What is Scite.ai and how does it work?
Short answer
Scite.ai is a citation analysis platform that classifies citations as supporting, contrasting, or mentioning. This helps researchers understand how a paper has been received by the scientific community. It indexes over 1.2 billion citation statements. For workflows beyond citation context — paper understanding, reference integrity checks, and retraction detection — LancetClaw offers complementary capabilities.
Execution Steps
- 1Search scite.ai by paper title, DOI, or topic keyword.
- 2Review the citation breakdown: supporting, contrasting, and mentioning citations.
- 3Check the citation context to understand how other papers reference this work.
- 4Use the dashboard to compare citation patterns across multiple papers.
- 5Use LancetClaw to go deeper — verify references for retractions and assess evidence quality beyond citation counts.
Prompt Template
Check the citation context for [DOI]. How many papers support vs contrast its findings? Are there any concerns I should know about before citing it?
Common Failure Points
- Equating high supporting citations with high quality (popular is not always right)
- Ignoring contrasting citations (they often point to important limitations)
- Using citation context as a substitute for reading the actual papers
FAQ
Composite User Feedback
Medical Student
"The answer pages helped me move from not understanding a paper to knowing which part I should read next."
Clinician
"These guides work because they answer the practical question first, then point me to the workflow I should use."
Medical Librarian
"The strongest pages are the ones that can stand alone as answers and still route people into the right LancetClaw skill."