Sunteți pe pagina 1din 7

qwertyuiopasdfghjklzxcvbnmqwertyui

opasdfghjklzxcvbnmqwertyuiopasdfgh
jklzxcvbnmqwertyuiopasdfghjklzxcvb
nmqwertyuiopasdfghjklzxcvbnmqwer
How To Write An Abstract
tyuiopasdfghjklzxcvbnmqwertyuiopas
Academic Writings
7/21/2009

dfghjklzxcvbnmqwertyuiopasdfghjklzx
By Yazid Jibrel
yazid.jibrel@gmail.com
Twitter @jibrel

cvbnmqwertyuiopasdfghjklzxcvbnmq
http://facebook.com/jibrel

wertyuiopasdfghjklzxcvbnmqwertyuio
pasdfghjklzxcvbnmqwertyuiopasdfghj
klzxcvbnmqwertyuiopasdfghjklzxcvbn
mqwertyuiopasdfghjklzxcvbnmqwerty
uiopasdfghjklzxcvbnmqwertyuiopasdf
ghjklzxcvbnmqwertyuiopasdfghjklzxc
vbnmqwertyuiopasdfghjklzxcvbnmrty
uiopasdfghjklzxcvbnmqwertyuiopasdf
ghjklzxcvbnmqwertyuiopasdfghjklzxc
The shortest way to do many things is to only do one thing at once.

Samuel Smiles (1812–1904)

Characteristics of an Abstract The abstract purposes can be boiled down to


At the beginning of scientific paper is the providing the answers to the following
ABSTRACT. It is a general synopsis of the questions:
entire paper. A short summary and a
preliminary report of research results. The
abstract should only convey the most
1. Why did you start?
important and most interesting parts of the 2. What did you do?
work. It applies for Journal articles, 3. What did you find?
proposal, and reports to a granting agency.
Think of it as condensed miniature version
4. What does it mean?
The different sections of the abstract
of the first draft of the paper?! Why;
address these 4 questions, and, even though
because in comparison to your full report,
your abstract may be read by fifty times as it cannot go into detail, every abstract
many people this is where you make the should answer all of them.
positive impression or convey the highest
quality information? It should also
Title
emphasize the new and important aspects of
The title should be an accurate promise of
the study or observation.
the abstract's contents. It should convey as
Some purposes for writing abstracts: much as possible about the context and the
aims of the study. Ideally about 10-12 words
 It is the first announcement of the long, it should include the scope of the
finding. investigation, the study design, and the goal.
 Access to feedback from one peer. In general it is preferable to make the title a
 The stepping-off point for archiving the description of what was investigated rather
ultimate aim of a research project. than to state the results or conclusions. The
 The writing and publishing of peer abstract's title should be easy for the reader
reviewed literature. to understand and should not include
 To tell the reader what you did in most jargon or unfamiliar acronyms.
clear informative way possible.

The abstract subtitles should include: title,


Authors and Affiliations
objective(s), study design, settings, material
The list of authors should be restricted to
or subjects, method(s), result(s) and
those individuals who actually did the study
conclusion(s).
conceived of it, designed it, gathered the
The number of words in an abstract should data, crunched the numbers, and wrote the
generally be less than 150 for unstructured
abstract. The author who will present the
abstracts, and less than 250 for structured
abstract should be listed first. Only
abstracts.
affiliations relevant to the study should be study more effectively than text alone. Keep
included generally the department and in mind that the abstract will be fairly small
institution at which the work was done. when published, and that details may be lost
if the table or figure is too small. Do not
include a table or figure unless it is
Introduction or background: necessary to convey your results.
"Why did you start?"
This should provide a brief context or
explanation for doing the study. It should
Conclusion: "What does it mean?"
also state the aim of the study, and ideally Here space limitations generally limit you to
should include a concise statement of the a simple statement of why you think your
study's hypothesis. A legitimate scientific findings are important, and their potential
study is not done "to prove that something implications. The most common mistake
is true" but rather "to find out whether it is here is to make way more of the data than
true." The difference may seem small, but it they deserve. Keep your conclusions
makes a huge difference. reasonable and supportable by the findings
of your study.

Methods: "What did you do?"


The methods section of a research paper
Keywords
could well be written before the research Many electronic databases require the
itself is begun and any data collected. In an keywords selection for your abstract to ease
abstract the description of the methods has the search and archiving.
to be concise, and much of the details of
what was done must be omitted. However,
in a few short sentences the reader can be
Checklist for conducting
given a good idea of the design of the study, research/writing scientific
the context in which it was done, and the abstracts
types of measurements and statistics that
were included. I. Conduct research project
• Formulate the research question

Results: "What did you find?" 1. Is it important?


Again, space is limited. Still, it is important
to give the main results of the study not just 2. State it as a testable hypothesis

in subjective terms but also in the form of 3. Search literature to see if your question
some real data. You will need to choose has already been answered
which findings to report here: it should be 4. Revise if necessary
the most important data in your study, and
the findings on which your conclusions will • Determine tools, materials, personnel and
be based. time to collect data, do analysis. Change
plans according to resources available.
A table or figure may be included in the
abstract if it conveys the findings of the
• Choose appropriate subjects and controls Unless they are basic, universally accepted
if necessary You may need to revise plans abbreviations, acronyms and abbreviations
according to the kind of patients involved in should be spelled out the first time they are
your practice. used in the abstract. Similarly, local
expressions and jargon should be watched
• Devise methods to collect data from for and eliminated from the abstract.
subjects (e.g. questionnaires)
Before the abstract is submitted, it should
• Discuss your plan with a biostatistician be double-checked for accuracy, not only of
the data reported but of the description of
• Collect data - you may do a small pilot
study first the methods and all other details. Tables
and figures should be checked especially
• Analyze the data with the help of a carefully. Having one or more colleagues
biostatistician (who were not involved in the study) read
the abstract and offer constructive criticism
• Write up results for publication can be extremely helpful.
• WRITE YOUR ABSTRACT LAST Ideally, your abstract will be added to a
public database such as MEDLINE® or
II. How to evaluate a good abstract PubMed® and will therefore achieve a
• Originality much wider distribution than the journal
article itself.
• Scientific Merit

• Clinical relevance or significance


Post submission
• Suitability for audience/meeting Once you have submitted your abstract start
thinking and planning the presentation.
Ensure you have booked your place at the
Some General Advice for Writing conference and have travel arrangements in
Abstracts place. If accepted you should stick to the
Follow the instructions. It is astounding original abstract and not introduce new or
how many people submit work that does not different work.
fit the description of what is desired, or
As both oral and poster presentations
abstracts that vary in format or style from
require significant work you might consider
th$at specified in the guidelines. Use
writing an article on the subject, that way
simple, declarative sentences. Active voice is
you get two means of spreading the word.
preferable to passive voice. "We studied 6
Good luck and now get writing!
hybrids of Fraxinus sp.” is much better than
"6 hybrids of Fraxinus sp. were studied..."
Examples for writing Abstracts

Sample Abstract (1)


Example of a well-structured abstract by BMJ
Randomised controlled trial of specialist nurse intervention in heart failure2
Objectives To determine whether specialist nurse intervention improves outcome in patients
with chronic heart failure.
Design Randomised controlled trial.
Setting Acute medical admissions unit in a teaching hospital.
Participants 165 patients admitted with heart failure due to left ventricular systolic dysfunction.
The intervention started before discharge and continued thereafter with home visits for up to 1
year.
Main outcome measures Time to first event analysis of death from all causes or readmission to
hospital with worsening heart failure.
Results 31 patients (37%) in the intervention group died or were readmitted with heart failure
compared with 45 (53%) in the usual care group (hazard ratio =0·61, 95% confidence interval
0·33 to 0·96). Compared with usual care, patients in the intervention group had fewer
readmissions for any reason (86 versus 114, P ≤0·018), fewer admissions for any reason (86 v
114), fewer admissions for heart failure (19 v 45, P ≤0·001) and spent fewer days in hospital for
heart failure (mean 3·43 v 7·46 days, P ≤0·0051).
Conclusions Specially trained nurses can improve the outcome of patients admitted to hospital
with heart failure.

Sample abstract (2)


Mori et al. Circadian clock protein KaiC forms ATP-dependent hexameric rings
and binds DNA. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. 99:17203-8.
Introduction KaiC from Synechococcus elongatus PCC 7942 (KaiC) is an essential circadian
clock protein in cyanobacteria. Previous sequence analyses suggested its inclusion
in the RecA/DnaB superfamily. A characteristic of the proteins of this superfamily
is that they form homohexameric complexes that bind DNA.
Methods & Results We show here that KaiC also forms ring complexes with a central pore that
can be visualized by
electron microscopy. A combination of analytical ultracentrifuation and
chromatographic analyses demonstrates that these complexes are hexameric. The
association of KaiC molecules into hexamers depends on the presence of ATP. The
KaiC sequence does not include the obvious DNA-binding motifs found in RecA
or DnaB. Nevertheless, KaiC binds forked DNA substrates.
Discussion These data support the inclusion of KaiC into the RecA/DnaB superfamily and have
important implications for enzymatic activity of KaiC in the circadian clock mechanism that
regulates global changes in gene expression patterns.
Let’s break this abstract down into the characteristics mentioned above.
1. Length. This abstract is 143 words long. This is short of the 250 word limit,
but in an abstract it is better to be shorter than longer (within reason). This is about
the absolute shortest an abstract should be.
2. Introduction. The abstract begins with three sentences of introduction.
KaiC from Synechococcus elongatus PCC 7942 (KaiC) is an essential circadian clock protein in
cyanobacteria. Previous sequence analyses suggested its inclusion in the RecA/DnaB
superfamily. A characteristic of the proteins of this superfamily is that they form
homohexameric complexes that bind DNA.
Notice that the information is specific to the work being done. General
information about the organism or overall field of research is in the Introduction
section of the paper. The purpose of the abstract is the give the maximum amount
of pertinent information in the minimum amount of space.
3. Methods/Results (data). The data is given in individual segments.
We show here that KaiC also forms ring complexes with a central pore that can be visualized by
electron microscopy.
A combination of analytical ultracentrifuation and chromatographic analyses demonstrates that
these complexes are hexameric.
The association of KaiC molecules into hexamers depends on the presence of ATP.
The KaiC sequence does not include the obvious DNA-binding motifs found in RecA or DnaB.
Nevertheless, KaiC binds forked DNA substrates.
Notice that individual pieces of data are given usually in 1 sentence.
The end result of the experiment is given (depends on the presence of ATP)
without details (numbers, band on gel, etc.)
Also notice that often the technique used is mentioned but not described in detail.
(electron microscopy, ultracentrifugation, chromatographic analyses)
4. Discussion. The meaning of the results in relation to the hypothesis/topic is
given.
These data support the inclusion of KaiC into the RecA/DnaB superfamily and have important
implications for enzymatic activity of KaiC in the circadian clock mechanism that regulates
global changes in gene expression patterns.
The end result of the data is summarized and the importance of it is involved with
the overall topic of “circadian clock mechanism”.
5. Importance. Why the work was done. and have important implications for enzymatic activity
of KaiC in the circadian clock mechanism that regulates global changes in gene expression
patterns.
The last sentence leaves the impression that this work has “important implications”
on the clock model “that regulates global changes in gene expression patterns”.
Though a statement of purpose, it is a fairly weak one. A stronger one would have
stated why the study of the circadian clock mechanism is important to the world.
Works Cited
A Practical Guide for health researchers [Book] / auth. Fathalla Mahmoud F. Fathalla
and Mohamed M.F.. - [s.l.] : WHO regional publications. - Eastern Mediterranean Series; 30) :
pp. 131-132.

How to Write a Scientific Abstract [Online] / auth. Curtis by Patrick // University of


Windsor. - july 21, 2007. - july 21, 2009. - http://web3.uwindsor.ca/.

Scientific Writing - easy when you know how [Book] / ed. Peat Jennifer. - [s.l.] : BMJ
books, 2002. - pp. 38-51.

S-ar putea să vă placă și