To give you an idea of how different searches will return different results, below is a table describing various ways to perform a search related to breast cancer. The content in the table describes frequently used syntaxes and examples. They are looking in the title or abstract search fields for the terms below. Click on the links in the table to visit the user guide, or go to the query and view the search in real time within the tool itself (Note: revisiting the search at a later date will likely add more records to the results since there is no timeframe filter on the queries below):
| Syntax name and link to user guide | Terms/syntax | Interpretation | Number of results | Results link (as of 9/11/2025) |
| 1. Keywords | Breast cancer |
This will look for breast AND cancer anywhere in the title or abstract
Note: this is assuming the Boolean button selected is AND (see screenshot). However, you can also type these commands out in the search bar |
70,974 | https://analytics.nih.gov/results/publicgrants?ID=901b258f-6162-49ea-aec1-34161fbb4f4c |
| 2. Exact phrase |
“breast cancer”
|
This will find “breast cancer” as an exact phrase (side by side only) in the title or abstract | 56,396 | https://analytics.nih.gov/results/publicgrants?ID=d34c6f81-4927-4fd2-bfb8-cbbfa9b7e994 |
| 3. Proximity |
“breast cancer”~5
|
This will find terms breast and cancer within 5 words of each other in the title or abstract | 65,438 | https://analytics.nih.gov/results/publicgrants?ID=a0409abf-fc8c-459e-8271-e12b3b672549 |
| 4. Match from list |
(Cancer tumor breast duct* carcinoma)~2
Note: Duct* above is a wildcard search, therefore, will return any word beginning with duct will be included in the results |
This will find any combination of two words from the list, i.e. tumor and ductal or cancer and breast in the title or abstract; they do not have to be near each other
Note: you must select OR in the Boolean buttons |
223,533 | https://analytics.nih.gov/results/publicgrants?ID=dd81b001-8f56-4be4-9ea4-524f62d0729a |
| 5. Find 3 mentions | fn:ordered("breast cancer" "breast cancer" "breast cancer") | This will find records with 3 or more mentions of “breast cancer” | 24,153 | https://analytics.nih.gov/results/publicgrants?ID=0d156d64-2912-43c1-878a-eee906f5d366 |
Search syntax overview
Visit this section of the user guide to learn more about ways to search: https://support.analytics.nih.gov/hc/en-us/articles/16798667544731-Overview-of-Search-Syntax. Visit the hyperlinks in this document to learn more about each syntax, or select them within the user guide.
Search strategy tutorials
There are many ways to create searches in iSearch, depending on the goal of your search. Review these tutorials to learn more: https://support.analytics.nih.gov/hc/en-us/articles/17318050740635-Tutorials
Additional search syntax
There are more advanced ways to search in iSearch as well. These are less frequently used but may be relevant to the search you are trying to perform to get the more precise results.