Presentation Guidelines

Introduction to Virology Africa 2026

Virology Without Borders: Integrating Human, Animal and Plant Health in Africa

Oral Presentations

You will have limited time, so make sure that you focus on the most important points. Try to avoid placing too much emphasis on a very general introduction and then running out of time to present the important results and conclusions.
A helpful rule of thumb is 1 slide per minute. Presentations with more than 20 slides will therefore be queried by our conference organisers.
Avoid too much text on slides. Slides are supposed to support and complement what you are saying, not duplicate it. Use short snappy bullet points to summarise your key messages.
Illustrate messages with clear, relevant images or diagrams. Avoid low resolution images (what is a low resolution image? See page 6 of https://apps.lib.umich.edu/files/services/exploratory/pdfs/preparingimages.pdf) .
Make sure text and images are large enough and clear enough to read from the back of a room. The consensus on minimum body text font size is 24 pt (google it!).
Make sure your text is in a contrasting colour to the slide background (light text on dark background or dark text on a light background).
Use colour-blind friendly palettes where possible, but definitely avoid red on green (https://venngage.com/blog/color-blind-friendly-palette/).
Avoid using auto sound effects or lots of animations in your slides – this can be highly distracting.
Rehearse your talk and time yourself so you are comfortable and you are sure you can keep to the allocated time. For students: please practice with other fellow students.
Have your presentation completed, rehearsed and backed-up before you leave for the conference.
There are many resources online that can give you further advice on presentation preparation. Here’s an example: Avoiding “death by PowerPoint” from TEDex
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iwpi1Lm6dFo.

Poster Presentation

Posters should be A1 (594x841mm) size with Portrait orientation
Identify your main messages before starting to design the poster.
Avoid too much text. You can use bullet points to help keep the text concise. Use graphs and pictures where possible.
Avoid including too much information in general. The viewer should be able to read and understand the material in roughly two minutes. You can provide references to papers and websites where people can find more information, and don’t forget your contact details!
Make sure your text is in a contrasting colour to the poster background (light text on dark background or dark text on a light background).Use colour-blind friendly palettes for your graphs where possible, but definitely avoid red on green (https://venngage.com/blog/color-blind-friendly-palette/).
Test that your font sizes are readable from a distance by viewing portions of your poster at 100% zoom on your computer and standing at least 2m away from the computer screen. (Suggested minimum body text font size is 24 pt).
Have colleagues or friends take a look at your draft poster to see if they understand it easily before you finalise and print.
Proof-read your poster for any spelling or grammatical mistakes.
There are many resources online that can give you further advice on poster preparation. Here’s an example: https://www.animateyour.science/post/how-to-design-an-award-winning-conference-po

Subthemes

Emerging viruses and outbreaks
One Health: zoonotic and vector-borne viruses
Enteric and respiratory viruses
HIV, HPV and other sexually transmitted viruses
Veterinary virology
Plant virology in Africa
Biotechnology and vaccines
Clinical and diagnostic virology
Antivirals and therapeutics

Click here to VIEW YOUR abstract or register

Abstract Submission

Closed

Registration

Open

Abstract Notification of Acceptance:

10 April 2026

Early Bird Payment

Closes: 15 April 2026

Standard Rates Open

Closes: 15 July 2026

Important Dates & Deadlines

ABSTRACT GUIDELINES

ABSTRACT GUIDELINES

Abstracts for both Oral and Poster presentations must be submitted using the online submission system (Conftool) available on the conference website.
There will be a limit on the number of abstracts that are accepted for Oral presentation. Authors should note that the method of presentation, whether oral or poster, does not reflect the quality of the work, but may be indicative of the scope of the study (e.g. short research projects or honours studies would be more appropriate for posters or short talks).
Submission type: Specify in the submission form if your preference is to give an Oral or poster presentation
Word limits: The maximum length for the abstract text is 250 words (excluding title, authors, and keywords). The title should be no longer than 20 words.
Formatting: Your abstract text will be entered into the submission box, as well as submitted as a word document.

The word document should include the headings:
Title, Name(s) of authors, First Name followed by Last Name
Speaker affiliation, city, state or province, country, Background
Materials and Methods, Results, Conclusions
All headings should be in bold. Text below headings should be in size 12, Times font, not bold.

Authors: The lead author or presenter’s name, institution, and email address will be separately entered into the form. Co-authors’ names should be written such that their first name appears first, followed by their last name, with their affiliation/institution in brackets after their name. The names and affiliations of additional co-authors should be listed in the order you wish them to appear in the conference programme.
Session themes: Select one or more broad themes that your presentation may fit under, as indicated in the submission form. Please be aware that the themes of the sessions in the symposium and the arrangement of talks will be finalised by the symposium committee based on the submissions received.
Keywords: A maximum of (5) keywords should be included in alphabetical order. These will help the congress scientific committee in grouping presentations into sessions and will appear in the programme to assist delegates in finding presentations and posters of particular interest. Please try to be specific, and avoid general keywords.

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