Q: How can we choose a captivating and appealing title for our research article?
In writing the title, can we use literary expressions to make the title more beautiful? CD133 as the Achilles heel of cancer stem cells? ( I intend to find a suitable title for my review article.)
Generally speaking, research papers are not expected to have "beautiful" titles, and the focus should be more on clarity and inclusion of relevant keywords. However, there is no harm in including literary allusions in the title of a research paper and this is not uncommon in academic publishing. According to a study by Neville Goodman of literary and other allusions in titles of biomedical publications, "more than 1,400 Shakespearean allusions exist, a third of them to 'What’s in a name' and another third to Hamlet—mostly to 'To be or not to be.'" Goodman also found many allusions to Lewis Carroll and Hans Christian Andersen's works.
Having said that, it is not known whether creative titles really make scientific paper more attractive for readers. Thus, as I have mentioned at the beginning, your focus should be on making the title clear and comprehensive rather than attractive.
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