Once you've added your Seeds, Grow finds papers connected to them and adds them to your map. 🐰
💡 Tip: Grow settings let you choose which direction to look in and which papers to bring in first, so you can steer your search towards what you need.
Three ways to grow your map
There's nothing to set up first. Your map grows whenever you:
Add more Seeds. This is the most common way. When you find a useful paper, click the seed button next to it, and your map and recommendations update straight away. The more relevant Seeds you add, the more focused your results become. See How to add seed papers to your search.
Click Show more. This adds more papers connected to your current Seeds.
Click Grow in Grow Settings. This adds papers using the settings you choose, so you can steer your search in a particular direction.
↩️ Changed your mind? Each time you add Seeds, click Show more or Grow, a message pops up with an Undo button. Click it to remove the papers that were just added. See How to undo or remove papers from your map.
🔄 With Auto-grow switched on, your map grows each time you add a Seed. You can turn it on or off in Journey Home: click the rabbit icon at the top left, then Edit. You can also switch on Auto-save there, so every Seed you add is saved to a collection automatically. See How to find your past searches.
Want more control? (optional)
If you'd like to steer your search, click the settings icon next to Show more to open Grow Settings. Choose where to find articles from, how to rank them and how many to add, then click Grow.
Your settings stay in place as you work. They're used whenever you click Grow or Show more, and when you add a new Seed, so your map keeps growing the way you've chosen.
Grow settings explained
Find articles from
Combined Citation Network: papers connected to your Seeds in any direction. A good place to start.
Cites of Seeds: newer papers that cite your Seeds.
Refs of Seeds: earlier papers your Seeds cite.
Rank articles by
Best Connected: papers most closely linked to your Seeds.
Most Recent: the newest papers first.
Oldest: the earliest papers first.
Most Cited: the most cited papers first.
Number of articles
Choose how many papers to add each time: 5, 10, 20 or 40.
💡 Tip: ResearchRabbit brings in the most relevant papers first, so adding 10 or 20 at a time is usually easier to review than 40. You can always grow again.
Which settings should I use?
I want to… | Find articles from | Rank articles by |
Explore my topic broadly | Combined Citation Network | Best Connected |
Catch up on the latest research | Combined Citation Network | Most Recent |
See where my field is heading | Cites of Seeds | Most Recent |
Find influential follow-up work | Cites of Seeds | Most Cited |
Trace an idea back to its origins | Refs of Seeds | Oldest |
Find the classic papers my Seeds rely on | Refs of Seeds | Most Cited |
Find the core papers my Seeds share | Refs of Seeds | Best Connected |
Sorting your list
Once papers are on your map, you can change the order they appear in your list. Click the sort icon next to Filter and choose:
Sort List: Relevance, Alphabetical, Most Recent, Oldest, Most Cited or Least Cited.
Sort Seeds: mix your Seeds in with your results, or show them at the top or bottom of the list.
Sorting only changes the order of the papers you already have. To change which new papers get added, use Rank articles by in Grow settings.
Exploring from one paper
Grow looks across all your Seeds together. To explore from a single paper instead, open it and choose:
Similar: papers that often appear in the same reference lists as this one.
Refs: the papers this one cites.
Cites: the papers that cite this one.
An author's name: other papers by that author.
Each one opens as a Rabbit-hole: a new tab named after the paper, for example "Brasel, 2011". You can hop out and explore while your base map stays exactly where you left it, and switch back to it at any time from the icons on the left.
Inside a Rabbit-hole
Top results first: a Rabbit-hole opens with the most relevant papers. Click Show more to dig deeper.
Grow settings work here too: click the settings icon next to Show more to choose where to find articles from, how to rank them and how many to add.
Merge what you find: use the Merge bar at the top to bring papers back into your search as Seeds. Choose which papers to merge, check the search they're going into, then click Merge.
Common questions
Do my Grow settings change my existing map?
No. They only affect the papers you add next. Papers already on your map stay where they are.