LG - PCS106 – W13
PCS106 Laboratory Guidelines
1. Students will work in lab groups of two people except by special arrangement with the teaching
assistant. Each student will submit, individually, at the conclusion of the laboratory session, a sheet of
paper containing the observations and measurements made during the lab, with the student's name
and student number on it. This should be brief and contain only essential data. These will not be
accepted after the conclusion of the lab period. The student will retain a copy of these results for their
own use. Attendance will be recorded from these results.
2. Structured Abstract:
One week later, at the next laboratory session, each student will submit an abstract (only) for the
experiment done the previous week. This will outline, in 250-300 words maximum, the experiment
including the results and conclusions (no tables or graphs). Read carefully the Abstract Guidelines
and the Example of an Abstract before writing your own paper. Late submissions will receive a 20%
penalty for up to 1 week. If the abstract is more than 1 week late, no marks will be received.
4. The titles and instructions for each experiment will be available for download from the Physics lab
website: http://www.ryerson.ca/physics/current/lab_information/
5. The first experiment is entitled “Errors in Simple Measurements” and its purpose is to introduce
you to several basic concepts of measurement and to the estimation of the experimental uncertainties
in values of physical quantities determined directly and indirectly. Before coming to this first lab,
read appendix 1: “Significant figures” and appendix 2: “Introduction to errors and error analysis”
which are also posted on the labs website. Complete all the exercises at the end of the “Significant
figures” document (already included in the “Errors in Simple Measurements” document) and attach
your solution as an Appendix to your report (it will be marked as part of the report).
6. Before each lab session, students must familiarize themselves with the physics of the experiment to
be performed. This requires reading the description of the experiment in the manual and appropriate
sections of the textbook.
7. Students must also prepare the necessary tables for data acquisition and data analysis, and study the
list of pre-lab questions posted on the labs website. The students may be asked the answers to those
questions by the lab instructor and thus should come prepared to the lab session.
8. Students will not be allowed to join their partners and perform the experiment if they show up more
than 15 minutes after the lab has commenced.
9. Starting the Fall 2010 term, there are NO lab exemptions. A student who is repeating the course, even
if he has completed the lab in the past needs to' re-do all experiments and submit reports on all of
them on time in order to obtain a passing mark for the lab component.
10. Plagiarism:
Plagiarism of any form (copying material or modifying data in order to get better results!) will not be
tolerated. Do not copy material (lab manuals, text books, your partner’s notes, old lab reports, etc…)
without citing the source. Your results will be compared against the actual data (from the raw-data
copy submitted by you at the end of each lab session).
For the Policy on Academic Misconduct, see http://www.ryerson.ca/senate/policies/pol60.pdf