Summarized description of the content of a document or document component.
Most journal publishers request an abstract that is a very short summary of the major findings or conclusions of an article and limit this abstract to a paragraph or two. But some publishers require “long” or “summary” abstracts in which each section of the paper is summarized in a separate abstract section that has the same title as the article section being summarized. Such abstracts may be extensive, incorporating figures and tables. While the model for the element <abstract> has been made flexible enough to allow for these titled sections, it is expected that most abstracts will be much simpler and will contain one or more paragraphs.
The @abstract-type attribute may be used to identify special types of abstracts required by some publishers, for example, graphical abstracts, stereochemical abstracts, ASCII abstracts for sending to small devices, and Table-of-contents abstracts that are so short they are inserted as annotations into a Table of Contents. See the attribute page for @abstract-type for a more complete list of types. If the abstract is not one of the types listed, the @abstract-type attribute should not be used.
Accessibility: For accessibility purposes, it is useful to provide a very short synopsis abstract (much like a Table of Contents blurb or a dek in some journals) whose purpose is to tell a non-sighted reader what the document is about. This abstract can be given the @abstract-type such as “meta-description”, “description”, or “dc:description” to indicate that, when making web pages from this XML, the abstract should be used to create the XHTML metadata description.
<!ELEMENT abstract %abstract-model; >
(label?, title?, (p)*, (sec)*)
The following, in order:
A typical abstract:
<article>
<front>...
<article-meta>...
<volume>97</volume>
<issue>4</issue>
<fpage>1665</fpage><lpage>1670</lpage>
<history>...</history>
<permissions>
<copyright-statement>Copyright © 2000, The National Academy of
Sciences</copyright-statement>
<copyright-year>2000</copyright-year>
</permissions>
<abstract>
<p>We describe a method for cloning nucleic acid molecules
onto the surfaces of 5-μm microbeads rather than in biological hosts. A
unique tag sequence is attached to each molecule, and the tagged library is
amplified. Unique tagging of the molecules is achieved by sampling a small
fraction (1%) of a very large repertoire of tag sequences. The resulting
library is hybridized to microbeads that each carry ≈10<sup>6</sup>
strands complementary to one of the tags. About 10<sup>5</sup> copies of each
molecule are collected on each microbead. Because such clones are segregated on
microbeads, they can be operated on simultaneously and then assayed separately.
To demonstrate the utility of this approach, we show how to label and extract
microbeads bearing clones differentially expressed between two libraries by
using a fluorescence-activated cell sorter (FACS). Because no prior information
about the cloned molecules is required, this process is obviously useful where
sequence databases are incomplete or nonexistent. More importantly, the process
also permits the isolation of clones that are expressed only in given tissues or
that are differentially expressed between normal and diseased states. Such
clones then may be spotted on much more cost-effective, tissue- or
disease-directed, low-density planar microarrays.</p></abstract>
<kwd-group kwd-group-type="author">...</kwd-group>
</article-meta>
</front>
...
</article>
An abstract with summarized sections:
<article>
<front>
<journal-meta>...
</journal-meta>
<article-meta>...
<permissions>
<copyright-statement>Copyright © 1999, British
Medical Journal</copyright-statement>
<copyright-year>1999</copyright-year>
</permissions>
<abstract>
<sec>
<title>Objective</title>
<p>To examine the effectiveness of
day hospital attendance in prolonging independent living for elderly
people.</p></sec>
<sec>
<title>Design</title>
<p>Systematic review of 12 controlled clinical trials (available
by January 1997) comparing day hospital care with
comprehensive care (five trials), domiciliary care (four trials),
or no comprehensive care (three trials).</p>
</sec>
<sec>
<title>Subjects</title>
<p>2867 elderly people.</p>
</sec>
<sec>
<title>Main outcome measures</title>
<p>Death, institutionalisation, disability, global “poor
outcome,” and use of resources.</p>
</sec>
<sec>
<title>Results</title>
<p>Overall, there was no significant difference between day hospitals and
alternative services for death, disability, or use of resources. However, ...</p>
</sec>
<sec>
<title>Conclusions</title>
<p>Day hospital care seems to be an effective service for elderly
people ...</p>
<p><boxed-text position="float">
<sec><title>Key messages</title>
<p>...</p>
</sec>
</boxed-text></p>
</sec>
</abstract>
</article-meta>
</front>
...
</article>
JATS-articlemeta1.ent