Abstract
An abstract is like the face of a person. It can tell one what to expect. It should give the gist of the paper in a short paragraph. Besides being a summary, it has another purpose. A showpiece, it beckons the reader into the paper. You do not want to compose an abstract so well devised the prospective reader after glancing at it will decide to skip the paper. But even worse, you want to avoid writing an abstract so discouraging as to turn the reader away from both the abstract and the paper itself.
Don’t compose an unreadable abstract. This would seem to go without saying. An opening sentence such as ”Fragments of polyketide synthase (PKS) genes were amplified from complementary DNA (cDNA) of the fusarin C producing filamentous fungi Fusarium monoliforme and Fusarium venetatum by using degenerate oligonucleotides designed to select for fungal PKS C-methyltransferase (CmeT) domains“ is impossible: Too technical, too dense, too complicated a syntax, heavy with acronyms.
Le’s start with translating and breaking down this sentence. How about, instead, ”Two species of filamentous fungi produce fusarin. Their complementary DNA serve to amplify fragments of polyketide synthase genes. We use for this purpose degenerate oligonucleotides, designed to select for the desired methyltransferase domains.“ Moreover, since the title of the paper starts with ”Fusarin C Biosynthesis“, don’t repeat it. The desired meaning of the above sentence is ”We have prepared oligonucleotide PCR primers selective for fungal polyketide synthase genes.“ Why not start the abstract thus?
Think of an abstract as a shop window. It requires elegance and attractiveness. The latter ought to be a reflection of the quality of the work, of the novelty of its approach, of the importance of its results. The former is exclusively a matter of word-craft, of style. It is not enough to whip out an abstract in five minutes, either before writing the paper or after having done so. A good abstract might be hours in the making. To invest time assembling such a jewel is not out of whack.
How can it be done? Write as if you were penning a postcard to a friend: use simple sentences, don’t get technical and utter a clean message in a maximum of 50 to 100 words.
Incapable of such a feat? In that case, take a printout of your completed paper and underline a dozen sentences you feel epitomize the work. Paste them together and tie them together with transitions. Now, edit this paragraph. Be merciless. Try to reduce it by a third. You should now have the first draft of your abstract. It only remains to turn it from decent into artful English. Do not hesitate to resort to a dictonary of synonyms and to use other tools such as a style manual. Read your abstract aloud, a crucial test. It will make you jettison multisyllabic unpronouncable words. It will make you focus on the genuine achievements of the paper. It will make you grab your reader by the sleeve: ”come inside, Mister, I have something truly marvellous I’d like to show you“. This is the message from a well-designed abstract.
Chapter PDF
Keywords
These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.
Reference
K. K. Landes (1951) Scrutiny of the abstract.1. AAPG Bulletin, 35(7):1660 (1966) Scrutiny of the abstract.2. AAPG Bulletin 50:1992.
R. A. Day (1994) How to write and publish a scientific paper. 4th edn, Oryx Press, Phoenix AZ.
K. T. Hanson (1995) The art of writing for publication, Allyn & Bacon, Needham, MA.
M. Young (1989) The technical writer’s handbook, University Science Books, Mill Valley, CA.
D. B. Givens (2005) The nonverbal dictionary of gestures, signs & body language cues. Center for Nonverbal Studies Press, Spokane WA.
M. Alley (1996) The craft of scientific writing. 3rd edn, Springer, New York.
G. P. Schneider, J. Evans and K. T. Pinard (2005) The Internet illustrated introductory. 4th edn, Course Technology, Boston M A.
J. v. Emden (2001) Effective communication for science and technology. Palgrave Macmillan, London.
M. Turner (1998) The literary mind. Oxford University Press, New York.
Council of Biology Editors (1994) Scientific style and format: the CBE manual for authors, editors, and publishers. 6th edn, Cambridge University Press, New York.
S. Bachrach, R. S. Berry, M. Blume, T. v. Foerster, A. Fowler, P. Ginsparg, S. Heller, N. Kestner, A. Odlyzko, A. Okerson, R. Wigington, and A. Moffat (1998) Intellectual property: who should own scientific papers?. Science 281(5382):1459–1460.
P. T. Manicas (1998) Social science, history of philosophy. In: Routledge encyclopedia of philosophy. Routledge, London.
E. R. Tufte (1983) The visual display of quantitative information. Graphics Press, Cheshire CT.
T. M. Bernstein (1984) The careful writer: a modern guide to English usage. Atheneum, New York.
J. Zobel (2004) Writing for computer science, 2nd edn, Springer, New York N Y.
R. Barrass (2002) Scientists must write. 2nd edn, Routledge, New York.
G. P. Nolan (2005) Tadpoles by the tail. Nature Methods 2:11–12
the primary publication which Nolan comments upon is: I. Burbulis, K. Yamaguchi, A. Gordon, R. Carlson, and R. Brent (2005) Using protein-DNA chimeras to detect and count small numbers of molecules. Nature Methods 2:31–37.
I. Verdaguer (1996) Making sense of neologisms. Forum 34(3):98.
A. Grafton (1997) The footnote. Harvard University Press, Cambridge M A.
G. M. Whitesides (2004) Angew chem int edn engl 43:3632–3641
M. Ruben et al (2004) Angew chem int edn engl 43:3644–3662.
A. Gawande (2004) The bell curve. The New Yorker, December 6: 82–91.
J. M. Williams (1994) Style: ten lessons in clarity and grace. HarperCollins, New York.
C. E. Glassick, M. Taylor Huber, G. I. Maeroff (2000) Scholarship assessed: an evaluation of the professoriate. Jossey-Bass Publishers-Wiley, Hoboken NJ.
W. Zissner (1990) On writing well: an informal guide to writing non-fiction. 4th edn, HarperCollins, New York.
S. Bachrach, R. S. Berry, M. Blume, T. v. Foerster, A. Fowler, P. Ginsparg, S. Heller, N. Kestner, A. Odlyzko, A. Okerson, R. Wigington, A. Moffat (1998) Intellectual property: who should own scientific papers? Science 281(5382):1459–1460.
S. L. Tubbs and S. Moss (1999) Human communication. 8th edn, Mc-Graw-Hill, New York.
J. J. Gartland (1993) Medical writing and communicating, University Publishing Group, Frederick MD.
A. Wennerstrom and A. F. Siegel (2003) Keeping the floor in multiparty conversations: intonation, syntax, and pause. Discourse Processes 36(2):77–107.
M. Alley (1996) The craft of scientific writing. 3rd edn, Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg, New York.
D. Berntsen and J. M. Kennedy (1996) Unresolved contradictions specifying attitudes — in metaphor, irony, understatement and tautology. Poetics 24:13–29.
R. Graves and A. Hodge (1990) The use and abuse of the english language. Paragon House, New York
E. R. Tufte (1997) Envisioning information. Graphics Press, Cheshire, CT.
the switch from Latinate to Saxon is associated with Basic English, which C. K. Ogden introduced, rather successfully, in 1923 in his book with I. A. Richards (1965) The meaning of meaning. A good place to look-up the right word is A dictionary of modern english usage. 2nd edn, H. W. Fowler, E. Gower, reviser, Oxford University Press, New York.
P. v. Dijck (2003) Information architecture for designers. RotoVision, Hove, East Sussex U K.
W. Strunk, Jr. and E. B. White (2000) The elements of style. 4th edn, Allyn & Bacon/Longman, New York.
Other Reference
the first quoted sentence is from A. Petitjean et al (2004) Angew chem int edn engl 43:3695–3699
the second from J. Wei and E. Iglesia (2004) Angew chem int edn engl 43:3685–3688.
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2006 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
(2006). Guidelines. In: Communicating Science. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-31920-4_1
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-31920-4_1
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-540-31919-1
Online ISBN: 978-3-540-31920-7
eBook Packages: Humanities, Social Sciences and LawHistory (R0)