Project Protocol Worksheet 1 - Planning
By Adrienne Dubois, Ph.D.
Tentative title of project:
Section and Instructor:
Group Number & Members:
INSTRUCTIONS: Answer each of the following questions in the space below the
question. The document has been formatted to display your work in BLUE to
distinguish it from the assigned question. Use as much space as necessary. Your Lab
Instructor will tell you when your team’s completed protocol sheet is due.
What observations have led to this study? (with citations)
Provide at least 3-4 observations that make your question a reasonable one to pursue.
Example: Many plants have shown an increase in peroxidase activity when experiencing salt
stress. In one study on rice (Oryza sativa), salt stress was induced by immersing the plant’s roots
in 0.1M NaCl for 48 hours (Swapna 2003). Note that this observation gives evidence for an effect of
NaCl on peroxidase activity in another organism, and includes a specific concentration of NaCl that
might be relevant for my study.
What is your question?
Remember to include well-defined, measurable components.
What is your hypothesis? (or What are your hypotheses?)
Remember to formulate as a statement. Hypotheses should be testable and falsifiable.
What are the predictions of your hypothesis (or hypotheses?)
Format predictions as if/then statements. If hypothesis is true, then we’d expect to find...
***Check in with your instructor before moving on to the next step.***
You must have a well-supported and well-stated hypothesis before designing an experiment.
How will you test your predictions?
Be thorough! What is your independent variable? What treatment groups/conditions/controls will you set
up to test your hypothesis? How many samples or trials will you include in each treatment and control
condition? What dependent variable will you measure? How will you measure it? What supplies do you need
to carry out these methods? What amounts of those supplies will you require? Do you need to conduct any
Project Protocol Worksheet 1 - Planning
By Adrienne Dubois, Ph.D.
calculations to answer the previous question? Are there any special care instructions or safety protocols you
should follow? See the detailed descriptions of “A Sample Experiment” from Lab 2 for examples.
How do you plan to record your data?
Will you use an Excel spreadsheet? If so, what columns and rows will best organize your data? Do you need
to do any calculations on your data before you conduct statistics? Who will be responsible for recording
data? How will you share your data among the group?
How do you plan to analyze your data?
Will you do statistics? If so, what test will you use? What comparisons will you make? Will you produce any
graphs, tables, or figures? What type of graph or table would best display differences in your groups?
List additional supplies your team will need (if not on the default supply list) here:
item
description
Quantity
List additional reagents your team will need (if not on the default regent list) here:
reagent
description (concentration; Molarity)
Amount needed
BEFORE YOU LEAVE LAB TODAY, YOU MUST SUBMIT THIS FORM TO YOUR
LABORATORY INSTRUCTOR IN ELECTRONIC FORM, AND WAIT FOR THE LAB
INSTRUCTOR TO APPROVE IT AND GIVE YOU PERMISSION TO LEAVE. STUDENTS
WHO LEAVE WITHOUT INSTRUCTOR APPROVAL WILL BE DOCKED FIVE (5) POINTS.
Literature Cited
For any articles you used to develop this protocol, list citation information here. Parenthetical citations
should be used in the protocol (see example observation). Use the format: Last name of author, First initials.
Year of publication. Title of article. Title of Journal, Volume # : Page-Page.
Example: Swapna, TS. 2003. Salt stress induced changes on enzyme activities during
different development stages of rice (Oryza sativa Linn.). Indian Journal of
Biotechnology, 2:251-258.