Guide for Writing a Scientific Paper

Write in past tense throughout the paper.

 

•  Abstract (10 points)

          To compose your abstract, you need at least 1-2 sentences for each of the following points (in this order, but do not include the point numbers). You can have more sentences as needed to fully convey your work, but an abstract should definitely not be longer than one double-spaced page. It is meant to be a clear and concise summary of the paper. Focus on your significant findings, not all of the results. There is no need to mention all of your raw data numbers but just the general conclusion. Also, do not use citations in the abstract. This should all be written in your own words.

1. Title and author (you)

1. Introduction of subject matter. This should be a broad statement about salinity’s affect on agriculture and the environment.
2. Your overall objective.
3. Statement of hypothesis: Links to an external site.use link for help with hypothesis.
4. How you tested this hypothesis: very brief (1-2 sentences) mention of methods.
5. Major significant results (state the actual percentages that were significantly different from the control, and state how they were different – i.e., greater than or less than control).
6. Significance of results and conclusion. How are the findings relevant to the big picture question? 

• Introduction (10 points)

          The Introduction is organized to move from general (broad) information to specific information and should focus on the specific objectives of your experiment.Just make sure it is at least ~400-500 words.  With your research done and methods known, you will also have an idea of what your results might mean depending on how the data turns out. Don’t use quotes! Instead, write the information in your own words and cite it. If you do not cite information that you got from another source, it is considered plagiarism. Avoid using “our” and “we” in the first two paragraphs.

You should have a paragraph on each of the following points (total of three paragraphs), in the order listed below:

1. Your very first sentence should be straightforward and introduce the issue with soil salinity. 
2. I recommend focusing this paragraph around the fact that different plants have different tolerances to salinity or that in general, most plants are negatively affected by increased salinity. The examples you use do not have to be just about radishes but can be about any plants/crops, including radishes. Include appropriately formatted citations with the primary author(s) and publication date such as (Vannatta et al. 2019) or (Vannatta and Klukowski 2016) or (Vannatta 2010) and include full citation later in a works cited (references) section 
3. Relate the topic to what your question/objective is, state your objective, and clearly state the hypothesis in the final line of this paragraph. Put the hypothesis in bold so it is easy for me to spot.

 

• Methods (10 points)

          In 1-2 paragraphs (more if needed), clearly and concisely (this is key) state the set-up, tools, and materials used to do the experiment. This needs to use exact measurements and have methods stated in such a way that if someone were to follow your descriptions, their experiment would be set up precisely the way yours was. This is important and is a key reason why scientific research is trustworthy and repeatable. It should be a narrative of the steps you took in your experiment or study, not a list of instructions such as you might find in a cookbook. Look at the end of lab 1 for a refresher on the methods and the order you completed each step. Include detail on what data were collected, how data were gathered, and the time intervals at which it was gathered. However, although this section requires inclusion of important details, it is also necessary to be concise. It can be a bit generalized instead of stating the exact step. For example, “I put water in a cup, then added salt and stirred until the salt was completely dissolved” – this information is implied and a bit too detailed. You could just say “Three teaspoons of salt were added to ½ cup of water to make a 0.5% salt solution”. Try not to use the word “then” too much; it is often not needed. You should start out your methods with an introductory statement on what you are doing to test your hypothesis. Also, write this as if it is your own experiment rather than referring to the class “groups”. You can take credit as if this is YOUR experiment to get the full writing experience.

          Write this section in past tense. You have already done the experiment, so you should write is as so. It is also OK and often preferred to write this in active voice. In the example above, instead of saying three teaspoons were added (passive voice), you could say “I added 3 teaspoons…”. Use I instead of we because this is your experiment even though we worked together as a class. Also make sure to include information about data collection and analysis. It is important that you not only explain the experiment but also include what type of data you collected (germination and leaves), how you collected it, and what statistics you are using to analyze it and test your hypothesis. We are using a t-test to compare average number of seeds germinated and average total number of leaves for each salt concentration to the control with no salt added. This is to test if the various salinity treatments are significantly different than a control with no salt in terms of germination and growth. You should mention that the experiment was replicated six times and mention the alpha level that you are using (0.05) to test for significant differences. DO NOT put any of your results in the methods! You will include the overall significant results from the six replicates in the results section.

 

• Results (10 points)

        This section presents the results of the experiment but does not attempt to interpret their meaning. As with the Methods section, the trick to writing a good Results section is knowing what information to include or exclude. You will not present the raw data that you collected, but rather you will summarize the data with text, tables, and figures. Use the text of the paper to state the results of your study, then refer the reader to a table or figure where they can see the data for themselves.

        The information in the results section is based on the averages from all six replicates where you are comparing the number of seeds germinated and the number of leaves for each treatment to the control treatment. DO NOT use your individual data, but instead use the overall class dataset. The results need to be clear and concise by simply indicating your significant findings. You do not need to regurgitate all of the data you collected. Only mention what was significant based on your statistics. You should have two figures and two tables and refer to those figures and tables at the end of your statements in parentheses. Do not state everything that is in the figures and tables. Do not say “the 0.25% concentration had 5 leaves”. State what is significant “significantly fewer leaves sprouted in the 2% salt solution than in the control”.

          In this section, you directly state the results. Clear trends can be referred to, but do NOT draw conclusions or provide any information other than what was measured. The conclusions will be drawn in the discussion. For the results, you will want some text to come first, followed by the figures and tables described in the text. To set this up, you can have a short paragraph (2-3 sentences is all you need) on number of seeds germinated followed by the figure and table on germination and then a second paragraph (2-3 sentences) on leaves with the figure and table following. Figures have a caption below them, whereas tables have the caption above them. The caption should be descriptive enough that the reader does not have to look at the text to figure out what the figure is showing.

          You do not need to restate what you did for the experiment because that is all in the methods. You can use the p-value at the end of your statements in parentheses to indicate significance, but you do not need to explain the p-value. A p-value less than 0.05 indicates significance, and 0.05 is almost always the alpha level (the level you set ahead of time) used in scientific studies, so your reader will know that, and they know it from its mention in the methods section.

Examples:

Say “Significantly fewer radish seeds germinated in the 4% salt concentration than in the control of 0% salt (p < 0.001, Table 1, Fig. 1).” DO NOT PUT “According to table 1, the p-value being less than 0.05 says that radish seeds germinated less at 4% than at the 0% control.”

Say “During week 1, the plant was 2 feet tall, while in week 2, it reached a height of 4 feet tall.” DO NOT PUT “The plant grew week to week, so it must be doing well with the treatment.” Also, if these numbers (2 feet and 4 feet tall) are already listed in a table, you don’t even need to state them again because the reader can view the table. Just state the overall significant results.

 

• Discussion/Conclusion (10 points)

          This portion is to wrap up the research and say what your results mean. This part of the research paper is what takes research scientists the longest amount of time because often their data seem to mean nothing or there is no paper related to what they did. This is your chance to interpret your results and say why they are important but what could have been done differently or what can be done in the future to make your argument stronger. You need to make sure to relate back to the topic in question that you first introduced in the introduction. Remember to refer to cited papers, but do not say “this study” or “all the papers I read said”. Just state what the results of the papers were and how it relates to your study, then cite the study like this at the end of the sentence (Vannatta et al. 2018). You also don’t need to extrapolate your results to other topics that we did not test or discuss. Just focus on the specifics of the study, which involves radishes and how salinity affects them. Do not make statements that are too broad. Think back to your hypothesis and objective and focus on that information when writing this section. Did salinity negatively affect radishes? Did other studies have similar findings as yours or different findings? What can you conclude from this information and from your significant results?

1-2 sentences required for each numbered point below; more as needed for clarity and completion of ideas. Include the following points in this order:

1. Restate the topic/significance.
2. Restate the hypothesis.
3. One sentence summary of findings from raw data.
4. At least 2 sentences on what you think these findings mean.
5. Use published articles to help interpret and back up your significant findings. Relate the findings back to the topic and mention again any of the previously cited research papers if their findings match/relate to or are opposite of your findings. You can bring in new citations that relate to your work and your results. Make sure to cite them using in-text citations at the end of your sentence!
6. State the answer to your hypothesis. If the findings are unique among the existing research literature, say so!
7. Include a concluding statement that wraps this up. This should be a broad statement of what high salinity might mean for agriculture/crop production.

 

•  References (10 points)

        This is the last section of the paper. Here, you should provide an alphabetical listing of all the published work you cited in the text of the paper. This does not mean every article you found in your research; only include the works you actually cited in the text of your paper. Please cite at least 2-3 peer-reviewedarticles in your paper. Please refrain from using websites or unpublished information. Your references all need to be formatted the same using the below template. This means in-text citations that you use within the body of the paper and the full references listed at the end in the references section need to all be consistent. See my examples below for proper formatting.

Honestly I have done some of the paper so you can keep that information but my instructor has left some comments that you can account for. Also, I can provide the data graphs to help write the scientific paper.