During the first class, you will submit requests for the order in which you do the
experiments. I will compare the requests and give every team the clsoest I can to their first
choice. I will announce the order of experiments at the second class. Fill in your group's
assigned experiments 1 - 3 in the boxes provided.
Date: Experiment Scheduled / Assignments Due
Feb 2: Introduction, Library, Molecular Modelling, the Fourier Transform
Feb 9: FT NMR / Read LSLC 1, 2, 5.1 - 5.6
Feb 16: MS, FTIR / Read LSLC 13.1 - 13.4, 7.1 - 7.6, 7.9
Feb 23 expt 1 / Library exercise due
Mar 1: expt 1
Mar 8: expt 1 / instructions for first instrument due
Mar 15: expt 2 / expt 1 Research Report due
Mar 22: Spring Break
Mar 29: expt 2
Apr 5: expt 2
Apr 12: expt 3 / expt 2 Research Report due
Apr 19: expt 3 / Mol. Model Research Report due
Apr 26: expt 3
May 3: disaster buffer, makeups / expt 3 Research Report due
May 10: disaster buffer, makeups / Full Paper on all experiments due
Components of a Full Research Paper in Science
First some comments. Most of the papers in the scientific literature are not read in great
detail by very many people. One of your most important tasks in writing a paper is to provide
enough information in the Title, Abstract, Figures and Tables to give people an overview so that
they can decide whether the want to or need to read it. Ideally, these parts of your paper will
attract readers.
1. Title
It should describe the study and may even be in the form of a sentence.
2. Authors
All those making substantive contribution to the planning, execution, analysis and writing
of the project should be listed, in order of decreasing contribution, with their work addresses.
Usually the person who did the writing had to do most of the analysis and thus is listed first.
3. Abstract
This is a brief summary of the entire paper, ideally in about three sentences: purpose,
methods and results. A fourth might describe what you think it means. The abstract is very
important, since on-line searches use title and abstract for keywords (some journals ask for other
keywords as well).
4. Introduction
Here you describe the background of the project, previous work and the problem you are
trying to solve. This section is likely to have the most references, because it puts the paper in
the context of related work. Usually, the introduction ends with a brief summary of what you
did ("In this paper we report the results of ... and propose a new theory to explain... "). Once
again, you are trying to keep the person reading.
5. Experimental Section
This part of the paper is often divided into Materials and Methods
subsections, which may be further subdivided as needed. This section
contains everything a reader would need to know to replicate the
experiment. Materials should be identified by source (and lot number),
instruments by brand and model and all relevant conditions for the
experiments should be described. For each instrument used, all the
settings needed to replicate the spectrum must be given. Synthetic
apparatus need not be described in detail if it is standard (e.g. reflux) but
the temperature, solvent, time and neutralization and purification must be
described. Spectroscopic (e.g. NMR spectrum) and physical characteristics
(e.g. MP) of new compounds are also described in this section.
6. Results
This part of the paper is often very short, and consists of a brief
description of the outcome of the experiments, augmented by the judicious
choice of tables and figures (graphs) to present the results in the most
efficient way. If necessary, it maybe divided into sections. It is always
necessary to say something about what experiments were done in this
section, because most people will not read the Experimental Section unless
they are really interested or want to repeat the experiments.
All Figures and Tables should be numbered in the order in which they
appear in the paper, one set of sequence numbers for each. Each must
have a caption at the top, e.g. "Figure 1. Title 1"; an excellent figure or
table makes it unnecessary to read the text to understand its content. Use
a table when you can to replace narrative, and use a figure when you can
to replace a table; pictures communicate more effectively than words,
especially to the busy people reading your work.
7. Discussion
Tell the reader what you think the Results mean. To do so, you will
refer to the Figures and Tables and compare your results with information
already in the literature. If you have complex computations applied to the
data, the methods are described here. This is one of the most difficult
parts to write, because you are often figuring out what the data means
while you are writing it. This part is usually the longest, although the
length varies with the type of study. It too may be divided into sections,
and it would help the reader if the sections paralleled any you created in
the Results
You may need to introduce additional Tables and Figures in this part
which provide analysis of the results. Say as much as you need to make
sense of the results, but don't try to make it long to impress people. What
impresses reviewers and editors is the ability to tell your story clearly and
succinctly.
8. Conclusions
This part of the paper is optional. It is only used if the results and
discussion have a lot of sections, to summarize the overall discussion and
tie everything together.
9. Acknowledgements
While you were doing these experiments, people helped you with
instruments, laboratory techniques, and discussion of principles. Their
contribution may not merit authorship, but certainly merits recognition. Do
it here.
10. References
This is the section where you effectively thank the people whose
written work helped you to devise your experiments and understand your
results by citing their work. All written sources should be here, not as a
random or alphabetical list but linked to the paper by a proper citation.
There are two common styles (detail in each journal): 1) numbers, both in
text and in this list, and in order of appearance in the text (ACS journals) or
2) name of author and year in text and alphabetical order in this list (most
biochemistry journals). Page numbers are usually needed for books, but
not for journal articles.
Other Types of Paperwork Styles
- Communications. When the study is small but meaty or of some urgency,
the project is often presented as a note or communication. A note does
not have the formal sections above, but is usually written as if they were
there, i.e. the order of presentation is retained. The biggest difference in a
note is that the Experimental Section is completely missing. Such
publications are expected to be followed by full papers which include this
data and other and then describe the experimental method; often this later
publication never appears, depriving the scientific community of the
opportunity to check up on the work.
- Review Articles. Several journals dedicate themselves to providing in-
depth analysis of the papers in the literature. The authors will read all the
paper on a particular subject and summarize them, providing at the same
time and analysis of the reliability of the studies and their importance.
Review articles are a gold mine if you are trying to learn a new field of
research. They are less formal about their organization that a full paper,
and do not include the experimental details, but their reference list is
humongous -- so that you can check the experimental details if you need
to.
- "Science". The journal Science and a few others provide for no
Experimental Section and thus sometimes do not provide the information
that would be needed for the study to be replicated. Often these "full
papers" are more like long communications.
- Research Reports. Internal reports not for publication but for the purpose
of evaluating the progress of the project by a supervisor or for
documenting a completed project within the organization have the same
structure as a paper. However, the balance is different: far more detail is
provided in the Experimental Section and Results, since other members of
the organization may wish to replicate it later. For instance, the internal
research report will might include experiments that were aborted because
of equipment failure and instructions for recovering from or preventing the
failure. Usually a Research Report also has less detail in the Discussion
section.
- Laboratory Notebooks. Notebooks are not reports but diaries. As such,
their organization is much looser. However, each page must have a title,
date, the name(s) of the experimenter(s), and a reference to the page it
follows and the page where the record continues. The laboratory notebook
in the "real world" provides the evidence needed for patents, but only if it
is kept properly. For more information about what goes into a laboratory
notebook, see my instructions to my organic class or the books by Kanare
and Porush.
- Other organizations of full papers.
- Older papers in the ACS journals had the Experimental Section at the
end of the paper. This makes pretty good sense from the reader's point of
view, since it is the least likely to be read. However, the logical flow from
"why" to "how" to "what happened" is lost.
- Experienced authors, and authors in some fields like synthesis, may
combine the Results and Discussion. This approach is not recommended
for beginners, since it is very easy to lose track of the line between what
you actually observed and what you think it means or think you should
have observed.
For More Detailed Information:
- Howard M. Kanare, Writing the Laboratory Notebook, American Chemical
Society, Washington, DC, 1985. An excellent guide for chemists.
- David Porush, A Brief Guide to Writing about Science, HarperCollins
College Publishers, New York, 1996. Writing for scientific and non-scientific audiences. TU bookstore.
- Janet S. Dodd, Ed. The ACS Style Guide, A Manual for Authors and
Editors, American Chemical Society, Washington, DC, 1986. All the
formatting rules.
- Edward R. Tufte, The Visual Display of Quantitative Information, Graphics
Press, Cheshire, CT, 1983. An art and science book about how to tell the
truth and lies effectively with figures.
LMS January 2000