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NROC60: Cellular Neuroscience Laboratory

Winter 2020

Keywords Matter

Ask yourself three questions:

  1. What is my topic?
  2. What are the key aspects of this topic?
  3. What are alternate keywords for each aspect?

Brainstorm keywords to use in your search. Pick words that represent each key aspect of your topic. This can be challenging. The same idea can be expressed in many ways. To ensure the best results when searching, brainstorm several keywords whenever possible.

Sample Topic

Let's say you were interested in finding research articles on immunohistochemistry and glioblastoma. What are some keywords you could use?

Key concepts:

  • immunohistochemistry AND glioblastoma

Related keywords/synonyms for each concept:

Immunohistochemistry:

  • IHC
  • Immunocytochemistry

Glioblastoma:

  • GBM
  • Astrocytoma
  • Brain cancer
  • Brain tumo(u)r