Jordan and Jerz
A blueprint is a rough but specific plan, or outline, which defines the structure of your whole essay. The blueprint, usually located within the , is a brief list of the points you plan to make, compressed into just a few words each, in the same order in which they appear in the body of your paper.
> Resources > Writing > Academic > Thesis Statements > Reminders
D.G. Jerz > Resources > Writing > Academic > Thesis Statements > Reminders
Developing a Thesis Statement
Many papers you write require developing a thesis statement. In this section you’ll learn what a thesis statement is and how to write one.
Keep in mind that not all papers require thesis statements . If in doubt, please consult your instructor for assistance.
A thesis statement . . .
Not all papers require thesis statements! Ask your instructor if you’re in doubt whether you need one.
Your topic is the subject about which you will write. Your assignment may suggest several ways of looking at a topic; or it may name a fairly general concept that you will explore or analyze in your paper.
Inform yourself about your topic, focus on one aspect of your topic, ask yourself whether your topic is worthy of your efforts, generate a topic from an assignment.
Below are some possible topics based on sample assignments.
Analyze Spain’s neutrality in World War II.
Identified topic
Franco’s role in the diplomatic relationships between the Allies and the Axis
This topic avoids generalities such as “Spain” and “World War II,” addressing instead on Franco’s role (a specific aspect of “Spain”) and the diplomatic relations between the Allies and Axis (a specific aspect of World War II).
Analyze one of Homer’s epic similes in the Iliad.
The relationship between the portrayal of warfare and the epic simile about Simoisius at 4.547-64.
This topic focuses on a single simile and relates it to a single aspect of the Iliad ( warfare being a major theme in that work).
Your assignment may suggest several ways of looking at a topic, or it may name a fairly general concept that you will explore or analyze in your paper. You’ll want to read your assignment carefully, looking for key terms that you can use to focus your topic.
Sample assignment: Analyze Spain’s neutrality in World War II Key terms: analyze, Spain’s neutrality, World War II
After you’ve identified the key words in your topic, the next step is to read about them in several sources, or generate as much information as possible through an analysis of your topic. Obviously, the more material or knowledge you have, the more possibilities will be available for a strong argument. For the sample assignment above, you’ll want to look at books and articles on World War II in general, and Spain’s neutrality in particular.
As you consider your options, you must decide to focus on one aspect of your topic. This means that you cannot include everything you’ve learned about your topic, nor should you go off in several directions. If you end up covering too many different aspects of a topic, your paper will sprawl and be unconvincing in its argument, and it most likely will not fulfull the assignment requirements.
For the sample assignment above, both Spain’s neutrality and World War II are topics far too broad to explore in a paper. You may instead decide to focus on Franco’s role in the diplomatic relationships between the Allies and the Axis , which narrows down what aspects of Spain’s neutrality and World War II you want to discuss, as well as establishes a specific link between those two aspects.
Before you go too far, however, ask yourself whether your topic is worthy of your efforts. Try to avoid topics that already have too much written about them (i.e., “eating disorders and body image among adolescent women”) or that simply are not important (i.e. “why I like ice cream”). These topics may lead to a thesis that is either dry fact or a weird claim that cannot be supported. A good thesis falls somewhere between the two extremes. To arrive at this point, ask yourself what is new, interesting, contestable, or controversial about your topic.
As you work on your thesis, remember to keep the rest of your paper in mind at all times . Sometimes your thesis needs to evolve as you develop new insights, find new evidence, or take a different approach to your topic.
Once you have a topic, you will have to decide what the main point of your paper will be. This point, the “controlling idea,” becomes the core of your argument (thesis statement) and it is the unifying idea to which you will relate all your sub-theses. You can then turn this “controlling idea” into a purpose statement about what you intend to do in your paper.
Compose a purpose statement.
Consult the examples below for suggestions on how to look for patterns in your evidence and construct a purpose statement.
Possible conclusion:
Spain’s neutrality in WWII occurred for an entirely personal reason: Franco’s desire to preserve his own (and Spain’s) power.
This paper will analyze Franco’s diplomacy during World War II to see how it contributed to Spain’s neutrality.
At first, the simile seems to take the reader away from the world of warfare, but we end up back in that world by the end.
This paper will analyze the way the simile about Simoisius at 4.547-64 moves in and out of the world of warfare.
To find out what your “controlling idea” is, you have to examine and evaluate your evidence . As you consider your evidence, you may notice patterns emerging, data repeated in more than one source, or facts that favor one view more than another. These patterns or data may then lead you to some conclusions about your topic and suggest that you can successfully argue for one idea better than another.
For instance, you might find out that Franco first tried to negotiate with the Axis, but when he couldn’t get some concessions that he wanted from them, he turned to the Allies. As you read more about Franco’s decisions, you may conclude that Spain’s neutrality in WWII occurred for an entirely personal reason: his desire to preserve his own (and Spain’s) power. Based on this conclusion, you can then write a trial thesis statement to help you decide what material belongs in your paper.
Sometimes you won’t be able to find a focus or identify your “spin” or specific argument immediately. Like some writers, you might begin with a purpose statement just to get yourself going. A purpose statement is one or more sentences that announce your topic and indicate the structure of the paper but do not state the conclusions you have drawn . Thus, you might begin with something like this:
At some point, you can turn a purpose statement into a thesis statement. As you think and write about your topic, you can restrict, clarify, and refine your argument, crafting your thesis statement to reflect your thinking.
As you work on your thesis, remember to keep the rest of your paper in mind at all times. Sometimes your thesis needs to evolve as you develop new insights, find new evidence, or take a different approach to your topic.
If you are writing a paper that will have an argumentative thesis and are having trouble getting started, the techniques in the table below may help you develop a temporary or “working” thesis statement.
Begin with a purpose statement that you will later turn into a thesis statement.
Assignment: Discuss the history of the Reform Party and explain its influence on the 1990 presidential and Congressional election.
Purpose Statement: This paper briefly sketches the history of the grassroots, conservative, Perot-led Reform Party and analyzes how it influenced the economic and social ideologies of the two mainstream parties.
If your assignment asks a specific question(s), turn the question(s) into an assertion and give reasons why it is true or reasons for your opinion.
Assignment : What do Aylmer and Rappaccini have to be proud of? Why aren’t they satisfied with these things? How does pride, as demonstrated in “The Birthmark” and “Rappaccini’s Daughter,” lead to unexpected problems?
Beginning thesis statement: Alymer and Rappaccinni are proud of their great knowledge; however, they are also very greedy and are driven to use their knowledge to alter some aspect of nature as a test of their ability. Evil results when they try to “play God.”
Write a sentence that summarizes the main idea of the essay you plan to write.
Main idea: The reason some toys succeed in the market is that they appeal to the consumers’ sense of the ridiculous and their basic desire to laugh at themselves.
Make a list of the ideas that you want to include; consider the ideas and try to group them.
Use a formula to arrive at a working thesis statement (you will revise this later).
Beginning statements obtained through the methods illustrated above can serve as a framework for planning or drafting your paper, but remember they’re not yet the specific, argumentative thesis you want for the final version of your paper. In fact, in its first stages, a thesis statement usually is ill-formed or rough and serves only as a planning tool.
As you write, you may discover evidence that does not fit your temporary or “working” thesis. Or you may reach deeper insights about your topic as you do more research, and you will find that your thesis statement has to be more complicated to match the evidence that you want to use.
You must be willing to reject or omit some evidence in order to keep your paper cohesive and your reader focused. Or you may have to revise your thesis to match the evidence and insights that you want to discuss. Read your draft carefully, noting the conclusions you have drawn and the major ideas which support or prove those conclusions. These will be the elements of your final thesis statement.
Sometimes you will not be able to identify these elements in your early drafts, but as you consider how your argument is developing and how your evidence supports your main idea, ask yourself, “ What is the main point that I want to prove/discuss? ” and “ How will I convince the reader that this is true? ” When you can answer these questions, then you can begin to refine the thesis statement.
To get to your final thesis, you’ll need to refine your draft thesis so that it’s specific and arguable.
Consult the example below for suggestions on how to refine your draft thesis statement.
Choose an activity and define it as a symbol of American culture. Your essay should cause the reader to think critically about the society which produces and enjoys that activity.
Drive-ins are an interesting symbol of American culture because they represent Americans’ significant creativity and business ingenuity.
Among the types of drive-in facilities familiar during the twentieth century, drive-in movie theaters best represent American creativity, not merely because they were the forerunner of later drive-ins and drive-throughs, but because of their impact on our culture: they changed our relationship to the automobile, changed the way people experienced movies, and changed movie-going into a family activity.
While drive-in facilities such as those at fast-food establishments, banks, pharmacies, and dry cleaners symbolize America’s economic ingenuity, they also have affected our personal standards.
While drive-in facilities such as those at fast- food restaurants, banks, pharmacies, and dry cleaners symbolize (1) Americans’ business ingenuity, they also have contributed (2) to an increasing homogenization of our culture, (3) a willingness to depersonalize relationships with others, and (4) a tendency to sacrifice quality for convenience.
This statement is now specific and fulfills all parts of the assignment. This version, like any good thesis, is not self-evident; its points, 1-4, will have to be proven with evidence in the body of the paper. The numbers in this statement indicate the order in which the points will be presented. Depending on the length of the paper, there could be one paragraph for each numbered item or there could be blocks of paragraph for even pages for each one.
The bottom line.
As you move through the process of crafting a thesis, you’ll need to remember four things:
In the beginning, the thesis statement was a tool to help you sharpen your focus, limit material and establish the paper’s purpose. When your paper is finished, however, the thesis statement becomes a tool for your reader. It tells the reader what you have learned about your topic and what evidence led you to your conclusion. It keeps the reader on track–well able to understand and appreciate your argument.
This is an accordion element with a series of buttons that open and close related content panels.
Interpreting Writing Assignments from Your Courses
Generating Ideas for
Thesis vs. Purpose Statements
Architecture of Arguments
Quoting and Paraphrasing Sources
Using Literary Quotations
Citing Sources in Your Paper
Generating Ideas for Your Paper
Introductions
Paragraphing
Developing Strategic Transitions
Conclusions
Peer Reviews
Reverse Outlines
Revising an Argumentative Paper
Revision Strategies for Longer Projects
Twelve Common Errors: An Editing Checklist
How to Proofread your Paper
Collaborative and Group Writing
Free Al Office Suite with PDF Editor
Edit Word, Excel, and PPT for FREE.
Read, edit, and convert PDFs with the powerful PDF toolkit.
Microsoft-like interface, easy to use.
Windows • MacOS • Linux • iOS • Android
This is very common in academic writing, sometimes on the identification of the main idea to be focused on by a paragraph. Most students find it hard to write specific and clear topic sentences that sometimes mislead the readers. Being an experienced writer, I have some useful tips for you to write good topic sentences. Just read on, and you can improve your writing capabilities for academic writing with the guidance of WPS AI.
What gives the structure to every paragraph in an academic essay is a topic sentence. It introduces the main idea of the paragraph and thus facilitates the reader's movement through the essay. It is typically located at the beginning of the paragraph and really should specifically state the focus of the paragraph.
A topic sentence can be defined as a short and general summary statement of the main idea in a paragraph. It tells the reader what to expect from the paragraph and keeps the paragraph on track.
Clarity: It should be easy to understand.
Specificity: It focuses on one main idea.
Relevance: It supports the essay's main argument or thesis.
Guidance: It organizes the paragraph and guides the reader.
Focus: It keeps the paragraph on track.
Transition: This links the previous and next paragraphs.
Relationship to the Thesis Statement
Although the thesis statement provides the argument for the whole essay, topic sentences fractionate this argument into sub-points that are discussed in every particular paragraph. This, therefore, helps to ensure that each paragraph supports the overall thesis and a clear structure is maintained in the essay.
A topic sentence can help be made much more effective with a clear process for how each paragraph will work together so that it is both organized and effective in your overall essay. Here's a step-by-step guide on how to write a strong topic sentence, with examples and tips for success.
First, make an outline of what the sentence is going to say, and then draft the topic sentence. This helps you not to get sidetracked from your main idea or too wordy about it.
Create an Outline Using WPS AI, you can come up with a comprehensive outline that will give your essay its structure. First, you have to craft a good thesis statement which sums up the purpose and argument of your essay. Next, look for some specific main idea which you will be discussing in each paragraph.
Example Outline:
Thesis Statement: "The rise of remote work changed a lot in terms of productivity, employee satisfaction, and work-life balance."
Paragraph Main Idea: "Through telecommuting, people have been able to increase productivity due to flexible working hours."
WPS AI Function: You can generate visual outlines of what you want to say with WPS AI and keep track of your thoughts. This tool can make sure that all of your ideas are clearly laid out.
With your outline in place, you can now draft your topic sentence. It needs to be specific, clear, and concise. The language should not be vague, and it must give clear direction to the paragraph.
Topic Sentences: Types
Simple Statement
Definition: A direct statement.
Example: "To this effect, remote work enhances productivity by letting people work where they are most productive."
Definition: A question that introduces what the paragraph is going to talk about.
Example: "How does remote work contribute to improved productivity?"
Definition: It indicates a contrast or difference.
Example: "Unlike traditional office settings, remote work offers unparalleled flexibility that boosts productivity."
Reason and Cause
Definition: It describes the reasons or causes.
Example: "The flexibility in remote work schedules directly leads to higher employee productivity."
Definition: It introduces a list of points.
Example: "Remote work boosts productivity through flexible hours, reduced commuting time, and individually customized workspaces."
WPS AI Function: You can use WPS AI to help you compose and refine topic sentences that are clear and focused on your main ideas.
After you have composed your topic sentence, brainstorm the evidence, examples, or details you will use to flesh out your main idea. Be sure all supporting details are relevant and directly relate to the topic sentence.
For example, if your topic sentence is that remote work improves productivity, you could use:
Statistics: "According to a 2023 study from Harvard Business Review, remote workers report an increase in productivity of 20%."
Research Studies: "A study by Stanford University showed that remote workers were 13% more productive than their peers working in the office."
Case Studies: "Companies like GitLab and Basecamp have reported significant boosts in productivity as a result of their remote work practices."
WPS AI Function: Using WPS AI, look for relevant data and examples and integrate them to add credibility and depth to the paragraph.
Finally, refine and revise your topic sentence so that it states what the paragraph contains explicitly and enhances the overall coherence of your essay. Besides that, check clarity and add transitional words if need be to enhance flow.
Example Revision: Original: "Working from home makes me more productive." Revised: "Working from home significantly improves productivity because it provides flexible hours and does not involve any hour-long commutes." WPS AI Function:
Use WPS AI's grammar and style check to perfect your topic sentences so that they are correct and make sense. You can effectively write topic sentences using these steps and the help of WPS AI, which gives your writing clarity and power.
The easiest and most effective way to write exact and relevant topic sentences is with WPS AI. Here to polish up your writing skills using advanced language capabilities, WPS AI makes sure that clarity and coherence echo through all the lines of your work. Here is how you can use WPS AI to get your topic sentences right:
Checking Grammar and Syntax
WPS AI can assist you in verifying your topic sentences for grammatical, punctuation, and syntactic errors. Clear and error-free language enhances the overall readability of your essays and makes them more credible.
Rephrase Topic Sentence for Clarity
WPS AI will review your topic sentence and suggest rewrites so you can present your intended message more clearly. It can rephrase any awkward language or sections that are ambiguous by creating a revised and more readable version of the sentence.
Automatically Expand/Shorten Topic Sentence
WPS AI can either draw out or shorten your topic sentences so they fit perfectly with what your paragraph requires. This will be very useful, especially in instances where there is an obligation to meet a word count or you would need to compress your topic sentence to a degree.
Sharpen your topic sentences for grammatical correctness, clarity, and details with these advanced features of WPS AI at your beck and call. This way, your write-ups will be more readable, leading to improved quality essays altogether.
The thesis statement tells what the whole paper is about. The topic sentence shows only what the paragraph it is attached to is about.
The topic sentence usually is at the very beginning because it immediately introduces the main idea of the paragraph. For stylistic reasons, however, it often occurs in the middle or end.
Paragraphs should not contain vague, over-broad statements or confusing or complicated sentences. Be sure your topic sentence is not just a statement of fact but rather the introduction of an idea to be further developed in the paragraph.
An effective topic sentence is an important part of writing for clarity and conveys an argument to the writer. Just follow these simple steps, and with WPS AI , you shall be guaranteed to generate strong, specific, and engaging topic sentences in a way that maximizes essay quality overall. WPS AI Grammar check, rewriting suggestions, and adjustment of length ensure improvement in your writing efficiency and results.
15 years of office industry experience, tech lover and copywriter. Follow me for product reviews, comparisons, and recommendations for new apps and software.
Trump lashes out at Harris, recommits to a Sept. 10 debate at hourlong news conference
Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump speaks to reporters during a news conference at his Mar-a-Lago estate Thursday, Aug. 8, 2024, in Palm Beach, Fla. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
FILE - Crowds are shown in front of the Washington Monument during the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, Aug. 28, 1963, in Washington. (AP Photo, File)
Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump talks about his ear as he speaks to reporters during a news conference at his Mar-a-Lago estate Thursday, Aug. 8, 2024, in Palm Beach, Fla. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
In his first news conference since Vice President Kamala Harris became the Democratic nominee for president, former President Donald Trump said he would debate her on Sept. 10 and pushed for two more debates. The Republican presidential nominee spoke for more than an hour, discussing a number of issues facing the country and then taking questions from reporters. He made a number of false and misleading claims. Many of them have been made before.
Here’s a look at some of those claims.
CLAIM: “The biggest crowd I’ve ever spoken — I’ve spoken to the biggest crowds. Nobody’s spoken to crowds bigger than me. If you look at Martin Luther King when he did his speech, his great speech, and you look at ours, same real estate, same everything, same number of people, if not we had more. And they said he had a million people, but I had 25,000 people.”
THE FACTS: Trump was comparing the crowd at his speech in front of the White House on Jan. 6, 2021, to the crowd that attended Martin Luther King Jr.’s famous “I Have a Dream” speech on Aug. 28, 1963, at the Lincoln Memorial.
But far more people are estimated to have been at the latter than the former.
Approximately 250,000 people attended the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, at which King gave his speech, according to the National Park Service . The Associated Press reported in 2021 that there were at least 10,000 people at Trump’s address.
Moreover, Trump and King did not speak in the same location. King spoke from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial , which looks east toward the Washington Monument. Trump spoke at the Ellipse , a grassy area just south of the White House.
CLAIM: “Nobody was killed on Jan. 6.”
THE FACTS: That’s false. Five people died in the Jan. 6, 2021, riot and its immediate aftermath. Pro-Trump rioters breached the U.S. Capitol that day amid Congress’ effort to certify Democrat Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory.
Among the deceased are Ashli Babbitt, a Trump supporter shot and killed by police, and Brian Sicknick, a police officer who died the day after battling the mob. Four additional officers who responded to the riot killed themselves in the following weeks and months.
Babbitt, a 35-year-old Air Force veteran from San Diego, was shot and killed by a police officer as she climbed through a broken part of a Capitol door during the violent riot. Trump has often cited Babbitt’s death while lamenting the treatment of those who attended a rally outside the White House that day and then marched to the Capitol, many of whom fought with police.
CLAIM: “The presidency was taken away from Joe Biden, and I’m no Biden fan, but I tell you what, from a constitutional standpoint, from any standpoint you look at, they took the presidency away.”
THE FACTS: There is nothing in the Constitution that prevents the Democratic Party from making Vice President Kamala Harris its nominee. That process is determined by the Democratic National Committee.
Harris officially claimed the nomination Monday following a five-day online voting process, receiving 4,563 delegate votes out of 4,615 cast, or about 99% of participating delegates. A total of 52 delegates in 18 states cast their votes for “present,” the only other option on the ballot.
The vice president was the only candidate eligible to receive votes after no other candidate qualified by the party’s deadline following President Joe Biden’s decision to drop out of the race on July 21.
What to know about the 2024 Election
CLAIM: Suggesting things would be different if he had been in office rather than Biden: “You wouldn’t have had inflation. You wouldn’t have had any inflation because inflation was caused by their bad energy problems. Now they’ve gone back to the Trump thing because they need the votes. They’re drilling now because they had to go back because gasoline was going up to 7, 8, 9 dollars a barrel.”
THE FACTS: There would have been at least some inflation if Trump had been reelected in 2020 because many of the factors causing inflation were outside a president’s control. Prices spiked in 2021 after cooped-up Americans ramped up their spending on goods such as exercise bikes and home office furniture, overwhelming disrupted supply chains. U.S. auto companies, for example, couldn’t get enough semiconductors and had to sharply reduce production, causing new and used car prices to shoot higher. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in March 2022 also sent gas and food prices soaring around the world, as Ukraine’s wheat exports were disrupted and many nations boycotted Russian oil and gas.
Still, under Biden, U.S. oil production reached a worldwide record level earlier this year .
Many economists, including some Democrats, say Biden’s $1.9 trillion financial support package, approved in March 2021, which provided a $1,400 stimulus check to most Americans, helped fuel inflation by ramping up demand. But it didn’t cause inflation all by itself. And Trump supported $2,000 stimulus checks in December 2020, rather than the $600 checks included in a package he signed into law in December 2020.
Prices still spiked in countries with different policies than Biden’s, such as France , Germany and the U.K. , though mostly because of the sharp increase in energy costs stemming from Russia’s invasion.
CLAIM: “Twenty million people came over the border during the Biden-Harris administration — 20 million people — and it could be very much higher than that. Nobody really knows.”
THE FACTS: Trump’s 20 million figure is unsubstantiated at best, and he didn’t provide sources.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection reports 7.1 million arrests for illegal crossings from Mexico from January 2021 through June 2024. That’s arrests, not people. Under pandemic-era asylum restrictions, many people crossed more than once until they succeeded because there were no legal consequences for getting turned back to Mexico. So the number of people is lower than the number of arrests.
In addition, CBP says it stopped migrants 1.1 million times at official land crossings with Mexico from January 2021 through June 2024, largely under an online appointment system to claim asylum called CBP One.
U.S. authorities also admitted nearly 500,000 migrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela under presidential authority if they had financial sponsors and arrived at an airport.
All told, that’s nearly 8.7 million encounters. Again, the number of people is lower due to multiple encounters for some.
There are an unknown number of people who eluded capture, known as “got-aways” in Border Patrol parlance. The Border Patrol estimates how many but doesn’t publish that number.
CLAIM: Vice President Kamala Harris “was the border czar 100% and all of a sudden for the last few weeks she’s not the border czar anymore.”
THE FACTS: Harris was appointed to address “root causes” of migration in Central America. That migration manifests itself in illegal crossings to the U.S., but she was not assigned to the border.
CLAIM: “The New York cases are totally controlled out of the Department of Justice.”
THE FACTS: Trump was referring to two cases brought against him in New York — one civil and the other criminal.
Neither has anything to do with the U.S. Department of Justice.
The civil case was initiated by a lawsuit from New York Attorney General Letitia James. In that case, Trump was ordered in February to pay a $454 million penalty for lying about his wealth for years as he built the real estate empire that vaulted him to stardom and the White House.
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, a state-level prosecutor, brought the criminal case . In May, a jury found Trump guilty on 34 felony counts in a scheme to illegally influence the 2016 election through a hush money payment to a porn actor who said the two had sex.
___ Associated Press writers Melissa Goldin and Elliot Spagat and economics writer Christopher Rugaber contributed to this article. ___
Find AP Fact Checks here: https://apnews.com/APFactCheck .
An earlier version of this story mixed up “latter” and “former” in the third paragraph. Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech on Aug. 28, 1963, drew a far larger crowd than Donald Trump’s speech near the White House on Jan. 6, 2021.
Cancer screening is based upon a linear model of neoplastic growth and malignant progression. Yet, historical observations suggest that malignant progression is uncoupled from growth which may explain the paradoxical increase in early-stage breast cancer detection without a dramatic reduction in metastatic burden. Here we lineage trace millions of genetically transformed field cells and thousands of screen detectable and symptomatic tumors using a cancer rainbow mouse model of HER2+ breast cancer. Transition rates from field cell to screen detectable tumor and then to symptomatic tumors were estimated from a dynamical model of tumor development. Field cells are orders of magnitude less likely to transition to a screen detectable tumor than the subsequent transition of a screen detectable tumor to a symptomatic tumor. Our model supports a critical occult transition in tumor development during which time a transformed cell becomes a bona fide neoplasm. Lineage tracing and test-by-transplantation reveals that nonlinear progression during or prior to the occult transition gives rise to nascent lethal cancers at screen detection. Simulations illustrate how occult transition rates are a critical determinant of tumor growth and malignancy in the lifetime of a host. Our data provides direct experimental evidence that cancers can deviate from the predictable linear progression model foundational to current screening paradigms.
The authors have declared no competing interest.
Figures 4 and 5 have been revised with new simulations of tumor growth. Accordingly, the introduction, results, and discussion have been updated to reflect these new results and clarify the historical use of terms like progression, screen detection, and clinical / symptomatic tumor.
View the discussion thread.
Thank you for your interest in spreading the word about bioRxiv.
NOTE: Your email address is requested solely to identify you as the sender of this article.
PhD graduate Masahiro Suzuki , from CEU’s Department of Environmental Sciences and Policy , received one of the university’s Best Dissertation Awards this year in recognition of his thesis research titled “ Political Acceleration in Energy Transitions: Historical Interventions and Their Outcomes in the G7 and the EU, compared to Net-Zero Targets ”. For the thesis, which he defended in May , Suzuki raised the question of whether climate policies have accelerated the shift to clean energy in the G7 and the EU. His research contributes to understanding the feasibility of reducing greenhouse gas emissions worldwide to keep the global temperature increase below one point five degrees Celsius, which is the current international target to avoid the dangerous effects of climate change.
Suzuki was recently awarded the prestigious Early Career Scientist Award by a top journal in the environmental sciences, Energy Research & Social Science, for a paper based on his dissertation . Suzuki published this paper with his supervisor Aleh Cherp , and CEU graduate Jessica Jewell , an associate professor at Chalmers University of Technology. Suzuki’s research was supported by CEU, NewClimate Institute , and an EU Horizon 2020 international research project ( ENGAGE ).
CEU spoke with Suzuki to learn about his research and how meeting the international climate target requires radically different energy transitions in the future.
What is your research aim?
The main theme of my dissertation research is climate change and energy transitions. My primary aim was to better understand how energy transitions have been politically accelerated, with a particular focus on investigating whether climate policies have accelerated the shift to clean energy, an important mechanism to meet the current climate target to keep the global temperature increase below one point five degrees Celsius.
To give you a little more background, our economy remains predominantly dependent on fossil fuels today across all sectors, including electricity generation, transportation, building heating and cooling, and industry. Mitigating climate change requires rapidly replacing this dependence on fossil fuels with low-carbon alternatives, which must be completed within the coming decades. Such low-carbon transition radically differs from the historical development of our economy over the last few centuries, during which we continuously increased the use of fossil fuels and added low-carbon technologies on top of, rather than replacing, existing fossil infrastructure to grow our economy. This is why strong political efforts are necessary to change the course of action, including by significantly accelerating the growth of low-carbon technologies and the decline of fossil fuels.
How much acceleration is necessary? In developed countries, governments must ensure the complete decarbonization of electricity generation already by 2035, because decarbonized electricity is necessary to reduce emissions in other sectors through electrification. But is such a level of acceleration possible? Interestingly, I found that the literature is split on this question with two major groups of scholars characterizing this acceleration in opposition as either impossible or possible.
One group analyzes long-term global energy transition and argues that the required acceleration is impossible because they observed no such acceleration in the past, even in recent years, where energy demand and emissions have continuously grown throughout the last centuries. However, this approach is problematic because potential acceleration in some countries (for example, in Europe) may be masked by developments elsewhere (for example, in fast-developing economies) in such aggregated analyses.
In contrast, the other group of scholars arguing that the required acceleration is possible conducts more granular analyses to identify what they characterize as “successful” or “leading” technological developments, such as the recent growth of solar and wind power in Germany and the U.K., or the recent decline of coal use in Canada. However, this approach is also problematic because it does not compare these cases with the historical development of other technologies. Without such benchmarks, we would not know whether these cases are truly accelerated. Another shortcoming is that these studies tend to focus on one or a few technologies and do not clarify whether the individual technological changes have led to any significant systemic transitions for decarbonization. For example, the decline of coal use in Canada was replaced by the rapid growth of natural gas, which is not a transition in line with keeping the global temperature increase below one point five degrees Celsius.
Therefore, my dissertation aimed to develop a framework and methods to conduct a more appropriate scope of analysis to examine political acceleration in energy transitions focused on systemic transition in the energy sector at a national level because energy transitions are mainly driven by national policies. For empirical research, I focused on analyzing electricity transitions in the G7 countries and the EU, both because of the importance of decarbonizing electricity and because these countries possess the largest technological and financial capacity in the world for climate change mitigation through their repeated political commitments to lead the global decarbonization process. In other words, if they are not accelerating transitions, who would and who can?
What did your research find?
I find that climate policies have not accelerated electricity transitions in the G7 and the EU beyond historical trends and rates of energy transitions. Throughout the last six decades, the transition speed has strongly correlated not with changes in polices but with changes in energy demand. The fastest technological changes in the electricity sector in the G7 and the EU took place in the 1970s and 1980s when these countries quickly developed nuclear power to replace the use of oil in order to improve energy security after the oil crises. Compared to these speeds, the recent growth of renewables and the current reduction of fossil fuels under climate policies have been slower.
I also find that none of the G7 countries nor the EU have demonstrated or even planned to accelerate electricity transitions comparable to meeting the international climate target, despite their repeated political announcements to do so. This indicates that there are no “successful” cases of sustainable energy transitions to date. The findings are in stark contrast to some claims in the literature that there are an increasing number of such cases driven by climate policies in recent decades. The required transitions to mitigate climate change are therefore unprecedented, necessitating radically stronger efforts such as accelerating the decarbonization of electricity immediately and multiple times over compared to the latest speed observed in the G7 and the EU.
My research also finds that there are several precedents that demonstrated either the necessary speed of low-carbon technology growth or fossil fuel decline comparable to achieving the international climate target goal. For example, France and Sweden rapidly developed nuclear power in the 1970s and 1980s, and the U.K. has swiftly reduced fossil fuels in electricity generation in more recent decades. My research shows that these cases are historically the fastest transition examples from which we can perhaps learn best about political acceleration in energy transitions.
What motivated you to carry out this research?
Before my PhD, I worked at the Institute for Global Environmental Strategies , an environmental think tank dedicated to sustainable transition, in Japan. My work involved participating in international climate change negotiations, including the Conference of Parties (COP), as a national delegate of the Japanese government. I also collaborated closely with representatives from other G7 and EU countries, as these nations often cooperate in climate negotiations.
During the negotiations, it seemed to me that many, if not all, countries continuously conveyed a very similar message regarding their ambitions, plans, and actions for climate change mitigation: they are ambitious and doing whatever they can. While many nations often claim their actions are adequate, we know that climate change mitigation efforts have remained far from successful. I therefore became increasingly interested in investigating whether these countries are actually doing more than business as usual to mitigate climate change, which led me to pursue my PhD.
What kind of sources and data do you use for this research?
For energy statistics, I used data from the International Energy Agency and Ember , as well as additional national data from the G7 and the EU. For climate policies, I used the Climate Policy Database from NewClimate Institute, where I had the pleasure to collaborate as a visiting researcher. I also analyzed hundreds of policy documents published by these countries over the last decades to examine how their climate change mitigation policies have evolved over time.
Based on your research, what would you like to point out more broadly on the topic of climate change mitigation?
I want to emphasize the importance of carefully identifying historical model cases to learn from in order to accelerate sustainable energy transitions. For example, there is a frequent call for Japan to learn from Germany because Japan lags behind Germany in developing renewables. But I think this advice is misguided because Germany has never achieved the comparable growth speed of low-carbon technologies necessary to meet the international climate targets. If Japan should learn from its peers, I believe that the better candidates at the moment are France and Sweden, which achieved comparable speeds in developing low-carbon electricity based on nuclear power in the 1970s and 1980s. An important question is whether and how the historical efforts in these two countries can be replicated and reinforced in Japan’s current context.
The research approach developed in this dissertation, which I call ‘middle-range’ compared to the existing approaches that are either too broad or too narrow, can easily be applied to track future progress in the G7 and the EU, and analyze the decarbonization processes of other sectors and countries. Recently, some European countries have shown signs of significantly accelerating the shift to clean energy in response to the Russo-Ukrainian War, though the planned speed remains insufficient for the one point five degrees Celsius target. We will yet see whether such acceleration can actually take place in these countries and beyond. However, as even greater acceleration may occur in the future, one of my future research plans is to develop and regularly update an inventory of historical model cases of energy transitions to support evidence-based research and policy-making.
As I continue the line of my dissertation research in the future, I am happy to share that I will soon join the Physical Resource Theory at Chalmers University of Technology as a postdoctoral researcher. I will also continue contributing to the international research group POLET (Perspectives on technOLogical change and Energy Transitions), which focuses on analyzing the feasibility of rapid energy transitions to mitigate climate change.
This interview is part of CEU's "Research in the Spotlight" series, which features the projects recognized in the university's 2024 Best Dissertation Awards.The full list of winners can be found here .
IMAGES
COMMENTS
What are some essay transition words examples? Some of the most common essay transition words examples include however, although, ultimately, in summary, next, last, also, in general, for that reason, as a result, for example, in the meantime, therefore, similarly, and likewise.
Transition words and phrases (also called linking words, connecting words, or transitional words) are used to link together different ideas in your text. They help the reader to follow your arguments by expressing the relationships between different sentences or parts of a sentence.
Clear transitions are crucial to clear writing: They show the reader how different parts of your essay, paper, or thesis are connected. Transition sentences can be used to structure your text and link together paragraphs or sections. Example of a transition sentence for a new paragraph. In this case, the researchers concluded that the method ...
Transitional words and phrases can create powerful links between ideas in your paper and can help your reader understand the logic of your paper. However, these words all have different meanings, nuances, and connotations. Before using a particular transitional word in your paper, be sure you understand its meaning and usage completely and be sure…
Enhance essays with our guide on transition words examples, ideal for starting paragraphs and conclusions. Elevate your writing with Grammarly.
Transitions. Transitions help your readers move between ideas within a paragraph, between paragraphs, or between sections of your argument. When you are deciding how to transition from one idea to the next, your goal should be to help readers see how your ideas are connected—and how those ideas connect to the big picture.
A transition between paragraphs can be a word or two (however, for example, similarly), a phrase, or a sentence. Transitions can be at the end of the first paragraph, at the beginning of the second paragraph, or in both places. Transitions within paragraphs: As with transitions between sections and paragraphs, transitions within paragraphs act ...
Learn how transition sentences help with the flow within a paragraph and within an entire text, along with transition words and phrases to use.
Learn how to use common transition words and phrases to improve your writing skills and connect your ideas. The Writing Studio at Vanderbilt offers helpful resources and guidance.
33 Transition Words and Phrases. 'Besides,' 'furthermore,' 'although,' and other words to help you jump from one idea to the next. Transitional terms give writers the opportunity to prepare readers for a new idea, connecting the previous sentence to the next one. Many transitional words are nearly synonymous: words that broadly indicate that ...
Transitions make the logical development of your work clearer. Here are some of the most useful transition words for research papers.
Transitions are words and/or phrases used to indicate movement or show change throughout a piece of writing. Transitions generally come at the beginning of a paragraph and can do the following: Alert readers of connections to, or further evidence for, the thesis. Function as the topic sentence of paragraphs.
Creating Effective Transition Statements WHAT ARE SPEECH TRANSITIONS? Speech transitions are words and phrases that help your argument flow smoothly.
What Are Transition Words Transition words are essential elements in essay writing that create smooth transitions between ideas. Think of a transition as a conjunction or a joining word. It helps create strong relationships between ideas, paragraphs, or sentences and assists the readers to understand the word phrases and sentences easily.
This article shows a complete list of transition words and expressions you can use when writing an argumentative essay.
Body Paragraph Transitions In answering the questions above, you likely realized that three body paragraphs will be required in this essay based on its current thesis statement. One body paragraph will focus on "spiritual" findings, another on "secular," and then finally one supported by "personal experience." You also likely realized that the Addition transition word category ...
The last thing you want is your transition words to feel trite and uninspired. Discover what these words are and a variety of examples for your writing here.
Transition words and phrases (also called linking words, connecting words, or transitional words) are used to link together different ideas in your text.
What are transition words? Transition words are words and even phrases that connect ideas. 'Because,' 'consequently,' 'and,' 'what's more,' 'resultantly,' 'in sum,' and 'briefly' are a few common transition words examples. Owing to their job as words that bridge ideas, transition words are also called connecting or ...
Improve essay writing by mastering transition words! Learn how and why to use introduction and thesis statement, connection between paragraphs, defining and summarizing, cause & effect, and contrasting ideas transition words in this comprehensive guide.
A thesis statement is a sentence that sums up the central point of your paper or essay. It usually comes near the end of your introduction.
A thesis reminder is a direct echo of the thesis statement. In a short paper, the topic sentence of each paragraph should repeat words or phrases from the thesis statement.
Developing a Thesis Statement Many papers you write require developing a thesis statement. In this section you'll learn what a thesis statement is and how to write one.
Transition: This links the previous and next paragraphs. Relationship to the Thesis Statement. Although the thesis statement provides the argument for the whole essay, topic sentences fractionate this argument into sub-points that are discussed in every particular paragraph.
Former President Donald Trump made a number of false and misleading claims in his news conference Thursday. Many of them have been made before.
The behavior of nonlinear systems close to critical transitions has relevant implications in assessing complex systems' stability, transient properties, and resilience. Transient times become extremely long near phase transitions (or bifurcations) in a phenomenon generically known as critical slowing down, observed in electronic circuits, quantum electrodynamics, ferromagnetic materials ...
We identified new mechanisms unlocking bract development. This natural variation sheds a new light on development canalisation during floral transition and on bract loss evolution. ### Competing Interest Statement The authors have declared no competing interest.
Field cells are orders of magnitude less likely to transition to a screen detectable tumor than the subsequent transition of a screen detectable tumor to a symptomatic tumor. Our model supports a critical occult transition in tumor development during which time a transformed cell becomes a bona fide neoplasm.
PhD graduate Masahiro Suzuki, from CEU's Department of Environmental Sciences and Policy, received one of the university's Best Dissertation Awards this year in recognition of his thesis research titled "Political Acceleration in Energy Transitions: Historical Interventions and Their Outcomes in the G7 and the EU, compared to Net-Zero Targets".