GPT Image and Nano Banana can now generate impressive scientific figures. But the more I test them, the more I feel the real bottleneck is not image generation. It is prompt writing.
Most researchers do not need a prompt like “make a beautiful scientific figure.” They need a prompt that explains the science: what the mechanism is, what happens first and next, which cells/molecules/materials must appear, what should be labeled, how the layout should work, and what the model should avoid.
That is the difference between a figure that looks nice and a figure that actually communicates research.
So we open-sourced 140 research figure prompts with real output examples across graphical abstracts, mechanisms, workflows, lab apparatus, microstructures, systems/networks, cross-sections, ecology diagrams, and journal-cover-style visuals.
The goal is simple: help researchers spend less time staring at a blank prompt box, and more time communicating their science clearly.
Repo:
github.com/Figpad/awesome-re…
Use it, fork it, or contribute prompts from your own field.