PhD Thesis: Introduction

A typical outline of a good Introduction to a PhD thesis is:

• Describe what the broader problem is. In my case, the research area deals with non-rigid image registration. I still haven't gotten to grips with my research topic, but the general idea that I have is that non-rigid registration is slow and not very accurate and point based non-rigid registration methods should be used to increase the accuracy as well as speed of the registration scheme.
• Break the problem up into its subsequent parts.
• Point based feature descriptor
• Similarity measure
• Transformation and alignment
• Interpolation
• Optimization and speed
• Applications of the problem that will be  specifically worked on can be analyzed. 
• Gall bladder segmentation
• Liver registration
• Brain shift
• One the broader problem is identified, then, start writing what you are going to be doing about it. State at least three very well defined goals.
• Goal 1
• Goal 2
• Goal 3 
• State the contributions. To really get a PhD, each contribution should be forcefully backed with a publication of the contribution in a reputable journal
• Contribution 1
• Contribution 2
• Contribution 3
• Once the goals are clearly stated, then at the end of the chapter give the outline describing which chapter contains what.