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How can I verify (ensure myself) that a research question in mathematics was not already treated ?

or at least see where a particular paper was cited ?

thank you.

PS : I hope i am posting in the right section and forum (please redirect me if iam not)

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    $\begingroup$ To find where a paper was cited there are lots of resources; MathSciNet has a citation search, for example; Scopus also does forward citation searches. If you have a local university/math library, they can probably help you with resources to do forward citation searches. You can also talk to people who work in the field. $\endgroup$ Oct 12, 2015 at 18:20
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    $\begingroup$ Google Scholar also gives citations. $\endgroup$
    – user9072
    Oct 12, 2015 at 18:21
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    $\begingroup$ Thanks for the edit. The two you name are the main ways in my opinion. You can present it at a conference or in a seminar (though this is subsumed under talking to experts in a way). You can also post a preprint to arXiv before you submit and wait a bit, if it is known somebody might point it out. A further check will be the referee (and the editor) at the journal. $\endgroup$
    – user9072
    Oct 12, 2015 at 18:31
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    $\begingroup$ If you are sufficiently careful, you can submit a reference request on MathOverflow on your question. quid's answer to meta.mathoverflow.net/q/1516 is good: the main point (in my view) is to convince the community that you have done some work trying to find out, and that you would like some help without the community doing a lot of work for you. Search meta.mathoverflow.net for other information on asking such kinds of questions. Gerhard "Helps Literature Searches, Not Replaces" Paseman, 2015.10.12 $\endgroup$ Oct 12, 2015 at 19:01
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    $\begingroup$ This question is basically asking "How do I do a literature search", so: Possible duplicate of Strategies for digging through literature $\endgroup$ Oct 12, 2015 at 19:42

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