Bio 126: Energy Flow in Biological Systems
Revised 4/28/06
CO2 Lab Report Stylesheet
Due Date: by 5:00 pm on the day
after your lab, May 17-19
Scientific Paper Format:
Your report should be typed or computerprinted, and stapled. All pages should be
numbered (except the Title Page). The
different sections of the lab report should each
be labeled ("Abstract," "Introduction," etc.).
Double-space and leave approximately 1-inch
margins all around, so that we have room to
write comments.
Contents:
- Full lab report
- You must cite at least one primary
literature paper (see Literature
Cited section below). Note that a
web page is not a primary literature
paper.
For general information on the format of a
scientific paper, follow the format given in
Chapter 4 of “A Student Handbook for Writing
in Biology” by Knisely – you should have
already read this chapter for the Alkaline
Phosphatase paper you wrote a few weeks ago.
You should also read through chapters 3, 5, and
6. This stylesheet highlights what we think is
important in writing scientific papers for this
course. Where there is a conflict between
Knisely (2005) and this stylesheet, you
should follow this stylesheet.
Do not hesitate to seek the advice of your
instructor, TA, or the writing tutors at The
Write Place.
Introduction:
Scientists use several types of papers to
communicate with one another in “the
literature” (i.e., published journals and
books). The major mode of written
communication is called a primary paper. It
describes the research performed by the
author(s) – how she/he did the study, what the
results were, and what the author thinks the
results mean. Since articles in scientific
journals are the main method of written
communication among scientists, we feel that
it is important that students in the
introductory biology classes gain skills in
writing papers in this format. This is the type
of paper you will be writing for the CO2 lab.
Another type of paper, which you will find
very useful for getting an overview of an area
of research, is called a review paper. Review
papers are not primary literature; they usually
are an attempt to put together a cohesive story
based on many primary papers. Review
papers are often a good place to find primary
papers you are interested in, since the authors
try to incorporate all of the literature relevant
to a given topic. Senior biology students who
are working on their comps are writing papers
which are much like review papers.
For your written assignment, use the class
data to calculate statistics for your experiment
(as described in the Bio 126 lab manual). You
should use the data from the entire lab section –
these data are on the Excel spreadsheet in the
Collab folder for your lab section. We
encourage you to analyze your results and
discuss their implications with your lab
partners. However, when you get around to
writing your paper, you may not even discuss
an outline of what you will write with another
student in the class. Your paper should be a
solo effort.
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Bio 126 – CO2 Report Stylesheet
experimental question, the methods you used,
your results and your interpretation of the
results. In short, the abstract should summarize
all other sections of the paper – someone
should be able to read just the abstract and
understand what you did, what you found, and
what you think it means.
Meeting with your TA:
You are expected to meet with your TA
during the week after the CO2 lab to discuss
your lab report. Your TA will bring a sign-up
sheet to the CO2 lab during week 6 so you can
sign up for a slot. To this meeting, you
should bring a draft of your lab report. This
meeting will provide an opportunity for you
to ask questions about the format of the lab
report, as well as data analysis and
interpretation issues. To receive full credit
for your rough draft, there should be text in
all sections of the report and at least two
figures.
3) Introduction
Here you should introduce the experiment.
First you should develop a context for the
experiment, introducing the issues that you will
address in the experiment. For example, in the
CO2 experiment, it would be good to say a few
words about rising levels of atmospheric CO2
and introduce the general responses that plants
show (i.e., what other researchers have found in
the past).
In addition, you should give a clear statement
of your experimental question and a rationale
for asking the question (i.e., why the
experimental question is interesting and/or
important). It would be good, too, to include a
brief summary of how you addressed the
experimental question.
Audience for the Report:
Knisely pp. 33-34 & 71
As with the Alkaline Phosphatase paper, the
reader of your paper is a person with an
introductory biology-level of understanding
of biology. Your reader, however, knows
nothing about your experiment – hypotheses,
methods, etc. For example, when you write
your report for the CO2 experiment, your
descriptions should not assume any prior
understanding of how you set up your
experiment. Your reader, however, will know
the basics of photosynthesis and the Calvin
cycle.
4) Materials and Methods
As in the Alkaline Phosphatase report, you
should present the experimental methods
clearly and concisely. In this section, state the
species used (and variety of tomato), how the
experiment was set up, how data were
collected, and how the data were analyzed,
including any statistical tests that were
performed. There should be just enough detail
so that someone else could repeat this
experiment if they read this section. You may
cite the laboratory manual to refer your reader
to a detailed description of the statistical tests
(don't provide any mathematical formulas).
Since you will be reporting on what you have
done, use past tense.
It is important to report the methods for the
entire experiment, not just the data you
personally collected. Though it may seem
artificial for this experiment, report the
Components of the Lab Report:
1) Title Page
This should include a concise and
informative title for your report, your name,
and your lab section. Ideally the title should
provide information about the experimental
question and results. The rest of the report
should begin on the next page.
2) Abstract
This section should be brief (not more than
about 5% of the total length of your paper)
and comprise a single paragraph. It should
concisely summarize the rationale and
purpose of your experiment, statement of the
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Bio 126 – CO2 Report Stylesheet
implications of the results; save that for the
Discussion section that follows.
You will be marked down if the text does
nothing more than tell the reader to look at a
table or figure, as in "The results are
summarized in Table 2." Check Knisely's book
(pp. 38-41) for help with referring to your
figures.
experiment as if you conducted it yourself.
You should not confuse your reader by
mentioning the members of your lab group or
partner, the division of labor while
conducting the experiment, etc., unless you
think the information is of vital importance.
Also, do not present a recipe description of
the methods, such as " first I did this, then I
did this, then I did that, ...". Your goal is to
provide a clear, concise description of the
experiment – a chronological list of events is
usually not necessary.
You should make all of your figures yourself;
it is not acceptable just to make copies of the
same figure for all of the students in a group.
Also, the figures and tables may be placed on
separate pages at the end of the report or
inserted between paragraphs in the text.
Each figure and table should have an
explanatory caption (also called a legend) that
includes: (1) the figure or table number, (2) a
descriptive title for your figure or table, (3) a
description of where the data came from and
(4) a description of the important features of
the data in the figure/table (e.g., how many
trials, what error bars correspond to). A table
caption goes above the table, while a figure
caption goes below the figure. Following the
figure or table number, the title is usually an
incomplete sentence with only the first word
capitalized. Do not put an additional title at the
top of your graph. Study the sample graphs
and tables in Knisely carefully to get a sense of
proper format.
5) Results
The Results section contains a text account
that describes all of the important
experimental results, including the major
trends, patterns, and differences in the data.
In addition, for this lab you should have a
separate bar graph with error bars for each
measurement that shows statistically
significant differences. Though the figures
present results, you must verbally describe all
of the important trends and patterns in your
data.
Also, it is important to describe the results
of the statistical tests (i.e., t-tests), but keep in
mind that statistics are only a tool to see if
patterns or differences are real – focus on the
results and the biology, not on the statistical
results. See the example text below:
“Plants grown in an elevated CO2
environment had significantly more leaves
than plants grown at ambient levels of CO2
(t=3.45, p<0.01, df=8) (Figure 1)."
6) Discussion
Here you tie everything together. It is often
good to start the section by summarizing your
basic findings and evaluating the hypotheses
you set out to test in this experiment. You need
to make clear, logical connections between
experimental question(s), results, and
conclusions. For the CO2 experiment, you
should attempt to explain your results. In
particular, what might be the physiological
basis for your results?
In addition to using your experimental
results, you should bring in other relevant
information to answer the experimental
You should note three things about this
sentence. First, the main trend in the data is
described in the text. Second, the statistical
results are in parentheses, since they just
provide support for the trend. And third, the
reader is referred to a figure showing these
trends on a bar graph.
While you must describe your results in this
section, be careful not to interpret the overall
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Bio 126 – CO2 Report Stylesheet
question. This information could come either
from the laboratory handout or other
references (e.g. your class textbook or a
journal article). For example, in the CO2
experiment, do data from other studies
support your results? When interpreting your
data, keep in mind the limits of your data and
reference material.
Finally, you should discuss the broader
implications of your results. For example,
you may want to discuss why your findings
may be important, and how they might have
implications outside your study. What will
happen to plants in a larger area (for example
in agriculture or in natural communities) if
atmospheric levels of CO2 continue rising?
Also, might your results suggest other
experiments that could be used to further
answer your experimental question?
Citations are parenthetical, and consist of the
author's name followed by the year published.
Parenthetical citations at the end of a sentence
always go before the period for that sentence.
You must cite each kind of information
individually: do not put one citation at the end
of a paragraph in the hopes that this will cover
the whole paragraph. Make it clear exactly
what you are citing; if you are using
information from an outside source in the first
half of a sentence, don't leave the parenthetical
citation until the end of the sentence.
When you cite the lab manual in the text of
your paper, follow the statement with
‘(Hougen-Eitzman, 2006).’ If you cite an idea
or fact from a textbook or journal article,
follow the statement with ‘(lastname, year),’
such as (Raven et al., 2005) or (Watson and
Crick, 1953). If you state some information
given to you by your instructor, follow the
statement with ‘(First Initial. Lastname,
personal communication),’ such as (C. Darwin,
personal communication).
Students often feel compelled to consider
any major problems with their experiment.
However, mistakes or errors in an experiment
are only relevant if they could have altered
the conclusions or interpretation of the
results. Problems that would not have
affected your conclusions should not be
discussed.
You should have a Literature Cited section
for the paper. Since you should cite at least
one primary literature article, at minimum there
will be one complete citation. Other citations
could include your class textbook, the lab
manual, articles referred to in the lab manual,
or even articles you find yourself on the Web of
Science. Remember that you need to cite any
information that you did not create yourself.
The citation(s) should be listed in the
Literature Cited section of your paper in
alphabetical order by author. Follow the
format given in Chapter 4 of Knisely (pages
58-65). If you cite a web page, please include
the date on which you accessed the page, as
shown below:
7) Literature Cited
You are not required to do any an
independent literature search for this report.
However, you should cite at least one primary
literature paper (for example, you could
choose one of the papers cited in the lab
manual, which are available on the Bio 126
lab web page). The most likely location for
your citation is the introduction and/or
discussion sections.
When you write your lab report, you must
give the source for any idea or data that is not
your own (either from your own head or your
own experiment). We will be using the
Name-Year System (see Knisely, pp. 58-65),
which is common to many scientific journals.
[Anonymous]. 2006. CO2 Lab Report Stylesheet.
Biology 126 Lab Web Page.
<https://www.carleton.edu/departments/BIOL/courses/f
acstaffstu_only/bio126/2006%20lab/CO2_report_Style
sheet.pdf> Accessed 2006 April 28.
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Bio 126 – CO2 Report Stylesheet
Revising your Report
After you write your lab report, we
recommend that you read through your draft
carefully and revise it. The helpful staff at
The Write Place is willing to read your draft
and make comments. You should also feel
free to ask advice from your lab instructor or
TA. Rarely can someone write a first draft
that needs no subsequent changes or
improvements. Chapter 5 in Knisely (2005)
contains good advice on how to read and
revise your report. You should also carefully
proofread your paper to find and correct all
spelling and grammatical errors.
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