Scientific writing for biomedical articles (Fall)

Before we start the course I would like to have some idea of who you are and what research you are working on.  Please write up to 300-500 words including:

•  A short bio (who you are, which languages you fluently write and speak, academic history).
• Your research area
• Your plans for the future
• Your expectations of the course.

On our first session we shall see the characteristics of reader friendly scientific writing.

From Day 1 you will need the Handbook and the blue book by Ann Bless.

We will discuss the structure of the abstract, the title and the introduction.

On session 2 you will get feedback from your peers on your abstract and titles. We also complete more exercises on tenses and punctuation. 

For Day 3 you will bring your introduction, please bring 3 printed copies or be ready to email your text to members of your working group.

The aim of this lesson is to practice giving a pitch of your research and practice scientific presentation skills.

To give you a realistic experience of the a conversation of your research where you feel you must convince others of the value of your research in a short time. Participants have two options to practice giving a pitch

1.     Slide show: a 2-5' minute description of a project or current research. A pitch is a brief statement of what you / your project aims or does, why it’s important and it’s scientific value. You can prepare 1 or two slides (an image, a graph, etc.). Here is a suggested template to structure your presentation: 

Foundations in Science and Engineering Teaching_ Learning and Assessment - EPFL - Ecole polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne

You can think of a pitch as the opening or a closing for your presentation.

2.     Poster: 2' pitch of a poster that aims to get conference participants to understand the key message of your poster and encourages them to stay longer and ask questions. Posters will be projected one by one, with a 1-2’ pitch (for format, I put below a few links).

 https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/communication/articles/10.3389/fcomm.2023.1063345/full

 https://books.google.ch/books?hl=en&lr=&id=WRAjEAAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PT8&ots=-77PNj3Qv9&sig=FBfYD8c54Mp2begiJNn3enPwFWY&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false

 Here is a suggested structure for a pitch:

‘I want to help ________________ (who / what field do you help?) by doing _______________  (how do you help them) so that ________________  (why is this important or what is the result?)

 Once you fill the gaps, you can add scientific terminology. You can also replace the verb help with more precise or illustrative ones like ‘contribute’ ‘advance research on…, research, design, manipulate, experiment, control, calculate, construct, produce, program, recreate, etc.

A pitch can also be the opening or the closing line to your presentation.