1. D. E. Koditschek kod@seas.upenn.edu 358 GRW
ESE 290/291 Introduction to Electrical & Systems Engineering Research Methodology & Design Lecture 3: What’s Your Problem? (Problem Formulation)
D. E. Koditschek
358 GRW

2. Project Proposal Proposal Environment Proposal Components
Context: many ideas; few resources ($, time)
Conceptual Challenge: reduce the broad unknown to one narrow question
Technical Challenge: assess the answer(s)
Social Challenge: communicate the value
Proposal Components
Motivation: why does humanity need to know or have this?
Gap: what is the advance relative to present state of the art ?
Hypothesis
project: specifically, what work needs to be done to establish what gain of knowledge or capability?
metrics: what is the predicted outcome and how can it be compared against the claimed advance?
means: what methods, equipment, supplies and effort are required to perform the work and measure the outcome?
Top Value 21st Century Skill: passion-driven technical vision
think globally (highest level view); act locally (research as mud-wrestling)
technical persuasion: anyone can know the facts; it takes vision to see the opportunity

3. Creativity in Science hugely varied, exciting opportunities
down in the mud
choice of tools or technique
what to communicate and how …
today’s topic
most creative act: what problem to work on
most important moment in scientific process
questions more important than answers
“see the universe in a grain of sand”
risk and reward
too hard to succeed in the short run?
too far-out to communicate?
too small to kindle excitement and ambition?

4. This Week’s Assignment
Statement: write a problem formulation
combine sponsor’s ideas with literature
identify a compelling area for advancement
propose a specific research project to close gap
support all statements via citations to annotated bibliography
Rubric (20 pts for ~5 paragraphs + bibliography)
Target: what is the missing knowledge or capability?
could be entirely new – or include some of prior C.1 & C.2 writing
must cite all statements using high quality sources of authority
some old lit; likely some new; all to be presented in bibliography
Gap: show it is really missing
best to find some recent publication that states so
use annotated bibliography to establish how you searched for gap-closing successors with no success
Project: exactly what work is needed
propose concrete design or knowledge step to address the gap
strive for concise focus, detail, clarity
Refutability: how will you know the project has succeeded or failed?
must be able to assess whether the proposed work truly shrinks the gap
measurement for experimental project; analysis for applied math project
Means: how would one go about applying those measurements?
as great detail as possible: mock table with labeled rows and columns for blank entries
start planning now for any supplies, equipment, tools, etc
Annotated Bibliography: same rubric as for C.2 (likely some new entries)

5. Week 2 Assignment Literature Review Problem Statement
write a brief review using high quality sources to document project importance and your way forward
features one general review (importance & state of the art) and one focused technical paper (next step)
use cited and citing papers to corroborate and bolster your understanding
paragraph structure of review + annotated bibliography
motivation: vivid and specific description of what is needed and what impact it would have
state-of-the-art: appraisal of 2 – 3 most important recent publications
technical approach: logical next step toward targeted advance
surrounding literature:
precursors (cited) and successors (citing) of featured papers
helpful vs unhelpful results of naïve search
open problems: alternative “next steps”
annotated bibliography
Annotated Bibliography
complete citation (following some archival journal format, including live link)
evidence of quality (venue, authors, publication)
relevance (a few sentences of annotation showing you’ve “read” the paper)
what is the paper about?
what sort of contribution does it make to the literature?
how does it relate to your topic or inform your project?

6. Week 1 Assignment Source Acquisition Problem Statement
Find two high quality sources
from the relevant scientific literature
summarizing the state of the art in your general technical area
thereby exposing technology or capability gap
Use their insight to find two different motivating sources
they‘ve (almost surely) motivated the importance of the gap
you‘re to verify by finding cited (or citing) motivating publications
Suggested Problem Approach
Start with your sponsor’s suggested papers (or simply Google/Wiki/GS)
Go to GS and find some other likely high quality publications
Look up those papers in Scopus to find your review articles
use their cited and citing publications (and recursively so as needed)
to look for the most recent highly cited review-style publications
Use review articles to find high impact corroborating motivation
Your job: provide evidence that your authors, papers, and venues are high quality
impact factor of venue; publication citation count; author h-index
show intellectual resilience in the face of inevitable obstacles
The publication is very new so there are very few citing pubs – but the venue and author(s) are clearly great
The publication is very new and so are the authors – but the venue is great and the institutions are reassuring
There are too few publications in this area (give evidence by reporting some details of how you searched)