Explore our 2026 Best Practices for all abstracts below.

Choosing Your Abstract Category

Introduction

Categories, subcategories and keywords are important ways to characterize your work so that the ISMRM can assign reviewers, so that the program committee can sort them into good sessions, and so that other members can find what they are interested in. Submission categories, subcategories and keywords evolve over time and are largely based on past submissions and feedback from both members and the AMPC members. Here we provide guidance to selecting categories, subcategories and keywords for your abstract – we recommend carefully reviewing the options with your co-authors ahead of the abstract submission deadline.

See the full list of categories, subcategories and keywords here.

 

Category Selection

Before submitting your abstract, you will need to select a Primary Category and Subcategory as well as a Secondary Category and Subcategory. You will also select a general keyword from the list, as well as entering your own keywords if you do not see what you are looking for on the list.

 

Here we define Categories as the highest-level separation, such as “Acquisition & Reconstruction,” “Neuro,” “Contrast Mechanisms,” or “Musculoskeletal,” which would be numbered 100, 1100, 600, or 1000. For each Category, there are multiple Subcategories, such as “Musculoskeletal: Cartilage,” “Musculoskeletal: Bone,” or “Musculoskeletal: Muscle,” and in all cases the Category and Subcategory are selected together.

 

  1. First you will choose the Primary Category and Subcategory together. For example “Acquisition & Reconstruction: Artifacts” means the Primary Category is “Acquisition & Reconstruction” while the Primary Subcategory is “Artifacts.”   
  2. Next you will choose the Secondary Category and Subcategory together.  For example “Neuro: Tumor” means the Secondary Category is “Neuro” and the Subcategory is “Tumor.”
  3. Please DO NOT duplicate the Primary and Secondary Subcategories.
  4. Next you choose general keywords from the list, primarily to help in search, but also used as needed to select reviewers and during assembly.
  5. Finally, you may type in any other keywords that you feel will help characterize your abstract, especially for those searching the proceedings.

Best Practices

  1. Do not select the same Primary and Secondary Subcategories! This just narrows the number of sessions where your work can fit, and it is highly unlikely that you cannot find at least two appropriate Subcategories.
  2. It is fine for your Primary and Secondary Category to be the same, but do select different Subcategories. For example, if your abstract describes a specialized acquisition for tractography, you may select “Diffusion: Diffusion Acquisition” and “Diffusion: Tractography.”
  3. Many abstracts include novel methods and applications, so for example the combination of “Contrast Mechanisms: Elastography” and “Body: Liver” might be a great choice.
  4. In some cases the options for Categories/Subcategories may be similar or even overlap.
  5. If you feel that the exact Category for your work is not represented, please do your best with the available Subcategories, and use additional keywords.
  6. You may provide feedback on the Categories to the ISMRM – Categories evolve, and many of the changes are based on member feedback. However, this most likely would not take effect until next year’s meeting.

Duplication

The ISMRM explicitly states that multiple submitted abstracts should not cover the same work.  Please use good judgment – if there is substantial new technical development AND a substantial application or human study, then two abstracts may be justified. A general rule is, if the scope of work can reasonably be presented in a 9-minute oral presentation, then only one abstract should be submitted. Note that trying to use different Categories specifically to separate very similar abstracts is likely to be noticed by the AMPC. In cases where two abstracts from one group are very similar, ISMRM policy is to reject one or both abstracts, so please take this seriously.

Review Assignment

For 2026, reviewer assignment will be based on the Primary and Secondary Categories and Subcategories, keywords, and other analysis of the submitted abstract. In the ideal case, a reviewer’s Category preferences may match both the Primary and Secondary Subcategories.  Alternatively, we will try to select some reviewers whose preferences include the Primary Subcategory, and other reviewers whose preferences include the Secondary Subcategory. The assignment is quite complicated, as we must work with the distribution of abstract Subcategories as well as the distribution of reviewer preferences. Be assured that the AMPC chairs will do their very best to ensure that all abstracts receive an appropriate set of reviewers.

Impact & Synopsis

Each abstract is accompanied by a 40-word impact statement and 100-word synopsis. These should be written in simple, clear language, at a higher level than the main abstract, to be broadly understandable to members who may not be in your direct field. The impact and synopsis must include text only, without equations or images, and be without references or citations to items described in the full abstract. We suggest the use of abstract keywords in the synopsis to improve the searchability of your abstract after publication.

 

We all pursue research in order to have an impact. But in the day to day work, and especially as we come together as a group to exchange our research results, it’s easy to lose sight of the specific end goal. The impact statement allows us to explicitly consider our end goal. We want to convey to each other what motivated our projects, what we did, and why it will matter. Not only will this enhance our conversations together, thinking this way will help in any networking situation, framing manuscripts and proposals, and design of future studies for impact.

 

Keep in mind that “impact” can take many forms; it can be, for example, that other scientists might now think about a problem differently, opening new questions or lines of investigations to be answered; it can be specific applications of the advances in technological capabilities; or new clinical information that can be disseminated and implemented more widely.

 

The impact of your study might affect several people, or several million people, both scenarios being important. The question is, what will be different because of the results of your study? Who will care (other than the next post-doc in the lab), and why? Your results do not need to “change the world”, although small changes together do change the world!  Beware the positive impact bias! Impact does not mean that something had a positive or expected result. “Why the work will matter” might be that it shows that a pivot or new direction is needed.

 

The 40-word Impact section will precede the Synopsis in the abstract and will also appear alone in the program. Therefore it should be a stand-alone statement of the potential impact of this work. The Impact section must include text only, without equations or images, and be without references or citations to items described in the full abstract.

  • Impact: State how the results might affect other scientists/clinicians/patients. What new questions might now be investigated? What can be done that was not possible before and why does it matter? Try to avoid vague statements and focus on specific potential impact of the results.

 

The Synopsis section is specific to each abstract type. For ISMRM abstracts, the Synopsis should be entered in the following sections, with a 100-word limit applied to total of the 4 sections:

  • Motivation: State specifically what motivates the research study, for example what new knowledge is being sought, what specific step in a clinical problem your research is addressing, and/or for what reason some technical development is needed. Try to avoid broad statements such as “early detection of x disease is important.”
  • Goal(s): The goal of this particular study. What specific question is being asked, what technical goal or specific advancement in capability is being sought?
  • Approach: The overall approach taken to address the goal, such as the study design to test a hypothesis or type of methodology to advance imaging tools. May include animal model, clinical trial, technology development, or other.
  • Results: Core results of the study that show how well you achieved the goals. Note that the “Impact” section will appear below the synopsis when printed, so you do not need to duplicate text from the “Impact” section here.

 

Please view examples of Impact and Synopsis here, and look at the Registered Abstract and MRI in Clinical Practice Abstract directions for their specific Synopsis instructions.

Please use the following links to access recorded content on how to write abstracts: