2024 BIOL 391 Research - Poster Presentation PDF

10/28/24 Poster Sessions Poster Presentation For many years, the standard meeting format was a series of 10- to 15-minute ora...

10/28/24 Poster Sessions Poster Presentation For many years, the standard meeting format was a series of 10- to 15-minute oral Ch 16, Hofmann (2025) presentations followed by 5 minutes for questions. However, as the number of meeting participants has increased dramatically without BIOL 391 any increase in meeting length, oral presentations are giving way to poster Introduction to Biological Research presentations, in which displays Burman, Fall 2024 containing both text and data are lined up in rows, like billboards, for all to see. 1 2 Poster Sessions Advantage/disadvantage of Posters Each display represents the research of one The advantage of poster presentations is person or team. that many biologists can “talk” about their research simultaneously in a single Each poster is usually displayed for only half room, while “listeners” can have detailed a day (or 2-4 hours). conversations with the authors of the 50 or more posters, sometimes even many posters they find especially interesting. hundreds, may be on display at any one time, The disadvantage of poster presentations is each competing for the attention of that the “speaker” no longer has a meeting attendees. captive audience. 3 4 “Selling” your Story To be successful in “selling” your information, you must plan carefully to create a display that captures the attention of browsers and then leads them through an especially clear, logical, and interesting presentation of the research and its major findings. Otherwise, much of your potential audience will simply pass you by, lured elsewhere by another person’s more compelling presentation. 5 6 1  10/28/24 7 8 Two most important aspects of a Be prepared to tell viewer about your great poster: work and to answer questions. Your poster should be designed to inform people 1. Limit the amount of information both within and outside your immediate you present. field about what you have done and what you have found, and it should provide a basis for – An effective poster presentation discussion with those who wish to find out includes less detail than a formal more about your work. publication or even a talk. An effective poster presentation highlights the major questions asked, the major results 2. Arrange the information obtained, and the major conclusions drawn, advantageously. and it does so using the least possible amount of text. 9 10 Design your poster around your “Rookie Mistake” – Too much Info research question. All too often, posters display what is Contain all the sections found in a research essentially a full scientific manuscript - paper except for the Discussion and a lower word count. complete with formal Introduction, Materials Include: and Methods, Results, and Discussion sections; – Title enlarged and hung up for view, page by page. – Abstract (optional) It is simply not reasonable, however, to expect – Introduction people to read through dozens of research – Materials and Methods – Results papers during the hour or so they may spend at – Conclusions a particular poster session. – References – Acknowledgements (optional) 11 12 2  10/28/24 Find visual ways to show your work – Focus only on the main points in let illustrations tell the story. each section. Think of each part of your poster like a slide Posters should be designed around your in a PowerPoint – i.e., try to keep text to a research question. minimum (thus, illustrations are important). You can always expand further on the aspects of the experiment(s) during your The clearest poster presentation stems from the proper arrangement of information poster presentation time. and from simplicity of design. Brief, distinct and memorable take-home Because visual impact is more important for message. a poster rather than text. 13 14 Logical, easy-to-follow, poster layout. Place sections in their expected places, e.g., Introduction in the upper left and Conclusions at the lower right. Place the least important information (References, Acknowledgements, logos, etc) at the bottom, as it is the least desirable real estate on the poster. 15 16 Other things to consider with layout. Arrange the material into columns – most horizontal posters have 3 to 4 columns; vertical posters usually contain 2 columns. Consider numbering panels to help audience follow the flow of the sections in the poster. Maintain a consistent formatting style (e.g., headings, fonts, etc). Use bullets and numbers to break text visually. Keep key terms consistent throughout. 17 18 3  10/28/24 19 20 Poster Background Use a single background color for the entire poster to unify the presentation, perhaps using different shades to better distinguish the different sections of the poster. Use a colour that is easy to view for a long time and to offer the best contrast for text, graphics and photographs. Use white or muted colours. Avoid more than 2 or 3 colours and bright background designs. 21 22 Make fonts large enough to read. Fonts Use the same font type throughout. – Preferably Arial, Times New Roman, or similar, for ease of reading. Font sizes: – Title: 90 pt., boldface – Subtitles: 72 pt. – Section headings: 32 to 36 pt. – Body text: 28 to 36 pt. – Other text (figure legends, references): 22 to 28 pt. 23 24 4  10/28/24 Poster Size Poster Guidelines Typical Scientific Posters – 56 x 36 Designing conference posters, Colin Purrington (2015) inches (sometimes 4 x 3 ft). http://colinpurrington.com/tips/poster-design Dependent on conference type. “A large-format poster is a big piece of paper or wall- mounted monitor featuring a short title, an For our class, a minimum 3 ft wide x 2 feet introduction to your burning question, an overview of your novel experimental approach, your amazing tall. results in graphical form, some insightful discussion of aforementioned results, a listing of previously published articles that are important to your research, and some brief acknowledgement of the tremendous assistance and financial support conned from others — if all text is kept to a minimum (500- 1000 words), a person could fully read your poster in 5-10 minutes.” 25 26 Online Guides Title You attract an audience (or not) with your http://guides.nyu.edu/posters title. https://www.utexas.edu/ugs/our/poster Make the title succinct, clear and complete. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/P Indicates clearly both the question MC1876493/ addressed in the study and the. https://students.dartmouth.edu/ugar/news- Should briefly convey the question addressed/interesting issue, the general events/designing-research-poster experimental approach, the system (e.g., organism), and the key finding of the study. Catchy to reel in intoxicated passersby. 27 28 Title [approximately 1-2 lines]. The title of your poster should be readable from 15 to 20 feet away, so plan on using letters about 4 cm (~1.5 inches) tall. You can use a slightly smaller font for the names of all the authors and the institutions they are from. The rest of your poster should be readable from about 4 to 6 feet away, so text size should be about 1 cm (~3/8 inches) high. 29 30 5  10/28/24 The rest of the poster should focus on the most important results. Each section is separated from the other sections by substantial space. Aim for about 20% text, 40% graphics and 40% blank space. 31 32 Abstract Introduction Do not include an abstract on a poster. Get your viewer interested in the issue A poster is an abstract of your or question while using the absolute research. minimum of background information If you need one, no more than 50 to 100 and definitions, i.e., concise. words. Also quickly place your issue in the context of published, primary literature; then Note sometimes: When registering to present a poster or oral presentation at a meeting, you are pitch an interesting, novel hypothesis … then generally required to submit an Abstract of your you can describe (briefly) the experimental work, and may be required to include the Abstract in the upper left corner of your poster. If so, be sure to approach that tested your hypothesis. leave room for the Abstract when planning your layout. 33 34 Introduction Please note that “X has never been studied before” is a lame reason for doing something. Unlike a manuscript, the introduction of a poster is a wonderful place to put a photograph or illustration that communicates some aspect of your research question. [approximately 200 words] 35 36 6  10/28/24 Materials and Methods Briefly describe experimental equipment and procedure, but not with the detail used for a manuscript. Use figures and flow charts to illustrate experimental design if possible; include photograph or labeled drawing of organism or setup; mention statistical analyses that were used and how they allowed you to address hypothesis. [approximately 200 words] 37 38 Results First, mention whether your experiment procedure worked (e.g., “90% of the birds survived the brainectomy”); in same paragraph, briefly describe qualitative and descriptive results (e.g., “surviving birds appeared to be lethargic and had difficulty locating seeds”) to give a more personal tone to your poster. Present results mainly in figures and tables. In second paragraph, begin presentation of data analysis that more specifically addresses your hypothesis; refer to supporting charts or images. 39 40 Results Provide extremely engaging figure legends that could stand on their own (i.e., could convey some point to reader if viewer skipped all other sections, which they will do); place tables with legends, too, but opt for figures whenever possible. Make illustrations simple and self- explanatory. This is always the largest section (except if you have no data). [approximately 200 words, not counting figure legends] 41 42 7  10/28/24 Fig. 1. Freeze-induced galactolipid remodeling is not observed in sfr2 mutants. (A) Appearance of wild-type (Col2) and sfr2 mutants at 5 days after freezing treatment. (B) Thin-layer chromatogram of Conclusion lipid extracts stained for glycolipids with a- naphthol reagent from cold- acclimated (CA) or freeze-treated (FT) wild-type (WT) and sfr2 plants. Remind the reader (without sounding like you (C) Changes in galactolipid amounts in plants are reminding the reader) of the major result treated as in (B). *P < 0.05 or **P < 0.01 versus WT CA levels for three biological repeats. Error and quickly state whether your hypothesis was bars indicate SD. (D) Thin-layer chromatogram of neutral lipids visualized by H2SO4 and charring supported – 2 to 4 main points. from WT and sfr2 plants treated as in (B). (E) Percent of total fatty acids esterified to TAG in Try to convince the visitor why the outcome plants treated as in (B); the average and standard deviation of at least three biological repeats are is interesting. shown. (F) Fatty acid profile of TAGs plants treated as in (B) shown on a mol % basis of the State the relevance of your findings to other average and standard deviation of at least three biological repeats; **P < 0.01 or ***P < 10−3 versus published work; relevance to real organisms in WT FT levels. The CA-treated control values for sfr2-3 were 44.7 ± 2.0 mol % (average ± SD) the real world. MGDG and 18.7 ± 0.7 mol % DGDG and for sfr2- 4 were 43.9 ± 1.3 mol % MGDG and 17.9 ± 0.7 State future directions. mol % DGDG. These were statistically not different from values for WT CA-treated plants [approximately 200 words] shown in (C). The labels along the x axis indicate the fatty acid species identified. 43 44 Literature Cited Follow format described by your main society exactly (grammar and typography police at conferences will find even minor infractions, trust me). [5 citations] 45 46 Acknowledgements Further Information Thank individuals for specific contributions Some visitors will want to know more about (equipment donation, statistical advice, your research, and you can use this section laboratory assistance, comments on earlier versions of the poster); mention who has to provide your e-mail address, your web provided funding; be sincere but do not lapse site address, or perhaps a URL where too much into informality in this section; do they can download a PDF version of not list people’s titles (e.g., write Colin the poster or relevant data. Purrington not Dr Purrington). Just make sure to edit the URL so it is not Also include in this section disclosures for any conflicts of interest and conflicts of blued or underlined when printed). commitment. [approximately 20 words] [approximately 40 words] 47 48 8  10/28/24 Miscellaneous Print out a miniature version of your poster (1 page letter size). Bring thumbtacks and tape to the meeting, in case they aren’t provided at the site, so you can attach the components of your poster to the display board. The poster has been checked for typographical and grammatical errors. If supplementary handouts are provided, they include the poster’s title, names of all authors and their school affiliations, and the mailing and e-mail addresses of the lead author (M&M and major results may be included). 49 50 Proofread! Proofread your poster before printing. Solicit your peers to read your poster. Be on time for your poster session. 51 9