Step 1 of the bio-manuscript pipeline: assess research-idea novelty. Use when expanding a topic into variants/synonyms, searching PubMed/bioRxiv/arXiv q-bio, de-duplicating related papers, assigning a novelty level, and suggesting how to sharpen or reposition the idea.
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---
name: bio-innovation-check
description: "Step 1 of the bio-manuscript pipeline: assess research-idea novelty. Use when expanding a topic into variants/synonyms, searching PubMed/bioRxiv/arXiv q-bio, de-duplicating related papers, assigning a novelty level, and suggesting how to sharpen or reposition the idea."
---
# bio-innovation-check
**Step 1: Innovation assessment (创新性检测)**
Estimate whether a research idea is sufficiently novel for a strong methods-style paper by expanding the topic and searching the literature.
## Purpose
1. Generate multiple topic variants and synonyms
2. Search PubMed, bioRxiv, and arXiv q-bio
3. Count and de-duplicate related papers
4. Assign a novelty level
5. Suggest how to sharpen or reposition the idea if needed
## Input Format
```text
topic: [research topic]
```
## Workflow
### Step 1.1: Topic expansion
Use several types of expansions:
1. Core term substitution
2. Phrase re-ordering
3. Parent / child concept expansion
4. Adjacent-domain vocabulary borrowing
5. Method keyword enrichment
Example:
- "spatial multi-omics integration"
- "integration of spatial transcriptomics and proteomics"
- "spatial multi-modal data fusion"
Target output: 15-20 topic variants by default.
### Step 1.2: Literature search
Search these sources:
- PubMed
- bioRxiv
- arXiv q-bio
Suggested pattern:
```python
for variant in topic_variants:
results = search(variant, platforms=["PubMed", "bioRxiv", "arXiv"])
all_papers.extend(results)
unique_papers = deduplicate(all_papers, threshold=0.8)
```
### Step 1.3: Novelty scoring
Use a simple first-pass threshold:
```python
if paper_count <= 2:
level = "strong novelty / methods-journal candidate"
elif paper_count <= 5:
level = "promising but needs sharpening"
else:
level = "needs repositioning"
```
This is only a heuristic. Final judgment should still use human reasoning.
### Step 1.4: Repositioning suggestions
If the project is not yet strong enough, suggest improvements from one or more of these angles:
1. Method angle
2. Task angle
3. Data / validation angle
4. Analysis angle
## Output Format
```markdown
# Innovation Assessment Report
## Search Strategy
- Number of variants:
- Search sources:
- Search date:
## Topic Variants
| No. | Variant |
|-----|---------|
| 1 | ... |
## Search Results Summary
| Variant | PubMed | bioRxiv | arXiv | Total |
|---------|--------|---------|-------|-------|
| ... | ... | ... | ... | ... |
## De-duplicated Counts
- Total related studies:
- Published papers:
- Preprints:
## Novelty Decision
- Level:
- Reason:
## Representative Related Work
1. [title]
- Source:
- Year:
- Main method:
- Overlap with the proposed idea:
## Repositioning Suggestions
1. Method:
2. Task:
3. Data / validation:
## Next Step
- If novelty is strong: continue to Step 2
- If the idea needs sharpening: refine and continue
- If it needs repositioning: redesign before proceeding
```
## Usage
```bash
/bio-innovation-check "spatial multi-omics integration"
```
## Notes
1. Use timeouts because search latency varies by source.
2. De-duplication matters; otherwise novelty will be overestimated or underestimated.
3. Overlap scoring still needs human judgment.
4. Journal-specific novelty expectations can differ by field.