Writing a research paper for conference:Basic sturcture and contents

The earlier post on writing a good journal paper gives a basic structure for writing a good research paper and this post gives important differences between a conference and journal paper and how write a good conference paper.

During my PhD I applied a simple strategy for writing conference papers. Whenever I decided to write a research paper, I started with a journal paper in my mind. Most of my conference papers are either shorter version with fewer results of my journal papers or the initial ideas and results. This makes a really ideal research paper for conferences.

The following work related to research can be published in conferences.

• A new idea with some results
• Implementation and results of a research paper with availability for testing
• An idea with strong theoretical support and evidence
• Implementation of different methods and their comparisons

Any B.Tech, M.Tech, or PhD project work falls in any of the above categories, the work can be worth publishing and useful for other researchers.

The basic structure of research paper for journal and conferences is almost same, on can add few more sections or subsection based on requirements. As the length of the very restricted in conferences, every section need to well restricted.

Abstract: It will be same as a journal paper abstract.

Overview and problem statement: With a brief introduction to the problem a precise problem statement and its application should be written. Additional supportive information should be avoided.

Literature Survey: This section either can be avoided or can be merged with “Overview and problem statement” section. Instead of giving an exhaustive survey of methods, it is better to cover only few important and frequently used methods in survey.

Proposed method: This most important part of the paper. Give all important details, assumptions and working of proposed method without going into minute detail of each and every step.

Experimental data and results: In this section give brief information about the data sets used and their properties. Results of proposed method after applying different data set to it must me added. Comparing with other methods can optional but adding them will definitely strengthen acceptability of the paper.

Conclusion: write a conclusion to paper stating the contribution, superiority of solution and its applications in one or two paragraphs.
References: usually there are 10~15 references are ideal in case of conference paper. Depending on requirement the number may change.

These just guide lines for research papers in engineering. Few different sections may be added or replaced while writing science and management papers.