a breadth of knowledge and often contain the majority of references in a paper. In this blog post, I want to present a workflow that makes it incredibly easy to write an introduction using so-called atomic statements and AI. Think of an atomic statement as piece of lego. If you lay out all your pieces in front of you, assembling your introduction becomes as easy as adding one to the next.

What are atomic statements?

An atomic statement is a single piece of information that is backed by one or more papers. It is a tiny bit of information out of which you can build your own arguments. Here are some examples:

Notice three things:

1. Each atomic statement starts with a paper reference.
2. The atomic statements are very short and unambiguous.
3. All statements are sorted by topic and that topic has a link to another paper.

Using 100s of these atomic bits will allow us to build an introduction in record time. We can use AI to create atomic statements and to recombine them for our introduction as well. Here is how it will work:

We can extract or mine atomic statements from other papers using AI. Then we are going to store these statements in a large mind map, sorted by topic and relation to one another. The results is a collection of building blocks that you may use to write your introduction in record time, all with sources that can be easily verified.

Step 1: Find Relevant Papers

If you are writing your paper you likely already have a collection of papers that are relevant to your topic. If you even just have one paper, upload it to Litmaps and it will produce similar papers in the area using the reference network. The key is to balance your literature review and not collect too many papers before getting down to writing. Check out this article if you struggle to find the right papers for your review:

Let’s assume you have found a few review papers that deal with your subject. Now you’re ready to extract some atomic statements.

Step 2: Extracting Atomic Statements From Your Paper

Scientific papers are rarely innovative. Most papers contribute only a small grain of information on top of what is already known. Yet, each paper has an introduction that summarises what is already known. This introduction can be broken down into a set of atomic statements using a CustomGPT, or AI assistant. CustomGPTs are one of the best tools for academic use, due to their boundless flexibility.

You can upload a paper as a PDF or simply copy and paste the introduction to ChatGPT to get started. Copying and pasting often gives better results, since the AI does not have to read the PDF format. Here are the instructions to the AI assistant I use:

## Role
You are a very detail-oriented reader of scientific literature. Your area of expertise is plant functional ecology and climate change science. You speak like a post doc. 
## First Task
I will give you a section of text and you need to do the following steps:
1. Identify the papers mentioned in the text (usually in brackets)
2. Create multiple lists where each entry contains a paper and an argument. The argument is a very much shortened sentence a logical statement this paper made.
example: "Herbaceous species outnumber trees by a ratio of six to one in temperate forests (Gilliam, 2007)." → 
"**Gilliam 2007**\n 6:1 ratio between herbacious and tree species." Notice that I am using the markdown format. You need to keep this exact template, so I can copy and paste it to my note-taking tool.
3. Each list is related to a narrower topic e.g. "effects of climate change on herbacious vegetation"
4. Under each block write a conclusion sentence summing it up.
5. Double check if there are any citations you missed.
## Template
"""
One block on the contribution of this paper if available (e.g. if there is a "here we..." paragraph or some other results or discussion section)
List topic header
Paper - Argument blocks (do not use bullets)
Block conclusion
"""

The instructions above also ensure that your atomic statements are sorted by category making it even easier to handle them. You can also try out the GPT under this link. Whenever you analyse a paper like this, you will get a long list of atomic statements. Filter through them and pick out the ones that seem relevant to your work.

Step 3: The Atomic Statement Mind Map

An easy way to organise your own writing is to use a mind map. It feels more organised if you can lay out things in two dimensions instead of a single-dimensional list. Give it a try. Obsidian is a perfect tool for this. If you are new to Obsidian, consider joining my free course on digital note taking. The Obsidian canvas is a wonderful tool to organise your reading, plan projects, or document data and code. Here is how a canvas of atomic statements looks like:

Notice a few key things here:

1. Each box has a topic sentence at the top…
2. …a set of atomic statements….
3. …and a link to the original ChatGPT conversation to ask follow-up questions later.
4. The boxes are connected logically to create a narrative.

Especially 3. is very important. Keep a link to the original conversation to double-check yourself. You can adjust your CustomGPT to give you the exact line from which it derived an atomic statement when asked. Here is an example regarding an atomic statement for the paper “Hampe and Jump 2011”. The GPT will copy the exact sentence from which it derived its atomic statement.

This allows me to double check if AI understood everything correctly.

Crafting a Narrative with AI

After analysing multiple papers with this method, you will have an extensive number of building blocks (i.e. atomic statements) for your own paper. This makes it very easy to start writing. Assemble 10-15 of these statements and use another AI assistant to help you write this up into a paragraph (here is a writing with AI tutorial).

Summary: How to Write an Introduction with AI?

First, you need to break down existing papers into a set of atomic statements using an AI assistant. An atomic statement is a small factual statement backed by an academic paper. Multiple statements can be merged together into a readable paragraph for your paper. Extracting the statements is easy if you use a custom AI assistant (try mine). Then you organise these statements and lay them out on a mind map to craft a narrative and build high-level understanding. Lastly, all you need to do is pick atomic statements that make sense for your paper and assemble them into your introduction.

This approach is incredibly powerful and easy to implement – it makes writing as easy as selecting a few relevant ideas from a list.

Writing a Research Paper Introduction: Best Practices

A good research paper introduction is about function and clarity. Practically speaking, an effective introduction serves six essential purposes:

• Grabs the Reader’s Attention: Begin with a larger, important idea to engage readers and establish the context.
• Deepen Context: Briefly summarise background information or existing research to help readers understand the larger conversation surrounding your topic.
• Define the Research Problem: Clearly state what gap, issue, or question your paper will address, so readers know exactly what’s at stake.
• State Your Main Aim: Present a thesis statement (for argumentative papers) or a research question/hypothesis (for empirical studies) to clarify the direction and focus of your work.
• Maps Out the Paper: Offer a brief overview of the paper’s structure, signalling to the reader what to expect in the pages ahead.

By following these steps, you demonstrate credibility and purpose from the very beginning, allowing you to refer to ideas in the discussion later. A practical introduction is one that orients, motivates, and prepares the reader for what’s to come.

How Long Should an Introduction Be For a Research Paper?

This depends on the type of your paper and the venue you wish to publish in. A rule of thumb might be to not spend more than 1/4 to 1/3 of the total length of your paper on the introduction. However, especially argumentative papers might not follow this guideline and instead have longer introductions, while methods papers might have shorter introductions since the problem they are solving might be narrower.

Write Introductions for Research Papers Using the CARS Method

Some research papers feel instantly credible, often, it’s because they follow John Swales’ timeless CARS model. CARS stands for “Create A Research Space” and is a strategic approach to writing introductions that resonates in academia. Swales recognized that academic writers face three core challenges: introducing research effectively, demonstrating relevance and originality, and fitting their writing to audience expectations.

The CARS model answers these challenges with a clear three-move structure: first, Establish a Territory by highlighting why the field matters and citing key studies; second, Establish a Niche by identifying gaps or unresolved issues in the literature; and finally, Occupy the Niche by stating your own research aims and contributions. Here is an example:

This method is effective because it positions your work in relation to the field, encourages thoughtful framing rather than information dumping, and builds momentum toward your research question. You can spot these moves in academic writing by looking for key phrases: territory claims like “Recent research has shown…,” niche pivots such as “However, few studies have addressed…,” and occupy statements like “This study aims to….”