Your Name:
Research Advisor:
Research Field:
Expected Semester of Graduation:
Title of My Honors Thesis One Day
Provide a preliminary title for your future honors thesis.
Single Sentence Summaries:
(1) You go home to tell your family or a friend in another field about what you are
doing, but they have a very short attention span, and they do not know the
technical language you know. Write a single sentence describing your research
for them.
(2) You are hanging out with other physics students. Write a single sentence
describing your research for them.
Abstract:
The abstract is a compact 3 to 5 sentence description of your project,
accomplishments, goals, and its importance. Think of this as providing the core
outline of what your prospectus or introduction will describe in more detail.
Prospectus, Summary or Introduction:
1/2 to 1.5 page summary of your research in the font, font size, and margins of
this template. The length should reflect the length of time you have been
engaged in the project. If you are writing your thesis this semester, then think of
this as the first full page of your thesis.
The summary/introduction should describe what you plan to accomplish or study
for your honors thesis. What is the hypothesis you will test or the new
understanding that you will develop during your research? Developing a Grand
Unified Theory of Everything is too broad a goal to express here (although don’t
let me dissuade you!) On the other hand, getting a temperature controller to
work is typically too narrow a goal to express here (although again, temperature
controllers are great, don’t let me dissuade you!)
The first paragraph of the summary should provide scientific context for your
work including references to related work, and clearly explain its importance or
potential impacts on our understanding, technologies, etc. If you do not already
know these things, this is a great excuse to have a conversation with the
graduate student, postdoc or professor with whom you are working. The
references should be numbered [1] or [1-3], and refer to entries in the next
Bibliography section.
Bibliography:
Provide a minimum of 8 references to papers you will read that are related to the
nuts and bolts of your project or that provide context and motivation for you work.
While books can be referenced, at least 6 of the references need to be to journal
articles (PRL, PRA, PRB, Nature, Science, etc.). Again, think of this as a great
way to have a conversation with the graduate student, postdoc, or professor you
are working with about how to further understand what you will be doing and why
it is important. Different fields have different formatting standards. Feel free to
use the format of your field. In some cases, you have been relying on a PhD
thesis to guide your research. You can use the PhD thesis (especially the first
chapter) to help guide you to the important references. I would suggest using
this as an opportunity to open these references and read the first page of each.
Example formatting:
[1] “Title of Article,” J. P. Smith et al, Phys. Rev. Lett. 89 78012 (2013).
[2] “Title of Article,” J. P. Smith, P.Q. Rstuv, Science 101 78012 (2009).
[3]
[4]
[5]
[6]
[7]
[8]
Note that “et al” may be used if the author list exceeds 3 authors.
Timeline:
Provide a minimum of 1 bullet point, maximum of 3, describing what you plan to
accomplish every two weeks this semester. The bullet points do not need to be
complete sentences, but they do need to clearly express your goals.
Real research, unlike problem sets, may not actually have clearly defined goals
that can be accomplished on a set schedule. The point of this timeline is really
for you to spend 10 to 30 minutes thinking about what would constitute
reasonable progress toward your research goals and as a consequence how you
will need to manage your time to make this progress.
If your major activity will be writing at some point, then set goals along the lines
of “first draft of chapters 1 and 2”, “polished thesis provided to research
supervisor for feedback”, ”provide thesis to committee 1 week in advance of
defense”, “defend the thesis”, etc.
By Feb. 6:
 Goal 1
 Goal 2
By Feb. 20:
 Goal 1
 Goal 2
By March 6:
 Goal 1
 Goal 2
By March 20:
 Goal 1
 Goal 2
By April 3:
 Goal 1
 Goal 2
By April 17:
 Goal 1
 Goal 2
By May 1:
 Goal 1
 Goal 2
Lastly, estimate the following by working backward from your defense
date:
month/day/year defend thesis
month/day/year provide polished thesis to committee that incorporates
research advisor’s feedback (>1 week prior to defense)
month/day/year provide initial draft to advisor for feedback
month/day/year start writing your thesis
month/day/year complete your main research activities
month/day/year any crucial milestone that it will be important to plan in
advance to meet