Good Research Strategy Personal Perspective

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RESEARCH STRATEGIES for Beginners

Dr. Muhammad Khurram KhanCenter of Excellence in Information AssuranceKing Saud UniversityKingdom of Saudi ArabiaEmail: [email protected]: www.coeia.edu.sa

15, March, 2009

mailto:[email protected]

http://www.coeia.edu.sa/

http://www.coeia.edu.sa/

mailto:[email protected]



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Outline

Research: What ?

Research Process

Research Cases Needs for a Researcher

Confusion in Research and Idea Making

Daily Life of a Researcher

Generating a Research Topic Credible and Famous Research Publishers

Typical Contents of a Research Paper

Questions While Reading a Research Paper

Qualities of a Good Researcher

Literature Search in the IEEEXplore Digital Library



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Research: What ?

Research = Re (repeat) + search

Much of the research has been built upon existing works,

therefore a thorough understanding of those is the basis Too many smart people in each area, so if an idea seems to

be too good to be true, it likely is => rethink that again

Each idea needs iterations: what is it? why has it not beendone? what is the logical connection with the existing

approaches?



The Research Process

Research as an idealized linear process:

Identify research topic

Define research problem Determine how to conduct research

Collect research data

Analyze and interpret research data

Propose a solution (Discovery)

Write dissertation/report



The Research Process



Research Cases

There are basically four cases of research works:

New problem and new solution (breakthrough)

New problem and old solution Old problem and new solution

Old problem and old solution

Case I comes rarely, perhaps something you could only wish,once a life-time experience Shannon’s theory

Cases II and III are the ones that you should target for Security in MANETs

Case IV is where you can start Plenty of out there under the category of “Yet another paper on … “



Logical thinking, after all we are in the engineering world

Develop basic skills:

You should know number theory in order to understandcryptography. You must know information theory forcommunication research

The ability to learn

Life long learning process, especially in CS&E

Abstraction. Take a problem, you have to know:

What is/are the fundamental problem(s)

What have been done, why?

What are seemingly undoable?

Understand your strength and weakness and interest10

Needs for a Researcher



I have learnt all the mathematics, and I am loaded with:

Discrete algorithms, partial differential equations, number

theory, probabilistic modeling, information theory, etc. I still don’t have a clue what to do in research!!!

Where in the world is research topic?

I have read all papers out there from journals andconferences

Can I do research now?

There is no way you can cope with all of them

Majority of the published work could be junk for you, andcan cause brain damage and can be misleading. How to

search useful and relevant material??? Where to search???

Confusion in Research!!!

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Ideas in most cases come from the deep understandingof a subject, and possess of broad knowledge

This is not a technical training, i.e., this is not aboutsolving differential equations or calculus, for example!

This is about relating them to real world problems

This is about providing new insight beyond known

This is about your creativity! Observations around you!

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Where Do Ideas Come From?



Daily Life of a Researcher

Reading

Thinking

Discussion

Simulations

Writing

Presenting

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Generating a Research Topic

From advisors, students, collaborators

Brainstorming with colleagues

Survey/Tutorial papers Listen to research talks

Teach a course/Give a talk: forced to understand thedetails and think hard to prepare for tough questions

Hot emerging fields that could lead to many publicationsor easier funding

…

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Good Research Topics

Should be of interest to both you and your advisor The work could lead to a well defined set of results

Work on the significant parts

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Some Credible Research Publishers

IEEE (US)-Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers &IET -Institution of Engineering & Technology (UK): The mostprestigious and the biggest EE society

Elsevier Science (The Netherlands): The most prestigiousand the biggest publisher (2094 journals)

Springer-Verlag (Germany) (1700 journals) SPIE (US)-The International Society for Optical Engineering ACM (US) – The Association for Computing Machinery World Scientific (Singapore): WorldSciNet (101 journals) IEICE (Japan) – The Institute of Electronics, Information &

Communication Engineers OUP (UK) John Wiley & Sons (UK): (400+ journals)

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Title

Best representation of the paper: contributions and

unique features Abstract

Summary in a few hundred words

Try to entice reader

Indicate why your work is new, better

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Introduction

Motivations and problem descriptions

Academic impact and importance Literature reviews

Show the state-of-the-art (classic papers)

Cite references available to general public

Avoid offensive remarks Do not cite too many web references

Summary of the major contributions of the paper

Organization of the paper

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Problem Descriptions or Theory Definitions of all notation for variables, symbols, etc.

Mathematical equations Methodology

Main ideas to solve the problem Theorems and proofs Descriptions of the approach or algorithm

Performance analysis (Security Analysis) Unique features of the method

Results of Experiment

Description of the experiments

Presentation of the results: tables, figures, etc.20




Conclusions

Summary of your findings (not a repeat of abstract)

Concluding remarks, hint on future work Acknowledgment

Acknowledge the supported fund

Thank individuals, if they helped you!

References List references in appropriate format

Have recent references if possible

Give complete information

List appropriate numbers of references

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Questions While Reading a Research Paper

What are the motivations for this work?

People Problem

Benefits in quality of life i.e. save time/ increased security Technical Problem

Why new technical or engineering solution is needed?

What is the proposed solution?

Why this solution is better than previous? How solution is achieved (designed or implemented)?

What is the evaluation of proposed solution?

What benefits or problems are identified?

Are they convincing?

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