How to Create a Research Poster with PowerPoint and Design Tips By Tess Grynoch

What needs to go into a research poster?

Title
Authors and institutional information
Institutional logo(s)
Introduction
Materials/ Methods
Figures/ Tables
Results
Conclusions and Future Work
Bibliography
Funding information

Examples of Research Posters

Austin, John-Marc; Foscolos, Anthony; Bennet, Nancy; Allison, Jeroan J.; and Trobaugh, John, "Addressing Bias in LGBTQIA+ Undergraduate Medical Education: An Innovative and Community Based Approach to Curriculum Reform" (2019). Community Engagement and Research Symposia. 6. https://escholarship.umassmed.edu/chr_symposium/2019/posters/6 https://doi.org/10.13028/gnpx-n983. Fiddian-Green, Alice; Gubrium, Aline C.; Harrington, Calla; and Evans, Elizabeth, "Women-Reported Barriers and Facilitators of Adherence to Medications for Opioid Use Disorder" (2019). Community Engagement and Research Symposia. 13. https://escholarship.umassmed.edu/chr_symposium/2019/posters/13 https://doi.org/10.13028/ma22-sn75. (Both used under CC-BY-NC-SA 3.0 license)

Research Posters on F1000

UMass Chan Research Posters in eScholarship@UMassChan

Posters can have many different layouts

First Step when Creating Your Research Poster:

Think about the message you want to present to your audience and sketch out your poster's layout

It's easier and faster to change the layout on paper than in PowerPoint!

Step 2

Find a template online which matches closely what you want

OR

Create a template from scratch in PowerPoint

Step 3

Open PowerPoint and set your slide size to your poster dimensions

Step 4

Add in your text and graphics or placeholders

What size should your text be?

General guidelines:

Title: 72-120

Section headers: 30-50

Body text: 18-30

A good target is 300-500 words for the entire poster (Point-form is highly recommended)

Step 5

Align text and graphics

Leave white space for comfort, grouping (put like things closer together, such as figures and their descriptions, section headings and the section body text, etc.), and alignment

Step 6

Finding UMass Chan logos and coordinating colors and fonts throughout poster

Step 7

Replace placeholders with content, do final alignment adjustments, and check for enough white space, then you're ready to print!

Bonus Tip

Link to electronic version of poster using a link shortner or QR code on your poster.

Links to resources mentioned

UMass Chan Medical School Style Guide

UMass Memorial Logos

Image Color Picker

Adobe Color

Paletton