Prof Brian Caulfield explaining how to write a paper for Marie Curie ITN fellows - ESRs on ITN projects CHESS www.chessitn.eu and CATCH www.catchitn.eu

1. Writing a Paper
Prof Brian Caulfield
This project has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant
agreement No 676201
www.chessitn.eu

3. target journal?
• Read the instructions for authors carefully….
• Look at style of other papers….
• Take note of turnaround time for Journal
review
• Keep an eye on impact factor and ranking

4. Tangled web. The location of a journal's publisher, editor,
and bank account are often continents apart.
John Bohannon Science 2013;342:60-65
Published by AAAS

5. intro
• Brevity is the key……
• Biggest mistake is putting too much info in
and not actually achieving the main objective
in an introduction……
• Set up the study……

6. Intro – key points…..
• Brief opening outlining the broad area that you are
going to address
• Hone in on the specific issue that you are talking about
• Tell us what is already known about this issue
• Describe the main information gap (and its
implications)
• If appropriate, let us know about any new information
that suggests that this information gap might be
addressable
• Tell us how you plan to address this in this study…..

7. Methods
• Content usually the same but order differs
from journal to journal….

8. Methods – key points
• Experimental design
• Participants
• Equipment/apparatus
• Procedures
• Data processing/analysis
• Statistical approach

9. Results
• Never discuss the relevance of your results in
the results section
• Simply present your findings and move on….
• Smart combination of tables and text….
– Tables for comprehensive results presentation
– Text to highlight key findings of note…

10. discussion
• Principal findings….
• Relevance….
• How does it compare to other studies?
Explore differences & commonalities….
• What contextual factors should be taken into
account?
• Where do we go from here? Implications for
practice, further study etc…

11. discussion
• Do not over reach….

12. conclusion
• Take home message

13. Writing a Paper
Prof Brian Caulfield
This project has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant
agreement No 676201
www.chessitn.eu