essay format scientific

Science Essay

Learn How to Write an A+ Science Essay

11 min read

What Is a Science Essay?

A science essay is an academic paper focusing on a scientific topic from physics, chemistry, biology, or any other scientific field.

Science essays are mostly expository. That is, they require you to explain your chosen topic in detail. However, they can also be descriptive and exploratory.

A descriptive science essay aims to describe a certain scientific phenomenon according to established knowledge.

On the other hand, the exploratory science essay requires you to go beyond the current theories and explore new interpretations.

So before you set out to write your essay, always check out the instructions given by your instructor. Whether a science essay is expository or exploratory must be clear from the start. Or, if you face any difficulty, you can take help from a science essay writer as well.

Moreover, check out this video to understand scientific writing in detail.

Now that you know what it is, let's look at the steps you need to take to write a science essay.

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How To Write a Science Essay?

Writing a science essay is not as complex as it may seem. All you need to do is follow the right steps to create an impressive piece of work that meets the assigned criteria.

Here's what you need to do:

Choose Your Topic

A good topic forms the foundation for an engaging and well-written essay. Therefore, you should ensure that you pick something interesting or relevant to your field of study.

To choose a good topic, you can brainstorm ideas relating to the subject matter. You may also find inspiration from other science essays or articles about the same topic.

Conduct Research

Once you have chosen your topic, start researching it thoroughly to develop a strong argument or discussion in your essay.

Make sure you use reliable sources and cite them properly . You should also make notes while conducting your research so that you can reference them easily when writing the essay. Or, you can get expert assistance from an essay writing service to manage your citations.

Create an Outline

A good essay outline helps to organize the ideas in your paper. It serves as a guide throughout the writing process and ensures you don’t miss out on important points.

An outline makes it easier to write a well-structured paper that flows logically. It should be detailed enough to guide you through the entire writing process.

However, your outline should be flexible, and it's sometimes better to change it along the way to improve your structure.

Start Writing

Once you have a good outline, start writing the essay by following your plan.

The first step in writing any essay is to draft it. This means putting your thoughts down on paper in a rough form without worrying about grammar or spelling mistakes.

So begin your essay by introducing the topic, then carefully explain it using evidence and examples to support your argument.

Don't worry if your first draft isn't perfect - it's just the starting point!

Proofread & Edit

After finishing your first draft, take time to proofread and edit it for grammar and spelling mistakes.

Proofreading is the process of checking for grammatical mistakes. It should be done after you have finished writing your essay.

Editing, on the other hand, involves reviewing the structure and organization of your essay and its content. It should be done before you submit your final work.

Both proofreading and editing are essential for producing a high-quality essay. Make sure to give yourself enough time to do them properly!

After revising the essay, you should format it according to the guidelines given by your instructor. This could involve using a specific font size, page margins, or citation style.

Most science essays are written in Times New Roman font with 12-point size and double spacing. The margins should be 1 inch on all sides, and the text should be justified.

In addition, you must cite your sources properly using a recognized citation style such as APA , Chicago , or Harvard . Make sure to follow the guidelines closely so that your essay looks professional.

Following these steps will help you create an informative and well-structured science essay that meets the given criteria.

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How to Structure a Science Essay?

A basic science essay structure includes an introduction, body, and conclusion.

Let's look at each of these briefly.

Introduction

Your essay introduction should introduce your topic and provide a brief overview of what you will discuss in the essay. It should also state your thesis or main argument.

For instance, a thesis statement for a science essay could be,

"The human body is capable of incredible feats, as evidenced by the many athletes who have competed in the Olympic games."

The body of your essay will contain the bulk of your argument or discussion. It should be divided into paragraphs, each discussing a different point.

For instance, imagine you were writing about sports and the human body.

Your first paragraph can discuss the physical capabilities of the human body.

The second paragraph may be about the physical benefits of competing in sports.

Similarly, in the third paragraph, you can present one or two case studies of specific athletes to support your point.

Once you have explained all your points in the body, it’s time to conclude the essay.

Your essay conclusion should summarize the main points of your essay and leave the reader with a sense of closure.

In the conclusion, you reiterate your thesis and sum up your arguments. You can also suggest implications or potential applications of the ideas discussed in the essay.

By following this structure, you will create a well-organized essay.

Check out a few example essays to see this structure in practice.

Science Essay Examples

A great way to get inspired when writing a science essay is to look at other examples of successful essays written by others.

Here are some examples that will give you an idea of how to write your essay.

Science Essay About Genetics - Science Essay Example

Environmental Science Essay Example | PDF Sample

The Science of Nanotechnology

Science, Non-Science, and Pseudo-Science

The Science Of Science Education

Science in our Daily Lives

Short Science Essay Example

Let’s take a look at a short science essay:

Want to read more essay examples? Here, you can find more science essay examples to learn from.

How to Choose the Right Science Essay Topic

Choosing the right science essay topic is a critical first step in crafting a compelling and engaging essay. Here's a concise guide on how to make this decision wisely:

Consider Your Interests: Start by reflecting on your personal interests within the realm of science. Selecting a topic that genuinely fascinates you will make the research and writing process more enjoyable and motivated.
Relevance to the Course: Ensure that your chosen topic aligns with your course or assignment requirements. Read the assignment guidelines carefully to understand the scope and focus expected by your instructor.
Current Trends and Issues: Stay updated with the latest scientific developments and trends. Opting for a topic that addresses contemporary issues not only makes your essay relevant but also demonstrates your awareness of current events in the field.
Narrow Down the Scope: Science is vast, so narrow your topic to a manageable scope. Instead of a broad subject like "Climate Change," consider a more specific angle like "The Impact of Melting Arctic Ice on Global Sea Levels."
Available Resources: Ensure that there are sufficient credible sources and research materials available for your chosen topic. A lack of resources can hinder your research efforts.
Discuss with Your Instructor: If you're uncertain about your topic choice, don't hesitate to consult your instructor or professor. They can provide valuable guidance and may even suggest specific topics based on your academic goals.

Science Essay Topics

Choosing an appropriate topic for a science essay is one of the first steps in writing a successful paper.

Here are a few science essay topics to get you started:

How space exploration affects our daily lives?
How has technology changed our understanding of medicine?
Are there ethical considerations to consider when conducting scientific research?
How does climate change affect the biodiversity of different parts of the world?
How can artificial intelligence be used in medicine?
What impact have vaccines had on global health?
What is the future of renewable energy?
How do we ensure that genetically modified organisms are safe for humans and the environment?
The influence of social media on human behavior: A social science perspective
What are the potential risks and benefits of stem cell therapy?

Important science topics can cover anything from space exploration to chemistry and biology. So you can choose any topic according to your interests!

Need more topics? We have gathered 100+ science essay topics to help you find a great topic!

Continue reading to find some tips to help you write a successful science essay.

Science Essay Writing Tips

Once you have chosen a topic and looked at examples, it's time to start writing the science essay.

Here are some key tips for a successful essay:

Research thoroughly

Make sure you do extensive research before you begin writing your paper. This will ensure that the facts and figures you include are accurate and supported by reliable sources.

Use clear language

Avoid using jargon or overly technical language when writing your essay. Plain language is easier to understand and more engaging for readers.

Referencing

Always provide references for any information you include in your essay. This will demonstrate that you acknowledge other people's work and show that the evidence you use is credible.

Make sure to follow the basic structure of an essay and organize your thoughts into clear sections. This will improve the flow and make your essay easier to read.

Ask someone to proofread

It’s also a good idea to get someone else to proofread your work as they may spot mistakes that you have missed.

These few tips will help ensure that your science essay is well-written and informative!

You've learned the steps to writing a successful science essay and looked at some examples and topics to get you started.

Make sure you thoroughly research, use clear language, structure your thoughts, and proofread your essay. With these tips, you’re sure to write a great science essay!

Do you still need expert help writing a science essay? Our science essay writing service is here to help. With our team of professional writers, you can rest assured that your essay will be written to the highest standards.

Contact our online writing service now to get started!

Also, do not forget to try our essay typer tool for quick and cost-free aid with your essays!

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Betty is a freelance writer and researcher. She has a Masters in literature and enjoys providing writing services to her clients. Betty is an avid reader and loves learning new things. She has provided writing services to clients from all academic levels and related academic fields.

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How to Format a Scientific Paper

#scribendiinc

Written by Joanna Kimmerly-Smith

You've done the research. You've carefully recorded your lab results and compiled a list of relevant sources. You've even written a draft of your scientific, technical, or medical paper, hoping to get published in a reputable journal. But how do you format your paper to ensure that every detail is correct? If you're a scientific researcher or co-author looking to get your research published, read on to find out how to format your paper.

While it's true that you'll eventually need to tailor your research for your target journal, which will provide specific author guidelines for formatting the paper (see, for example, author guidelines for publications by Elsevier , PLOS ONE , and mBio ), there are some formatting rules that are useful to know for your initial draft. This article will explore some of the formatting rules that apply to all scientific writing, helping you to follow the correct order of sections ( IMRaD ), understand the requirements of each section, find resources for standard terminology and units of measurement, and prepare your scientific paper for publication.

Format Overview

The four main elements of a scientific paper can be represented by the acronym IMRaD: introduction, methods, results, and discussion. Other sections, along with a suggested length,* are listed in the table below.

* Length guidelines are taken from https://www.elsevier.com/connect/11-steps-to-structuring-a-science-paper-editors-will-take-seriously#step6 .

Now, let's go through the main sections you might have to prepare to format your paper.

On the first page of the paper, you must present the title of the paper along with the authors' names, institutional affiliations, and contact information. The corresponding author(s) (i.e., the one[s] who will be in contact with the reviewers) must be specified, usually with a footnote or an asterisk (*), and their full contact details (e.g., email address and phone number) must be provided. For example:

Dr. Clara A. Bell 1, * and Dr. Scott C. Smith 2

1 University of Areopagitica, Department of Biology, Sometown, Somecountry

2 Leviathan University, Department of Biochemistry and Biomedical Sciences, Sometown, Somecountry

*[email protected]

FORMATTING TIPS:

If you are unsure of how to classify author roles (i.e., who did what), guidelines are available online. For example, American Geophysical Union (AGU) journals now recommend using Contributor Roles Taxonomy (CRediT), an online taxonomy for author contributions.

In this summary of your research, you must state your subject (i.e., what you did) and encapsulate the main findings and conclusions of your paper.

Do not add citations in an abstract (the reader might not be able to access your reference list).
Avoid using acronyms and abbreviations in the abstract, as the reader may not be familiar with them. Use full terms instead.

Below the abstract, include a list of key terms to help other researchers locate your study. Note that "keywords" is one word (with no space) and is followed by a colon:

Keywords : paper format, scientific writing.

Check whether "Keywords" should be italicized and whether each term should be capitalized.
Check the use of punctuation (e.g., commas versus semicolons, the use of the period at the end).
Some journals (e.g., IEEE ) provide a taxonomy of keywords. This aids in the classification of your research.

Introduction

This is the reader's first impression of your paper, so it should be clear and concise. Include relevant background information on your topic, using in-text citations as necessary. Report new developments in the field, and state how your research fills gaps in the existing research. Focus on the specific problem you are addressing, along with its possible solutions, and outline the limitations of your study. You can also include a research question, hypothesis, and/or objectives at the end of this section.

Organize your information from broad to narrow (general to particular). However, don't start too broad; keep the information relevant.
You can use in-text citations in this section to situate your research within the body of literature.

This is the part of your paper that explains how the research was done. You should relate your research procedures in a clear, logical order (i.e., the order in which you conducted the research) so that other researchers can reproduce your results. Simply refer to the established methods you used, but describe any procedures that are original to your study in more detail.

Identify the specific instruments you used in your research by including the manufacturer’s name and location in parentheses.
Stay consistent with the order in which information is presented (e.g., quantity, temperature, stirring speed, refrigeration period).

Now that you've explained how you gathered your research, you've got to report what you actually found. In this section, outline the main findings of your research. You need not include too many details, particularly if you are using tables and figures. While writing this section, be consistent and use the smallest number of words necessary to convey your statistics.

Use appendices or supplementary materials if you have too much data.
Use headings to help the reader follow along, particularly if your data are repetitive (but check whether your style guide allows you to use them).

In this section, you interpret your findings for the reader in relation to previous research and the literature as a whole. Present your general conclusions, including an assessment of the strengths and weaknesses of the research and the implications of your findings. Resolve the hypothesis and/or research question you identified in the introduction.

Use in-text citations to support your discussion.
Do not repeat the information you presented in the results or the introduction unless it is necessary for a discussion of the overall implications of the research.

This section is sometimes included in the last paragraph of the discussion. Explain how your research fits within your field of study, and identify areas for future research.

Keep this section short.

Acknowledgments

Write a brief paragraph giving credit to any institution responsible for funding the study (e.g., through a fellowship or grant) and any individual(s) who contributed to the manuscript (e.g., technical advisors or editors).

Check whether your journal uses standard identifiers for funding agencies (e.g., Elsevier's Funder Registry ).

Conflicts of Interest/Originality Statement

Some journals require a statement attesting that your research is original and that you have no conflicts of interest (i.e., ulterior motives or ways in which you could benefit from the publication of your research). This section only needs to be a sentence or two long.

Here you list citation information for each source you used (i.e., author names, date of publication, title of paper/chapter, title of journal/book, and publisher name and location). The list of references can be in alphabetical order (author–date style of citation) or in the order in which the sources are presented in the paper (numbered citations). Follow your style guide; if no guidelines are provided, choose a citation format and be consistent .

While doing your final proofread, ensure that the reference list entries are consistent with the in-text citations (i.e., no missing or conflicting information).
Many citation styles use a hanging indent and may be alphabetized. Use the styles in Microsoft Word to aid you in citation format.
Use EndNote , Mendeley , Zotero , RefWorks , or another similar reference manager to create, store, and utilize bibliographic information.

Appendix/Supplementary Information

In this optional section, you can present nonessential information that further clarifies a point without burdening the body of the paper. That is, if you have too much data to fit in a (relatively) short research paper, move anything that's not essential to this section.

Note that this section is uncommon in published papers. Before submission, check whether your journal allows for supplementary data, and don't put any essential information in this section.

Beyond IMRaD: Formatting the Details

Aside from the overall format of your paper, there are still other details to watch out for. The sections below cover how to present your terminology, equations, tables and figures, measurements, and statistics consistently based on the conventions of scientific writing.

Terminology

Stay consistent with the terms you use. Generally, short forms can be used once the full term has been introduced:

full terms versus acronyms (e.g., deoxyribonucleic acid versus DNA);
English names versus Greek letters (e.g., alpha versus α); and
species names versus short forms (e.g., Staphylococcus aureus versus S. aureus ).

One way to ensure consistency is to use standard scientific terminology. You can refer to the following resources, but if you're not sure which guidelines are preferred, check with your target journal.

For gene classification, use GeneCards , The Mouse Genome Informatics Database , and/or genenames.org .
For chemical nomenclature, refer to the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) Compendium of Chemical Terminology (the Gold Book ) and the IUPAC–IUB Combined Commission on Biochemical Nomenclature .
For marine species names, use the World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS) or the European Register of Marine Species (ERMS) .

Italics must be used correctly for scientific terminology. Here are a couple of formatting tips:

Species names, which are usually in Greek or Latin, are italicized (e.g., Staphylococcus aureus ).
Genes are italicized, but proteins aren't.

Whether in mathematical, scientific, or technical papers, equations follow a conventional format. Here are some tips for formatting your calculations:

Number each equation you present in the text, inserting the number in parentheses.

X + Y = 1 (1)

Check whether your target journal requires you to capitalize the word "Equation" or use parentheses for the equation number when you refer to equations within the text.

In Equation 1, X represents . . .

In equation (1), X represents . . .

(Note also that you should use italics for variables.)

Try using MathType or Equation Editor in Microsoft Word to type your equations, but use Unicode characters when typing single variables or mathematical operators (e.g., x, ≥, or ±) in running text. This makes it easier to edit your text and format your equations before publication.
In line with the above tip, remember to save your math equations as editable text and not as images in case changes need to be made before publication.

Tables and Figures

Do you have any tables, graphs, or images in your research? If so, you should become familiar with the rules for referring to tables and figures in your scientific paper. Some examples are presented below.

Capitalize the titles of specific tables and figures when you refer to them in the text (e.g., "see Table 3"; "in Figure 4").
In tables, stay consistent with the use of title case (i.e., Capitalizing Each Word) and sentence case (i.e., Capitalizing the first word).
In figure captions, stay consistent with the use of punctuation, italics, and capitalization. For example:

Figure 1. Classification of author roles.

Figure 2: taxonomy of paper keywords

Measurements

Although every journal has slightly different formatting guidelines, most agree that the gold standard for units of measurement is the International System of Units (SI) . Wherever possible, use the SI. Here are some other tips for formatting units of measurement:

Add spaces before units of measurement. For example, 2.5 mL not 2.5mL.
Be consistent with your units of measure (especially date and time). For example, 3 hours or 3 h.

When presenting statistical information, you must provide enough specific information to accurately describe the relationships among your data. Nothing is more frustrating to a reviewer than vague sentences about a variable being significant without any supporting details. The author guidelines for the journal Nature recommend that the following be included for statistical testing: the name of each statistical analysis, along with its n value; an explanation of why the test was used and what is being compared; and the specific alpha levels and P values for each test.

Angel Borja, writing for Elsevier publications, described the statistical rules for article formatting as follows:

Indicate the statistical tests used with all relevant parameters.
Use mean and standard deviation to report normally distributed data.
Use median and interpercentile range to report skewed data.
For numbers, use two significant digits unless more precision is necessary.
Never use percentages for very small samples.

Remember, you must be prepared to justify your findings and conclusions, and one of the best ways to do this is through factual accuracy and the acknowledgment of opposing interpretations, data, and/or points of view.

Even though you may not look forward to the process of formatting your research paper, it's important to present your findings clearly, consistently, and professionally. With the right paper format, your chances of publication increase, and your research will be more likely to make an impact in your field. Don't underestimate the details. They are the backbone of scientific writing and research.

One last tip: Before you submit your research, consider using our academic editing service for expert help with paper formatting, editing, and proofreading. We can tailor your paper to specific journal guidelines at your request.

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How to successfully write a scientific essay.

Posted by Cody Rhodes

If you are undertaking a course which relates to science, you are more or less apt to write an essay on science. You need to know how to write a science essay irrespective of whether your professor gives you a topic or you come up with one. Additionally, you need to have an end objective in mind. Writing a science essay necessitates that you produce an article which has all the details and facts about the subject matter and it ought to be to the point. Also, you need to know and understand that science essays are more or less different from other types of essays. They require you to be analytical and precise when answering questions. Hence, this can be quite challenging and tiresome. However, that should not deter you from learning how to write your paper. You can always inquire for pre-written research papers for sale from writing services like EssayZoo.

Also, you can read other people’s articles and find out how they produce and develop unique and high-quality papers. Moreover, this will help you understand how to approach your essays in different ways. Nonetheless, if you want to learn how to write a scientific paper in a successful manner, consider the following tips.

How to successfully write a scientific essay

Select a topic for your article Like any other type of essay, you need to have a topic before you start the actual writing process. Your professor or instructor may give you a science essay topic to write about or ask you to come up with yours. When selecting a topic for your paper, ensure that you choose one you can write about. Do not pick a complex topic which can make the writing process boring and infuriating for you. Instead, choose one that you are familiar with. Select a topic you will not struggle gathering information about. Also, you need to have an interest in it. If you are unable to come up with a good topic, trying reading other people’s articles. This will help you develop a topic with ease.

Draft a plan After selecting a topic, the next step is drafting a plan or an outline. An outline is fundamental in writing a scientific essay as it is the foundation on which your paper is built. Additionally, it acts as a road map for your article. Hence, you need to incorporate all the thoughts and ideas you will include in your essay in the outline. You need to know what you will include in the introduction, the body, and the conclusion. Drafting a plan helps you save a lot of time when writing your paper. Also, it helps you to keep track of the primary objective of your article.

Start writing the article After drafting a plan, you can begin the writing process. Writing your paper will be smooth and easier as you have an outline which helps simplify the writing process. When writing your article, begin with a strong hook for your introduction. Dictate the direction your paper will take. Provide some background information and state the issue you will discuss as well as the solutions you have come up with. Arrange the body of your article according to the essay structure you will use to guide you. Also, ensure that you use transitory sentences to show the relationship between the paragraphs of your article. Conclude your essay by summarizing all the key points. Also, highlight the practical potential of our findings and their impacts.

Proofread and check for errors in the paper Before submitting or forwarding your article, it is fundamental that you proofread and correct all the errors that you come across. Delivering a paper that is full of mistakes can affect your overall performance in a negative manner. Thus, it is essential you revise your paper and check for errors. Correct all of them. Ask a friend to proofread your paper. He or she may spot some of the mistakes you did not come across.

In conclusion, writing a scientific essay differs from writing other types of papers. A scientific essay requires you to produce an article which has all the information and facts about the subject matter and it ought to be to the point. Nonetheless, the scientific essay formats similar to the format of any other essay: introduction, body, and conclusion. You need to use your outline to guide you through the writing process. To learn how to write a scientific essay in a successful manner, consider the tips above.

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A Guide to Writing a Scientific Paper: A Focus on High School Through Graduate Level Student Research

Renee a. hesselbach.

1 NIEHS Children's Environmental Health Sciences Core Center, University of Wisconsin—Milwaukee, Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

David H. Petering

2 Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of Wisconsin—Milwaukee, Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

Craig A. Berg

3 Curriculum and Instruction, University of Wisconsin—Milwaukee, Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

Henry Tomasiewicz

Daniel weber.

This article presents a detailed guide for high school through graduate level instructors that leads students to write effective and well-organized scientific papers. Interesting research emerges from the ability to ask questions, define problems, design experiments, analyze and interpret data, and make critical connections. This process is incomplete, unless new results are communicated to others because science fundamentally requires peer review and criticism to validate or discard proposed new knowledge. Thus, a concise and clearly written research paper is a critical step in the scientific process and is important for young researchers as they are mastering how to express scientific concepts and understanding. Moreover, learning to write a research paper provides a tool to improve science literacy as indicated in the National Research Council's National Science Education Standards (1996), and A Framework for K–12 Science Education (2011), the underlying foundation for the Next Generation Science Standards currently being developed. Background information explains the importance of peer review and communicating results, along with details of each critical component, the Abstract, Introduction, Methods, Results , and Discussion . Specific steps essential to helping students write clear and coherent research papers that follow a logical format, use effective communication, and develop scientific inquiry are described.

Introduction

A key part of the scientific process is communication of original results to others so that one's discoveries are passed along to the scientific community and the public for awareness and scrutiny. 1 – 3 Communication to other scientists ensures that new findings become part of a growing body of publicly available knowledge that informs how we understand the world around us. 2 It is also what fuels further research as other scientists incorporate novel findings into their thinking and experiments.

Depending upon the researcher's position, intent, and needs, communication can take different forms. The gold standard is writing scientific papers that describe original research in such a way that other scientists will be able to repeat it or to use it as a basis for their studies. 1 For some, it is expected that such articles will be published in scientific journals after they have been peer reviewed and accepted for publication. Scientists must submit their articles for examination by other scientists familiar with the area of research, who decide whether the work was conducted properly and whether the results add to the knowledge base and are conveyed well enough to merit publication. 2 If a manuscript passes the scrutiny of peer-review, it has the potential to be published. 1 For others, such as for high school or undergraduate students, publishing a research paper may not be the ultimate goal. However, regardless of whether an article is to be submitted for publication, peer review is an important step in this process. For student researchers, writing a well-organized research paper is a key step in learning how to express understanding, make critical connections, summarize data, and effectively communicate results, which are important goals for improving science literacy of the National Research Council's National Science Education Standards, 4 and A Framework for K–12 Science Education, 5 and the Next Generation Science Standards 6 currently being developed and described in The NSTA Reader's Guide to A Framework for K–12 Science Education. 7 Table 1 depicts the key skills students should develop as part of the Science as Inquiry Content Standard. Table 2 illustrates the central goals of A Framework for K–12 Science Education Scientific and Engineering Practices Dimension.

Key Skills of the Science as Inquiry National Science Education Content Standard

National Research Council (1996).

Important Practices of A Framework for K–12 Science Education Scientific and Engineering Practices Dimension

National Research Council (2011).

Scientific papers based on experimentation typically include five predominant sections: Abstract, Introduction, Methods, Results, and Discussion . This structure is a widely accepted approach to writing a research paper, and has specific sections that parallel the scientific method. Following this structure allows the scientist to tell a clear, coherent story in a logical format, essential to effective communication. 1 , 2 In addition, using a standardized format allows the reader to find specific information quickly and easily. While readers may not have time to read the entire research paper, the predictable format allows them to focus on specific sections such as the Abstract , Introduction , and Discussion sections. Therefore, it is critical that information be placed in the appropriate and logical section of the report. 3

Guidelines for Writing a Primary Research Article

The Title sends an important message to the reader about the purpose of the paper. For example, Ethanol Effects on the Developing Zebrafish: Neurobehavior and Skeletal Morphogenesis 8 tells the reader key information about the content of the research paper. Also, an appropriate and descriptive title captures the attention of the reader. When composing the Title , students should include either the aim or conclusion of the research, the subject, and possibly the independent or dependent variables. Often, the title is created after the body of the article has been written, so that it accurately reflects the purpose and content of the article. 1 , 3

The Abstract provides a short, concise summary of the research described in the body of the article and should be able to stand alone. It provides readers with a quick overview that helps them decide whether the article may be interesting to read. Included in the Abstract are the purpose or primary objectives of the experiment and why they are important, a brief description of the methods and approach used, key findings and the significance of the results, and how this work is different from the work of others. It is important to note that the Abstract briefly explains the implications of the findings, but does not evaluate the conclusions. 1 , 3 Just as with the Title , this section needs to be written carefully and succinctly. Often this section is written last to ensure it accurately reflects the content of the paper. Generally, the optimal length of the Abstract is one paragraph between 200 and 300 words, and does not contain references or abbreviations.

All new research can be categorized by field (e.g., biology, chemistry, physics, geology) and by area within the field (e.g., biology: evolution, ecology, cell biology, anatomy, environmental health). Many areas already contain a large volume of published research. The role of the Introduction is to place the new research within the context of previous studies in the particular field and area, thereby introducing the audience to the research and motivating the audience to continue reading. 1

Usually, the writer begins by describing what is known in the area that directly relates to the subject of the article's research. Clearly, this must be done judiciously; usually there is not room to describe every bit of information that is known. Each statement needs one or more references from the scientific literature that supports its validity. Students must be reminded to cite all references to eliminate the risk of plagiarism. 2 Out of this context, the author then explains what is not known and, therefore, what the article's research seeks to find out. In doing so, the scientist provides the rationale for the research and further develops why this research is important. The final statement in the Introduction should be a clearly worded hypothesis or thesis statement, as well as a brief summary of the findings as they relate to the stated hypothesis. Keep in mind that the details of the experimental findings are presented in the Results section and are aimed at filling the void in our knowledge base that has been pointed out in the Introduction .

Materials and Methods

Research utilizes various accepted methods to obtain the results that are to be shared with others in the scientific community. The quality of the results, therefore, depends completely upon the quality of the methods that are employed and the care with which they are applied. The reader will refer to the Methods section: (a) to become confident that the experiments have been properly done, (b) as the guide for repeating the experiments, and (c) to learn how to do new methods.

It is particularly important to keep in mind item (b). Since science deals with the objective properties of the physical and biological world, it is a basic axiom that these properties are independent of the scientist who reported them. Everyone should be able to measure or observe the same properties within error, if they do the same experiment using the same materials and procedures. In science, one does the same experiment by exactly repeating the experiment that has been described in the Methods section. Therefore, someone can only repeat an experiment accurately if all the relevant details of the experimental methods are clearly described. 1 , 3

The following information is important to include under illustrative headings, and is generally presented in narrative form. A detailed list of all the materials used in the experiments and, if important, their source should be described. These include biological agents (e.g., zebrafish, brine shrimp), chemicals and their concentrations (e.g., 0.20 mg/mL nicotine), and physical equipment (e.g., four 10-gallon aquariums, one light timer, one 10-well falcon dish). The reader needs to know as much as necessary about each of the materials; however, it is important not to include extraneous information. For example, consider an experiment involving zebrafish. The type and characteristics of the zebrafish used must be clearly described so another scientist could accurately replicate the experiment, such as 4–6-month-old male and female zebrafish, the type of zebrafish used (e.g., Golden), and where they were obtained (e.g., the NIEHS Children's Environmental Health Sciences Core Center in the WATER Institute of the University of Wisconsin—Milwaukee). In addition to describing the physical set-up of the experiment, it may be helpful to include photographs or diagrams in the report to further illustrate the experimental design.

A thorough description of each procedure done in the reported experiment, and justification as to why a particular method was chosen to most effectively answer the research question should also be included. For example, if the scientist was using zebrafish to study developmental effects of nicotine, the reader needs to know details about how and when the zebrafish were exposed to the nicotine (e.g., maternal exposure, embryo injection of nicotine, exposure of developing embryo to nicotine in the water for a particular length of time during development), duration of the exposure (e.g., a certain concentration for 10 minutes at the two-cell stage, then the embryos were washed), how many were exposed, and why that method was chosen. The reader would also need to know the concentrations to which the zebrafish were exposed, how the scientist observed the effects of the chemical exposure (e.g., microscopic changes in structure, changes in swimming behavior), relevant safety and toxicity concerns, how outcomes were measured, and how the scientist determined whether the data/results were significantly different in experimental and unexposed control animals (statistical methods).

Students must take great care and effort to write a good Methods section because it is an essential component of the effective communication of scientific findings.

The Results section describes in detail the actual experiments that were undertaken in a clear and well-organized narrative. The information found in the Methods section serves as background for understanding these descriptions and does not need to be repeated. For each different experiment, the author may wish to provide a subtitle and, in addition, one or more introductory sentences that explains the reason for doing the experiment. In a sense, this information is an extension of the Introduction in that it makes the argument to the reader why it is important to do the experiment. The Introduction is more general; this text is more specific.

Once the reader understands the focus of the experiment, the writer should restate the hypothesis to be tested or the information sought in the experiment. For example, “Atrazine is routinely used as a crop pesticide. It is important to understand whether it affects organisms that are normally found in soil. We decided to use worms as a test organism because they are important members of the soil community. Because atrazine damages nerve cells, we hypothesized that exposure to atrazine will inhibit the ability of worms to do locomotor activities. In the first experiment, we tested the effect of the chemical on burrowing action.”

Then, the experiments to be done are described and the results entered. In reporting on experimental design, it is important to identify the dependent and independent variables clearly, as well as the controls. The results must be shown in a way that can be reproduced by the reader, but do not include more details than needed for an effective analysis. Generally, meaningful and significant data are gathered together into tables and figures that summarize relevant information, and appropriate statistical analyses are completed based on the data gathered. Besides presenting each of these data sources, the author also provides a written narrative of the contents of the figures and tables, as well as an analysis of the statistical significance. In the narrative, the writer also connects the results to the aims of the experiment as described above. Did the results support the initial hypothesis? Do they provide the information that was sought? Were there problems in the experiment that compromised the results? Be careful not to include an interpretation of the results; that is reserved for the Discussion section.

The writer then moves on to the next experiment. Again, the first paragraph is developed as above, except this experiment is seen in the context of the first experiment. In other words, a story is being developed. So, one commonly refers to the results of the first experiment as part of the basis for undertaking the second experiment. “In the first experiment we observed that atrazine altered burrowing activity. In order to understand how that might occur, we decided to study its impact on the basic biology of locomotion. Our hypothesis was that atrazine affected neuromuscular junctions. So, we did the following experiment..”

The Results section includes a focused critical analysis of each experiment undertaken. A hallmark of the scientist is a deep skepticism about results and conclusions. “Convince me! And then convince me again with even better experiments.” That is the constant challenge. Without this basic attitude of doubt and willingness to criticize one's own work, scientists do not get to the level of concern about experimental methods and results that is needed to ensure that the best experiments are being done and the most reproducible results are being acquired. Thus, it is important for students to state any limitations or weaknesses in their research approach and explain assumptions made upfront in this section so the validity of the research can be assessed.

The Discussion section is the where the author takes an overall view of the work presented in the article. First, the main results from the various experiments are gathered in one place to highlight the significant results so the reader can see how they fit together and successfully test the original hypotheses of the experiment. Logical connections and trends in the data are presented, as are discussions of error and other possible explanations for the findings, including an analysis of whether the experimental design was adequate. Remember, results should not be restated in the Discussion section, except insofar as it is absolutely necessary to make a point.

Second, the task is to help the reader link the present work with the larger body of knowledge that was portrayed in the Introduction . How do the results advance the field, and what are the implications? What does the research results mean? What is the relevance? 1 , 3

Lastly, the author may suggest further work that needs to be done based on the new knowledge gained from the research.

Supporting Documentation and Writing Skills

Tables and figures are included to support the content of the research paper. These provide the reader with a graphic display of information presented. Tables and figures must have illustrative and descriptive titles, legends, interval markers, and axis labels, as appropriate; should be numbered in the order that they appear in the report; and include explanations of any unusual abbreviations.

The final section of the scientific article is the Reference section. When citing sources, it is important to follow an accepted standardized format, such as CSE (Council of Science Editors), APA (American Psychological Association), MLA (Modern Language Association), or CMS (Chicago Manual of Style). References should be listed in alphabetical order and original authors cited. All sources cited in the text must be included in the Reference section. 1

When writing a scientific paper, the importance of writing concisely and accurately to clearly communicate the message should be emphasized to students. 1 – 3 Students should avoid slang and repetition, as well as abbreviations that may not be well known. 1 If an abbreviation must be used, identify the word with the abbreviation in parentheses the first time the term is used. Using appropriate and correct grammar and spelling throughout are essential elements of a well-written report. 1 , 3 Finally, when the article has been organized and formatted properly, students are encouraged to peer review to obtain constructive criticism and then to revise the manuscript appropriately. Good scientific writing, like any kind of writing, is a process that requires careful editing and revision. 1

A key dimension of NRC's A Framework for K–12 Science Education , Scientific and Engineering Practices, and the developing Next Generation Science Standards emphasizes the importance of students being able to ask questions, define problems, design experiments, analyze and interpret data, draw conclusions, and communicate results. 5 , 6 In the Science Education Partnership Award (SEPA) program at the University of Wisconsin—Milwaukee, we found the guidelines presented in this article useful for high school science students because this group of students (and probably most undergraduates) often lack in understanding of, and skills to develop and write, the various components of an effective scientific paper. Students routinely need to focus more on the data collected and analyze what the results indicated in relation to the research question/hypothesis, as well as develop a detailed discussion of what they learned. Consequently, teaching students how to effectively organize and write a research report is a critical component when engaging students in scientific inquiry.

Acknowledgments

This article was supported by a Science Education Partnership Award (SEPA) grant (Award Number R25RR026299) from the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences of the National Institutes of Health. The SEPA program at the University of Wisconsin—Milwaukee is part of the Children's Environmental Health Sciences Core Center, Community Outreach and Education Core, funded by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (Award Number P30ES004184). The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health or the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences.

Disclosure Statement

No competing financial interests exist.

Writing the Scientific Paper

When you write about scientific topics to specialists in a particular scientific field, we call that scientific writing. (When you write to non-specialists about scientific topics, we call that science writing.)

The scientific paper has developed over the past three centuries into a tool to communicate the results of scientific inquiry. The main audience for scientific papers is extremely specialized. The purpose of these papers is twofold: to present information so that it is easy to retrieve, and to present enough information that the reader can duplicate the scientific study. A standard format with six main part helps readers to find expected information and analysis:

Title--subject and what aspect of the subject was studied.
Abstract--summary of paper: The main reason for the study, the primary results, the main conclusions
Introduction-- why the study was undertaken
Methods and Materials-- how the study was undertaken
Results-- what was found
Discussion-- why these results could be significant (what the reasons might be for the patterns found or not found)

There are many ways to approach the writing of a scientific paper, and no one way is right. Many people, however, find that drafting chunks in this order works best: Results, Discussion, Introduction, Materials & Methods, Abstract, and, finally, Title.

The title should be very limited and specific. Really, it should be a pithy summary of the article's main focus.

"Renal disease susceptibility and hypertension are under independent genetic control in the fawn hooded rat"
"Territory size in Lincoln's Sparrows ( Melospiza lincolnii )"
"Replacement of deciduous first premolars and dental eruption in archaeocete whales"
"The Radio-Frequency Single-Electron Transistor (RF-SET): A Fast and Ultrasensitive Electrometer"

This is a summary of your article. Generally between 50-100 words, it should state the goals, results, and the main conclusions of your study. You should list the parameters of your study (when and where was it conducted, if applicable; your sample size; the specific species, proteins, genes, etc., studied). Think of the process of writing the abstract as taking one or two sentences from each of your sections (an introductory sentence, a sentence stating the specific question addressed, a sentence listing your main techniques or procedures, two or three sentences describing your results, and one sentence describing your main conclusion).

Example One

Hypertension, diabetes and hyperlipidemia are risk factors for life-threatening complications such as end-stage renal disease, coronary artery disease and stroke. Why some patients develop complications is unclear, but only susceptibility genes may be involved. To test this notion, we studied crosses involving the fawn-hooded rat, an animal model of hypertension that develops chronic renal failure. Here, we report the localization of two genes, Rf-1 and Rf-2 , responsible for about half of the genetic variation in key indices of renal impairment. In addition, we localize a gene, Bpfh-1 , responsible for about 26% of the genetic variation in blood pressure. Rf-1 strongly affects the risk of renal impairment, but has no significant effect on blood pressure. Our results show that susceptibility to a complication of hypertension is under at least partially independent genetic control from susceptibility to hypertension itself.

Brown, Donna M, A.P. Provoost, M.J. Daly, E.S. Lander, & H.J. Jacob. 1996. "Renal disease susceptibility and hypertension are under indpendent genetic control in the faun-hooded rat." Nature Genetics , 12(1):44-51.

Example Two

We studied survival of 220 calves of radiocollared moose ( Alces alces ) from parturition to the end of July in southcentral Alaska from 1994 to 1997. Prior studies established that predation by brown bears ( Ursus arctos ) was the primary cause of mortality of moose calves in the region. Our objectives were to characterize vulnerability of moose calves to predation as influenced by age, date, snow depths, and previous reproductive success of the mother. We also tested the hypothesis that survival of twin moose calves was independent and identical to that of single calves. Survival of moose calves from parturition through July was 0.27 ± 0.03 SE, and their daily rate of mortality declined at a near constant rate with age in that period. Mean annual survival was 0.22 ± 0.03 SE. Previous winter's snow depths or survival of the mother's previous calf was not related to neonatal survival. Selection for early parturition was evidenced in the 4 years of study by a 6.3% increase in the hazard of death with each daily increase in parturition date. Although there was no significant difference in survival of twin and single moose calves, most twins that died disappeared together during the first 15 days after birth and independently thereafter, suggesting that predators usually killed both when encountered up to that age.

Key words: Alaska, Alces alces , calf survival, moose, Nelchina, parturition synchrony, predation

Testa, J.W., E.F. Becker, & G.R. Lee. 2000. "Temporal patterns in the survival of twin and single moose ( alces alces ) calves in southcentral Alaska." Journal of Mammalogy , 81(1):162-168.

Example Three

We monitored breeding phenology and population levels of Rana yavapaiensis by use of repeated egg mass censuses and visual encounter surveys at Agua Caliente Canyon near Tucson, Arizona, from 1994 to 1996. Adult counts fluctuated erratically within each year of the study but annual means remained similar. Juvenile counts peaked during the fall recruitment season and fell to near zero by early spring. Rana yavapaiensis deposited eggs in two distinct annual episodes, one in spring (March-May) and a much smaller one in fall (September-October). Larvae from the spring deposition period completed metamorphosis in earlv summer. Over the two years of study, 96.6% of egg masses successfully produced larvae. Egg masses were deposited during periods of predictable, moderate stream flow, but not during seasonal periods when flash flooding or drought were likely to affect eggs or larvae. Breeding phenology of Rana yavapaiensis is particularly well suited for life in desert streams with natural flow regimes which include frequent flash flooding and drought at predictable times. The exotic predators of R. yavapaiensis are less able to cope with fluctuating conditions. Unaltered stream flow regimes that allow natural fluctuations in stream discharge may provide refugia for this declining ranid frog from exotic predators by excluding those exotic species that are unable to cope with brief flash flooding and habitat drying.

Sartorius, Shawn S., and Philip C. Rosen. 2000. "Breeding phenology of the lowland leopard frog ( Rana yavepaiensis )." Southwestern Naturalist , 45(3): 267-273.

Introduction

The introduction is where you sketch out the background of your study, including why you have investigated the question that you have and how it relates to earlier research that has been done in the field. It may help to think of an introduction as a telescoping focus, where you begin with the broader context and gradually narrow to the specific problem addressed by the report. A typical (and very useful) construction of an introduction proceeds as follows:

"Echimyid rodents of the genus Proechimys (spiny rats) often are the most abundant and widespread lowland forest rodents throughout much of their range in the Neotropics (Eisenberg 1989). Recent studies suggested that these rodents play an important role in forest dynamics through their activities as seed predators and dispersers of seeds (Adler and Kestrell 1998; Asquith et al 1997; Forget 1991; Hoch and Adler 1997)." (Lambert and Adler, p. 70)

"Our laboratory has been involved in the analysis of the HLA class II genes and their association with autoimmune disorders such as insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus. As part of this work, the laboratory handles a large number of blood samples. In an effort to minimize the expense and urgency of transportation of frozen or liquid blood samples, we have designed a protocol that will preserve the integrity of lymphocyte DNA and enable the transport and storage of samples at ambient temperatures." (Torrance, MacLeod & Hache, p. 64)

"Despite the ubiquity and abundance of P. semispinosus , only two previous studies have assessed habitat use, with both showing a generalized habitat use. [brief summary of these studies]." (Lambert and Adler, p. 70)

"Although very good results have been obtained using polymerase chain reaction (PCR) amplification of DNA extracted from dried blood spots on filter paper (1,4,5,8,9), this preservation method yields limited amounts of DNA and is susceptible to contamination." (Torrance, MacLeod & Hache, p. 64)

"No attempt has been made to quantitatively describe microhabitat characteristics with which this species may be associated. Thus, specific structural features of secondary forests that may promote abundance of spiny rats remains unknown. Such information is essential to understand the role of spiny rats in Neotropical forests, particularly with regard to forest regeneration via interactions with seeds." (Lambert and Adler, p. 71)

"As an alternative, we have been investigating the use of lyophilization ("freeze-drying") of whole blood as a method to preserve sufficient amounts of genomic DNA to perform PCR and Southern Blot analysis." (Torrance, MacLeod & Hache, p. 64)

"We present an analysis of microhabitat use by P. semispinosus in tropical moist forests in central Panama." (Lambert and Adler, p. 71)

"In this report, we summarize our analysis of genomic DNA extracted from lyophilized whole blood." (Torrance, MacLeod & Hache, p. 64)

Methods and Materials

In this section you describe how you performed your study. You need to provide enough information here for the reader to duplicate your experiment. However, be reasonable about who the reader is. Assume that he or she is someone familiar with the basic practices of your field.

It's helpful to both writer and reader to organize this section chronologically: that is, describe each procedure in the order it was performed. For example, DNA-extraction, purification, amplification, assay, detection. Or, study area, study population, sampling technique, variables studied, analysis method.

Include in this section:

study design: procedures should be listed and described, or the reader should be referred to papers that have already described the used procedure
particular techniques used and why, if relevant
modifications of any techniques; be sure to describe the modification
specialized equipment, including brand-names
temporal, spatial, and historical description of study area and studied population
assumptions underlying the study
statistical methods, including software programs

Example description of activity

Chromosomal DNA was denatured for the first cycle by incubating the slides in 70% deionized formamide; 2x standard saline citrate (SSC) at 70ºC for 2 min, followed by 70% ethanol at -20ºC and then 90% and 100% ethanol at room temperature, followed by air drying. (Rouwendal et al ., p. 79)

Example description of assumptions

We considered seeds left in the petri dish to be unharvested and those scattered singly on the surface of a tile to be scattered and also unharvested. We considered seeds in cheek pouches to be harvested but not cached, those stored in the nestbox to be larderhoarded, and those buried in caching sites within the arena to be scatterhoarded. (Krupa and Geluso, p. 99)

Examples of use of specialized equipment

Oligonucleotide primers were prepared using the Applied Biosystems Model 318A (Foster City, CA) DNA Synthesizer according to the manufacturers' instructions. (Rouwendal et al ., p.78)
We first visually reviewed the complete song sample of an individual using spectrograms produced on a Princeton Applied Research Real Time Spectrum Analyzer (model 4512). (Peters et al ., p. 937)

Example of use of a certain technique

Frogs were monitored using visual encounter transects (Crump and Scott, 1994). (Sartorius and Rosen, p. 269)

Example description of statistical analysis

We used Wilcox rank-sum tests for all comparisons of pre-experimental scores and for all comparisons of hue, saturation, and brightness scores between various groups of birds ... All P -values are two-tailed unless otherwise noted. (Brawner et al ., p. 955)

This section presents the facts--what was found in the course of this investigation. Detailed data--measurements, counts, percentages, patterns--usually appear in tables, figures, and graphs, and the text of the section draws attention to the key data and relationships among data. Three rules of thumb will help you with this section:

present results clearly and logically
avoid excess verbiage
consider providing a one-sentence summary at the beginning of each paragraph if you think it will help your reader understand your data

Remember to use table and figures effectively. But don't expect these to stand alone.

Some examples of well-organized and easy-to-follow results:

Size of the aquatic habitat at Agua Caliente Canyon varied dramatically throughout the year. The site contained three rockbound tinajas (bedrock pools) that did not dry during this study. During periods of high stream discharge seven more seasonal pools and intermittent stretches of riffle became available. Perennial and seasonal pool levels remained stable from late February through early May. Between mid-May and mid-July seasonal pools dried until they disappeared. Perennial pools shrank in surface area from a range of 30-60 m² to 3-5- M². (Sartorius and Rosen, Sept. 2000: 269)

Notice how the second sample points out what is important in the accompanying figure. It makes us aware of relationships that we may not have noticed quickly otherwise and that will be important to the discussion.

A similar test result is obtained with a primer derived from the human ß-satellite... This primer (AGTGCAGAGATATGTCACAATG-CCCC: Oligo 435) labels 6 sites in the PRINS reaction: the chromosomes 1, one pair of acrocentrics and, more weakly, the chromosomes 9 (Fig. 2a). After 10 cycles of PCR-IS, the number of sites labeled has doubled (Fig. 2b); after 20 cycles, the number of sites labeled is the same but the signals are stronger (Fig. 2c) (Rouwendal et al ., July 93:80).

Related Information: Use Tables and Figures Effectively

Do not repeat all of the information in the text that appears in a table, but do summarize it. For example, if you present a table of temperature measurements taken at various times, describe the general pattern of temperature change and refer to the table.

"The temperature of the solution increased rapidly at first, going from 50º to 80º in the first three minutes (Table 1)."

You don't want to list every single measurement in the text ("After one minute, the temperature had risen to 55º. After two minutes, it had risen to 58º," etc.). There is no hard and fast rule about when to report all measurements in the text and when to put the measurements in a table and refer to them, but use your common sense. Remember that readers have all that data in the accompanying tables and figures, so your task in this section is to highlight key data, changes, or relationships.

In this section you discuss your results. What aspect you choose to focus on depends on your results and on the main questions addressed by them. For example, if you were testing a new technique, you will want to discuss how useful this technique is: how well did it work, what are the benefits and drawbacks, etc. If you are presenting data that appear to refute or support earlier research, you will want to analyze both your own data and the earlier data--what conditions are different? how much difference is due to a change in the study design, and how much to a new property in the study subject? You may discuss the implication of your research--particularly if it has a direct bearing on a practical issue, such as conservation or public health.

This section centers on speculation . However, this does not free you to present wild and haphazard guesses. Focus your discussion around a particular question or hypothesis. Use subheadings to organize your thoughts, if necessary.

This section depends on a logical organization so readers can see the connection between your study question and your results. One typical approach is to make a list of all the ideas that you will discuss and to work out the logical relationships between them--what idea is most important? or, what point is most clearly made by your data? what ideas are subordinate to the main idea? what are the connections between ideas?

Achieving the Scientific Voice

Eight tips will help you match your style for most scientific publications.

Develop a precise vocabulary: read the literature to become fluent, or at least familiar with, the sort of language that is standard to describe what you're trying to describe.
Once you've labeled an activity, a condition, or a period of time, use that label consistently throughout the paper. Consistency is more important than creativity.
Define your terms and your assumptions.
Include all the information the reader needs to interpret your data.
Remember, the key to all scientific discourse is that it be reproducible . Have you presented enough information clearly enough that the reader could reproduce your experiment, your research, or your investigation?
When describing an activity, break it down into elements that can be described and labeled, and then present them in the order they occurred.
When you use numbers, use them effectively. Don't present them so that they cause more work for the reader.
Include details before conclusions, but only include those details you have been able to observe by the methods you have described. Do not include your feelings, attitudes, impressions, or opinions.
Research your format and citations: do these match what have been used in current relevant journals?
Run a spellcheck and proofread carefully. Read your paper out loud, and/ or have a friend look over it for misspelled words, missing words, etc.

Applying the Principles, Example 1

The following example needs more precise information. Look at the original and revised paragraphs to see how revising with these guidelines in mind can make the text clearer and more informative:

Before: Each male sang a definite number of songs while singing. They start with a whistle and then go from there. Each new song is always different, but made up an overall repertoire that was completed before starting over again. In 16 cases (84%), no new songs were sung after the first 20, even though we counted about 44 songs for each bird.

After: Each male used a discrete number of song types in his singing. Each song began with an introductory whistle, followed by a distinctive, complex series of fluty warbles (Fig. 1). Successive songs were always different, and five of the 19 males presented their entire song repertoire before repeating any of their song types (i.e., the first IO recorded songs revealed the entire repertoire of 10 song types). Each song type recurred in long sequences of singing, so that we could be confident that we had recorded the entire repertoire of commonly used songs by each male. For 16 of the 19 males, no new song types were encountered after the first 20 songs, even though we analyzed and average of 44 songs/male (range 30-59).

Applying the Principles, Example 2

In this set of examples, even a few changes in wording result in a more precise second version. Look at the original and revised paragraphs to see how revising with these guidelines in mind can make the text clearer and more informative:

Before: The study area was on Mt. Cain and Maquilla Peak in British Columbia, Canada. The study area is about 12,000 ha of coastal montane forest. The area is both managed and unmanaged and ranges from 600-1650m. The most common trees present are mountain hemlock ( Tsuga mertensiana ), western hemlock ( Tsuga heterophylla ), yellow cedar ( Chamaecyparis nootkatensis ), and amabilis fir ( Abies amabilis ).

After: The study took place on Mt. Cain and Maquilla Peak (50'1 3'N, 126'1 8'W), Vancouver Island, British Columbia. The study area encompassed 11,800 ha of coastal montane forest. The landscape consisted of managed and unmanaged stands of coastal montane forest, 600-1650 m in elevation. The dominant tree species included mountain hemlock ( Tsuga mertensiana ), western hemlock ( Tsuga heterophylla ), yellow cedar ( Chamaecyparis nootkatensis ), and amabilis fir ( Abies amabilis ).

Two Tips for Sentence Clarity

Although you will want to consider more detailed stylistic revisions as you become more comfortable with scientific writing, two tips can get you started:

First, the verb should follow the subject as soon as possible.

Really Hard to Read : "The smallest of the URF's (URFA6L), a 207-nucleotide (nt) reading frame overlapping out of phase the NH2- terminal portion of the adenosinetriphosphatase (ATPase) subunit 6 gene has been identified as the animal equivalent of the recently discovered yeast H+-ATPase subunit gene."

Less Hard to Read : "The smallest of the UR-F's is URFA6L, a 207-nucleotide (nt) reading frame overlapping out of phase the NH2-terminal portion of the adenosinetriphosphatase (ATPase) subunit 6 gene; it has been identified as the animal equivalent of the recently discovered yeast H+-ATPase subunit 8 gene."

Second, place familiar information first in a clause, a sentence, or a paragraph, and put the new and unfamiliar information later.

More confusing : The epidermis, the dermis, and the subcutaneous layer are the three layers of the skin. A layer of dead skin cells makes up the epidermis, which forms the body's shield against the world. Blood vessels, carrying nourishment, and nerve endings, which relay information about the outside world, are found in the dermis. Sweat glands and fat cells make up the third layer, the subcutaneous layer.

Less confusing : The skin consists of three layers: the epidermis, the dermis, and the subcutaneous layer. The epidermis is made up of dead skin cells, and forms a protective shield between the body and the world. The dermis contains the blood vessels and nerve endings that nourish the skin and make it receptive to outside stimuli. The subcutaneous layer contains the sweat glands and fat cells which perform other functions of the skin.

Bibliography

Scientific Writing for Graduate Students . F. P. Woodford. Bethesda, MD: Council of Biology Editors, 1968. [A manual on the teaching of writing to graduate students--very clear and direct.]
Scientific Style and Format . Council of Biology Editors. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994.
"The science of scientific writing." George Gopen and Judith Swann. The American Scientist , Vol. 78, Nov.-Dec. 1990. Pp 550-558.
"What's right about scientific writing." Alan Gross and Joseph Harmon. The Scientist , Dec. 6 1999. Pp. 20-21.
"A Quick Fix for Figure Legends and Table Headings." Donald Kroodsma. The Auk , 117 (4): 1081-1083, 2000.

Wortman-Wunder, Emily, & Kate Kiefer. (1998). Writing the Scientific Paper. Writing@CSU . Colorado State University. https://writing.colostate.edu/resources/writing/guides/.

How to Write a Scientific Essay

When writing any essay it’s important to always keep the end goal in mind. You want to produce a document that is detailed, factual, about the subject matter and most importantly to the point.

Writing scientific essays will always be slightly different to when you write an essay for say English Literature . You need to be more analytical and precise when answering your questions. To help achieve this, you need to keep three golden rules in mind.

Analysing the question, so that you know exactly what you have to do

Planning your answer

Writing the essay

Now, let’s look at these steps in more detail to help you fully understand how to apply the three golden rules.

Analysing the question

Start by looking at the instruction. Essays need to be written out in continuous prose. You shouldn’t be using bullet points or writing in note form.
If it helps to make a particular point, however, you can use a diagram providing it is relevant and adequately explained.
Look at the topic you are required to write about. The wording of the essay title tells you what you should confine your answer to – there is no place for interesting facts about other areas.

The next step is to plan your answer. What we are going to try to do is show you how to produce an effective plan in a very short time. You need a framework to show your knowledge otherwise it is too easy to concentrate on only a few aspects.

For example, when writing an essay on biology we can divide the topic up in a number of different ways. So, if you have to answer a question like ‘Outline the main properties of life and system reproduction’

The steps for planning are simple. Firstly, define the main terms within the question that need to be addressed. Then list the properties asked for and lastly, roughly assess how many words of your word count you are going to allocate to each term.

Writing the Essay

The final step (you’re almost there), now you have your plan in place for the essay, it’s time to get it all down in black and white. Follow your plan for answering the question, making sure you stick to the word count, check your spelling and grammar and give credit where credit’s (always reference your sources).

How Tutors Breakdown Essays

An exceptional essay

reflects the detail that could be expected from a comprehensive knowledge and understanding of relevant parts of the specification
is free from fundamental errors
maintains appropriate depth and accuracy throughout
includes two or more paragraphs of material that indicates greater depth or breadth of study

A good essay

An average essay

contains a significant amount of material that reflects the detail that could be expected from a knowledge and understanding of relevant parts of the specification.

In practice this will amount to about half the essay.

is likely to reflect limited knowledge of some areas and to be patchy in quality
demonstrates a good understanding of basic principles with some errors and evidence of misunderstanding

A poor essay

contains much material which is below the level expected of a candidate who has completed the course
Contains fundamental errors reflecting a poor grasp of basic principles and concepts

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Scientific Writing

Thinking and writing like a scientist, writing clearly, citation help.

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For more information on writing your scientific papers, here are some good resources:

http://writingcenter.unc.edu/handouts/scientific-reports/

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1559667/

The Scientific Method

When writing or reading about science, it is useful to keep the scientific method in mind. The scientific method is used as a model to construct writing that can be shared with others in a logical and informative way. Any piece of scientific writing is informative and persuasive: informative because the author is telling the audience how he or she conducted their research and what new information they learned, and persuasive because science papers demonstrate how that new information was obtained and what conclusions can be drawn from the data collected. The format of most journal articles follows the steps of the scientific method, with Introduction, Methods, and Results sections at a minimum.

Evidence and Argumentation

Science writing has a persuasive element to it. Researchers need to convince others that they have done their experiments properly and that they have answered their central research questions. Therefore, all science papers, even theoretical ones, make use of evidence to support their points. Remember that statistical measures, while extremely useful, are not the only source of evidence. Observations of even a single event can be useful in the right context. Remember to use logic to link your evidence and claims together!

Tips for writing a persuasive paper: http://www.facstaff.bucknell.edu/awolaver/term1.htm

Relating evidence and ideas: http://undsci.berkeley.edu/article/coreofscience_01

Clarity and Reader Expectations

Many people complain that scientific literature is difficult to understand because of the complicated language and the use of jargon. However, scientific literature can be difficult to understand even if one is familiar with the concepts being discussed.

To avoid confusing the reader, writers should focus on writing clearly and keeping the reader’s expectations in mind. In a scientific paper, it is important that most readers will agree with the information being presented. Writing in a clear and concise way helps the writer accomplish this. Use the paper as a story-telling medium. Concentrate on showing the reader that your experiments show definite conclusion, and how this contribution changes the state of knowledge in the field.

Gopen and Swan (1990) offer the following seven easy ways to make your writing more clear and to say what you want the reader to hear.

Follow a grammatical subject as soon as possible with its verb.
Place in the stress position the "new information" you want the reader to emphasize.
Place the person or thing whose "story" a sentence is telling at the beginning of the sentence, in the topic position.
Place appropriate "old information" (material already stated in the discourse) in the topic position for linkage backward and contextualization forward.
Articulate the action of every clause or sentence in its verb.
In general, provide context for your reader before asking that reader to consider anything new.
In general, try to ensure that the relative emphases of the substance coincide with the relative expectations for emphasis raised by the structure.

[Gopen, G. and Swan, J. 1990. The Science of Scientific Writing. American Scientist. Available here: https://www.americanscientist.org/blog/the-long-view/the-science-of-scientific-writing ]

One major problem many students have when they start writing papers is using so called “running jumps.” This is the placement of unnecessary words at the beginning of a sentence. For example:

RUNNING JUMP: According to the researchers, the control group showed more change in chlorophyll production (Smith et. al., 2014).

NO RUNNING JUMP: The control group showed more change in chlorophyll production (Smith et. al., 2014).

We’ve already cited a study, so it’s clear that we are referring to researchers and their findings. So the first part of the sentence is unnecessary.

Try to limit the number of ideas expressed in a single sentence. If a sentence seems like it is trying to say more than two things at once, split it into two sentences. If a sentence is long and tangled and just doesn't make sense, don't try to perform "surgery" to fix the sentence. Instead, "kill" the sentence and start over, using short, direct sentences to express what you mean.

If you can make a noun phrase into a verb, do it! For example, made note of = noted, provided a similar opinion = agreed with, conducted an experiment = experimented, etc.

Avoid the Passive Voice Where You Can

If a sentence is written in the passive voice, the subject of the sentence (person/thing doing the action) does not come first; rather, the object of the sentence (person/thing not doing the action) is the first noun in the sentence.

PASSIVE: Radiation was the mechanism by which the samples were sterilized.

MORE ACTIVE: The samples were sterilized using radiation.

ACTIVE: We sterilized the samples using radiation.

Professors (and scientific journals) have differing opinions on the use of passive voice. Some consider it unacceptable, but many are more lenient. And in fact, often it will make more sense to write in the passive voice in certain sections (i.e. Methods) and when you can't use first-person pronouns like "I." In any case, reducing overuse of passive voice in your writing makes it more concise and easier to understand.

Here's a useful link for clear scientific writing style: http://www.nature.com/scitable/topicpage/effective-writing-13815989

Posters are often used as an accompaniment to a talk or presentation, or as a substitute. You’ve probably seen posters hanging up around campus, showcasing students' research. The idea of a poster is to simplify a study and present it in a visual way, so it can be understood by a wide audience. The most important thing to remember when designing a poster (or completing any kind of published work) is to follow the guidelines given. If your instructor, or the conference you’re presenting at, wants a certain format, adhere to that format. These three rules are especially important to follow:

Shorter is better: make sure that your poster does not contain too much text! Packing text onto the poster makes it difficult to read and understand.
Bigger is better. No, this is not a contradiction of rule 1! Make sure your text is large enough to read, and readable against the background of the poster.
Use images. The key aspect of a poster is that it is a visual medium. Include graphs, photos, and illustrations of your work.

Here are some excellent tips and templates for research posters:

1. http://colinpurrington.com/tips/academic/posterdesign

2. http://www.waspacegrant.org

3. http://www.personal.psu.edu/drs18/postershow/ : Poster tips from Penn State

Most scientific citation styles are based on APA format. It’s totally okay to use a resource to look up how to format a paper in APA style! As you become more familiar with the format, you will become less reliant on these resources, but for now, here are some sites that may be useful .

Our APA guide

APA Style Official Website

Last Updated: Jul 21, 2021 3:01 PM
URL: https://research.ewu.edu/writers_center_sci_writing

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13.1 Formatting a Research Paper

Learning objectives.

Identify the major components of a research paper written using American Psychological Association (APA) style.
Apply general APA style and formatting conventions in a research paper.

In this chapter, you will learn how to use APA style , the documentation and formatting style followed by the American Psychological Association, as well as MLA style , from the Modern Language Association. There are a few major formatting styles used in academic texts, including AMA, Chicago, and Turabian:

AMA (American Medical Association) for medicine, health, and biological sciences
APA (American Psychological Association) for education, psychology, and the social sciences
Chicago—a common style used in everyday publications like magazines, newspapers, and books
MLA (Modern Language Association) for English, literature, arts, and humanities
Turabian—another common style designed for its universal application across all subjects and disciplines

While all the formatting and citation styles have their own use and applications, in this chapter we focus our attention on the two styles you are most likely to use in your academic studies: APA and MLA.

If you find that the rules of proper source documentation are difficult to keep straight, you are not alone. Writing a good research paper is, in and of itself, a major intellectual challenge. Having to follow detailed citation and formatting guidelines as well may seem like just one more task to add to an already-too-long list of requirements.

Following these guidelines, however, serves several important purposes. First, it signals to your readers that your paper should be taken seriously as a student’s contribution to a given academic or professional field; it is the literary equivalent of wearing a tailored suit to a job interview. Second, it shows that you respect other people’s work enough to give them proper credit for it. Finally, it helps your reader find additional materials if he or she wishes to learn more about your topic.

Furthermore, producing a letter-perfect APA-style paper need not be burdensome. Yes, it requires careful attention to detail. However, you can simplify the process if you keep these broad guidelines in mind:

Work ahead whenever you can. Chapter 11 “Writing from Research: What Will I Learn?” includes tips for keeping track of your sources early in the research process, which will save time later on.
Get it right the first time. Apply APA guidelines as you write, so you will not have much to correct during the editing stage. Again, putting in a little extra time early on can save time later.
Use the resources available to you. In addition to the guidelines provided in this chapter, you may wish to consult the APA website at http://www.apa.org or the Purdue University Online Writing lab at http://owl.english.purdue.edu , which regularly updates its online style guidelines.

General Formatting Guidelines

This chapter provides detailed guidelines for using the citation and formatting conventions developed by the American Psychological Association, or APA. Writers in disciplines as diverse as astrophysics, biology, psychology, and education follow APA style. The major components of a paper written in APA style are listed in the following box.

These are the major components of an APA-style paper:

Body, which includes the following:

Headings and, if necessary, subheadings to organize the content
In-text citations of research sources
References page

All these components must be saved in one document, not as separate documents.

The title page of your paper includes the following information:

Title of the paper
Author’s name
Name of the institution with which the author is affiliated
Header at the top of the page with the paper title (in capital letters) and the page number (If the title is lengthy, you may use a shortened form of it in the header.)

List the first three elements in the order given in the previous list, centered about one third of the way down from the top of the page. Use the headers and footers tool of your word-processing program to add the header, with the title text at the left and the page number in the upper-right corner. Your title page should look like the following example.

Beyond the Hype: Evaluating Low-Carb Diets cover page

The next page of your paper provides an abstract , or brief summary of your findings. An abstract does not need to be provided in every paper, but an abstract should be used in papers that include a hypothesis. A good abstract is concise—about one hundred fifty to two hundred fifty words—and is written in an objective, impersonal style. Your writing voice will not be as apparent here as in the body of your paper. When writing the abstract, take a just-the-facts approach, and summarize your research question and your findings in a few sentences.

In Chapter 12 “Writing a Research Paper” , you read a paper written by a student named Jorge, who researched the effectiveness of low-carbohydrate diets. Read Jorge’s abstract. Note how it sums up the major ideas in his paper without going into excessive detail.

Write an abstract summarizing your paper. Briefly introduce the topic, state your findings, and sum up what conclusions you can draw from your research. Use the word count feature of your word-processing program to make sure your abstract does not exceed one hundred fifty words.

Depending on your field of study, you may sometimes write research papers that present extensive primary research, such as your own experiment or survey. In your abstract, summarize your research question and your findings, and briefly indicate how your study relates to prior research in the field.

Margins, Pagination, and Headings

APA style requirements also address specific formatting concerns, such as margins, pagination, and heading styles, within the body of the paper. Review the following APA guidelines.

Use these general guidelines to format the paper:

Set the top, bottom, and side margins of your paper at 1 inch.
Use double-spaced text throughout your paper.
Use a standard font, such as Times New Roman or Arial, in a legible size (10- to 12-point).
Use continuous pagination throughout the paper, including the title page and the references section. Page numbers appear flush right within your header.
Section headings and subsection headings within the body of your paper use different types of formatting depending on the level of information you are presenting. Additional details from Jorge’s paper are provided.

Begin formatting the final draft of your paper according to APA guidelines. You may work with an existing document or set up a new document if you choose. Include the following:

Your title page
The abstract you created in Note 13.8 “Exercise 1”
Correct headers and page numbers for your title page and abstract

APA style uses section headings to organize information, making it easy for the reader to follow the writer’s train of thought and to know immediately what major topics are covered. Depending on the length and complexity of the paper, its major sections may also be divided into subsections, sub-subsections, and so on. These smaller sections, in turn, use different heading styles to indicate different levels of information. In essence, you are using headings to create a hierarchy of information.

The following heading styles used in APA formatting are listed in order of greatest to least importance:

Section headings use centered, boldface type. Headings use title case, with important words in the heading capitalized.
Subsection headings use left-aligned, boldface type. Headings use title case.
The third level uses left-aligned, indented, boldface type. Headings use a capital letter only for the first word, and they end in a period.
The fourth level follows the same style used for the previous level, but the headings are boldfaced and italicized.
The fifth level follows the same style used for the previous level, but the headings are italicized and not boldfaced.

Visually, the hierarchy of information is organized as indicated in Table 13.1 “Section Headings” .

Table 13.1 Section Headings

A college research paper may not use all the heading levels shown in Table 13.1 “Section Headings” , but you are likely to encounter them in academic journal articles that use APA style. For a brief paper, you may find that level 1 headings suffice. Longer or more complex papers may need level 2 headings or other lower-level headings to organize information clearly. Use your outline to craft your major section headings and determine whether any subtopics are substantial enough to require additional levels of headings.

Working with the document you developed in Note 13.11 “Exercise 2” , begin setting up the heading structure of the final draft of your research paper according to APA guidelines. Include your title and at least two to three major section headings, and follow the formatting guidelines provided above. If your major sections should be broken into subsections, add those headings as well. Use your outline to help you.

Because Jorge used only level 1 headings, his Exercise 3 would look like the following:

Citation Guidelines

In-text citations.

Throughout the body of your paper, include a citation whenever you quote or paraphrase material from your research sources. As you learned in Chapter 11 “Writing from Research: What Will I Learn?” , the purpose of citations is twofold: to give credit to others for their ideas and to allow your reader to follow up and learn more about the topic if desired. Your in-text citations provide basic information about your source; each source you cite will have a longer entry in the references section that provides more detailed information.

In-text citations must provide the name of the author or authors and the year the source was published. (When a given source does not list an individual author, you may provide the source title or the name of the organization that published the material instead.) When directly quoting a source, it is also required that you include the page number where the quote appears in your citation.

This information may be included within the sentence or in a parenthetical reference at the end of the sentence, as in these examples.

Epstein (2010) points out that “junk food cannot be considered addictive in the same way that we think of psychoactive drugs as addictive” (p. 137).

Here, the writer names the source author when introducing the quote and provides the publication date in parentheses after the author’s name. The page number appears in parentheses after the closing quotation marks and before the period that ends the sentence.

Addiction researchers caution that “junk food cannot be considered addictive in the same way that we think of psychoactive drugs as addictive” (Epstein, 2010, p. 137).

Here, the writer provides a parenthetical citation at the end of the sentence that includes the author’s name, the year of publication, and the page number separated by commas. Again, the parenthetical citation is placed after the closing quotation marks and before the period at the end of the sentence.

As noted in the book Junk Food, Junk Science (Epstein, 2010, p. 137), “junk food cannot be considered addictive in the same way that we think of psychoactive drugs as addictive.”

Here, the writer chose to mention the source title in the sentence (an optional piece of information to include) and followed the title with a parenthetical citation. Note that the parenthetical citation is placed before the comma that signals the end of the introductory phrase.

David Epstein’s book Junk Food, Junk Science (2010) pointed out that “junk food cannot be considered addictive in the same way that we think of psychoactive drugs as addictive” (p. 137).

Another variation is to introduce the author and the source title in your sentence and include the publication date and page number in parentheses within the sentence or at the end of the sentence. As long as you have included the essential information, you can choose the option that works best for that particular sentence and source.

Citing a book with a single author is usually a straightforward task. Of course, your research may require that you cite many other types of sources, such as books or articles with more than one author or sources with no individual author listed. You may also need to cite sources available in both print and online and nonprint sources, such as websites and personal interviews. Chapter 13 “APA and MLA Documentation and Formatting” , Section 13.2 “Citing and Referencing Techniques” and Section 13.3 “Creating a References Section” provide extensive guidelines for citing a variety of source types.

Writing at Work

APA is just one of several different styles with its own guidelines for documentation, formatting, and language usage. Depending on your field of interest, you may be exposed to additional styles, such as the following:

MLA style. Determined by the Modern Languages Association and used for papers in literature, languages, and other disciplines in the humanities.
Chicago style. Outlined in the Chicago Manual of Style and sometimes used for papers in the humanities and the sciences; many professional organizations use this style for publications as well.
Associated Press (AP) style. Used by professional journalists.

References List

The brief citations included in the body of your paper correspond to the more detailed citations provided at the end of the paper in the references section. In-text citations provide basic information—the author’s name, the publication date, and the page number if necessary—while the references section provides more extensive bibliographical information. Again, this information allows your reader to follow up on the sources you cited and do additional reading about the topic if desired.

The specific format of entries in the list of references varies slightly for different source types, but the entries generally include the following information:

The name(s) of the author(s) or institution that wrote the source
The year of publication and, where applicable, the exact date of publication
The full title of the source
For books, the city of publication
For articles or essays, the name of the periodical or book in which the article or essay appears
For magazine and journal articles, the volume number, issue number, and pages where the article appears
For sources on the web, the URL where the source is located

The references page is double spaced and lists entries in alphabetical order by the author’s last name. If an entry continues for more than one line, the second line and each subsequent line are indented five spaces. Review the following example. ( Chapter 13 “APA and MLA Documentation and Formatting” , Section 13.3 “Creating a References Section” provides extensive guidelines for formatting reference entries for different types of sources.)

In APA style, book and article titles are formatted in sentence case, not title case. Sentence case means that only the first word is capitalized, along with any proper nouns.

Key Takeaways

Following proper citation and formatting guidelines helps writers ensure that their work will be taken seriously, give proper credit to other authors for their work, and provide valuable information to readers.
Working ahead and taking care to cite sources correctly the first time are ways writers can save time during the editing stage of writing a research paper.
APA papers usually include an abstract that concisely summarizes the paper.
APA papers use a specific headings structure to provide a clear hierarchy of information.
In APA papers, in-text citations usually include the name(s) of the author(s) and the year of publication.
In-text citations correspond to entries in the references section, which provide detailed bibliographical information about a source.

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Example of a great essay | Explanations, tips & tricks

Example of a Great Essay | Explanations, Tips & Tricks

Published on February 9, 2015 by Shane Bryson . Revised on July 23, 2023 by Shona McCombes.

This example guides you through the structure of an essay. It shows how to build an effective introduction , focused paragraphs , clear transitions between ideas, and a strong conclusion .

Each paragraph addresses a single central point, introduced by a topic sentence , and each point is directly related to the thesis statement .

As you read, hover over the highlighted parts to learn what they do and why they work.

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Other interesting articles, frequently asked questions about writing an essay, an appeal to the senses: the development of the braille system in nineteenth-century france.

The invention of Braille was a major turning point in the history of disability. The writing system of raised dots used by visually impaired people was developed by Louis Braille in nineteenth-century France. In a society that did not value disabled people in general, blindness was particularly stigmatized, and lack of access to reading and writing was a significant barrier to social participation. The idea of tactile reading was not entirely new, but existing methods based on sighted systems were difficult to learn and use. As the first writing system designed for blind people’s needs, Braille was a groundbreaking new accessibility tool. It not only provided practical benefits, but also helped change the cultural status of blindness. This essay begins by discussing the situation of blind people in nineteenth-century Europe. It then describes the invention of Braille and the gradual process of its acceptance within blind education. Subsequently, it explores the wide-ranging effects of this invention on blind people’s social and cultural lives.

Lack of access to reading and writing put blind people at a serious disadvantage in nineteenth-century society. Text was one of the primary methods through which people engaged with culture, communicated with others, and accessed information; without a well-developed reading system that did not rely on sight, blind people were excluded from social participation (Weygand, 2009). While disabled people in general suffered from discrimination, blindness was widely viewed as the worst disability, and it was commonly believed that blind people were incapable of pursuing a profession or improving themselves through culture (Weygand, 2009). This demonstrates the importance of reading and writing to social status at the time: without access to text, it was considered impossible to fully participate in society. Blind people were excluded from the sighted world, but also entirely dependent on sighted people for information and education.

In France, debates about how to deal with disability led to the adoption of different strategies over time. While people with temporary difficulties were able to access public welfare, the most common response to people with long-term disabilities, such as hearing or vision loss, was to group them together in institutions (Tombs, 1996). At first, a joint institute for the blind and deaf was created, and although the partnership was motivated more by financial considerations than by the well-being of the residents, the institute aimed to help people develop skills valuable to society (Weygand, 2009). Eventually blind institutions were separated from deaf institutions, and the focus shifted towards education of the blind, as was the case for the Royal Institute for Blind Youth, which Louis Braille attended (Jimenez et al, 2009). The growing acknowledgement of the uniqueness of different disabilities led to more targeted education strategies, fostering an environment in which the benefits of a specifically blind education could be more widely recognized.

Several different systems of tactile reading can be seen as forerunners to the method Louis Braille developed, but these systems were all developed based on the sighted system. The Royal Institute for Blind Youth in Paris taught the students to read embossed roman letters, a method created by the school’s founder, Valentin Hauy (Jimenez et al., 2009). Reading this way proved to be a rather arduous task, as the letters were difficult to distinguish by touch. The embossed letter method was based on the reading system of sighted people, with minimal adaptation for those with vision loss. As a result, this method did not gain significant success among blind students.

Louis Braille was bound to be influenced by his school’s founder, but the most influential pre-Braille tactile reading system was Charles Barbier’s night writing. A soldier in Napoleon’s army, Barbier developed a system in 1819 that used 12 dots with a five line musical staff (Kersten, 1997). His intention was to develop a system that would allow the military to communicate at night without the need for light (Herron, 2009). The code developed by Barbier was phonetic (Jimenez et al., 2009); in other words, the code was designed for sighted people and was based on the sounds of words, not on an actual alphabet. Barbier discovered that variants of raised dots within a square were the easiest method of reading by touch (Jimenez et al., 2009). This system proved effective for the transmission of short messages between military personnel, but the symbols were too large for the fingertip, greatly reducing the speed at which a message could be read (Herron, 2009). For this reason, it was unsuitable for daily use and was not widely adopted in the blind community.

Nevertheless, Barbier’s military dot system was more efficient than Hauy’s embossed letters, and it provided the framework within which Louis Braille developed his method. Barbier’s system, with its dashes and dots, could form over 4000 combinations (Jimenez et al., 2009). Compared to the 26 letters of the Latin alphabet, this was an absurdly high number. Braille kept the raised dot form, but developed a more manageable system that would reflect the sighted alphabet. He replaced Barbier’s dashes and dots with just six dots in a rectangular configuration (Jimenez et al., 2009). The result was that the blind population in France had a tactile reading system using dots (like Barbier’s) that was based on the structure of the sighted alphabet (like Hauy’s); crucially, this system was the first developed specifically for the purposes of the blind.

While the Braille system gained immediate popularity with the blind students at the Institute in Paris, it had to gain acceptance among the sighted before its adoption throughout France. This support was necessary because sighted teachers and leaders had ultimate control over the propagation of Braille resources. Many of the teachers at the Royal Institute for Blind Youth resisted learning Braille’s system because they found the tactile method of reading difficult to learn (Bullock & Galst, 2009). This resistance was symptomatic of the prevalent attitude that the blind population had to adapt to the sighted world rather than develop their own tools and methods. Over time, however, with the increasing impetus to make social contribution possible for all, teachers began to appreciate the usefulness of Braille’s system (Bullock & Galst, 2009), realizing that access to reading could help improve the productivity and integration of people with vision loss. It took approximately 30 years, but the French government eventually approved the Braille system, and it was established throughout the country (Bullock & Galst, 2009).

Although Blind people remained marginalized throughout the nineteenth century, the Braille system granted them growing opportunities for social participation. Most obviously, Braille allowed people with vision loss to read the same alphabet used by sighted people (Bullock & Galst, 2009), allowing them to participate in certain cultural experiences previously unavailable to them. Written works, such as books and poetry, had previously been inaccessible to the blind population without the aid of a reader, limiting their autonomy. As books began to be distributed in Braille, this barrier was reduced, enabling people with vision loss to access information autonomously. The closing of the gap between the abilities of blind and the sighted contributed to a gradual shift in blind people’s status, lessening the cultural perception of the blind as essentially different and facilitating greater social integration.

The Braille system also had important cultural effects beyond the sphere of written culture. Its invention later led to the development of a music notation system for the blind, although Louis Braille did not develop this system himself (Jimenez, et al., 2009). This development helped remove a cultural obstacle that had been introduced by the popularization of written musical notation in the early 1500s. While music had previously been an arena in which the blind could participate on equal footing, the transition from memory-based performance to notation-based performance meant that blind musicians were no longer able to compete with sighted musicians (Kersten, 1997). As a result, a tactile musical notation system became necessary for professional equality between blind and sighted musicians (Kersten, 1997).

Braille paved the way for dramatic cultural changes in the way blind people were treated and the opportunities available to them. Louis Braille’s innovation was to reimagine existing reading systems from a blind perspective, and the success of this invention required sighted teachers to adapt to their students’ reality instead of the other way around. In this sense, Braille helped drive broader social changes in the status of blindness. New accessibility tools provide practical advantages to those who need them, but they can also change the perspectives and attitudes of those who do not.

Bullock, J. D., & Galst, J. M. (2009). The Story of Louis Braille. Archives of Ophthalmology , 127(11), 1532. https://doi.org/10.1001/archophthalmol.2009.286.

Herron, M. (2009, May 6). Blind visionary. Retrieved from https://eandt.theiet.org/content/articles/2009/05/blind-visionary/.

Jiménez, J., Olea, J., Torres, J., Alonso, I., Harder, D., & Fischer, K. (2009). Biography of Louis Braille and Invention of the Braille Alphabet. Survey of Ophthalmology , 54(1), 142–149. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.survophthal.2008.10.006.

Kersten, F.G. (1997). The history and development of Braille music methodology. The Bulletin of Historical Research in Music Education , 18(2). Retrieved from https://www.jstor.org/stable/40214926.

Mellor, C.M. (2006). Louis Braille: A touch of genius . Boston: National Braille Press.

Tombs, R. (1996). France: 1814-1914 . London: Pearson Education Ltd.

Weygand, Z. (2009). The blind in French society from the Middle Ages to the century of Louis Braille . Stanford: Stanford University Press.

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An essay is a focused piece of writing that explains, argues, describes, or narrates.

In high school, you may have to write many different types of essays to develop your writing skills.

Academic essays at college level are usually argumentative : you develop a clear thesis about your topic and make a case for your position using evidence, analysis and interpretation.

The structure of an essay is divided into an introduction that presents your topic and thesis statement , a body containing your in-depth analysis and arguments, and a conclusion wrapping up your ideas.

The structure of the body is flexible, but you should always spend some time thinking about how you can organize your essay to best serve your ideas.

Your essay introduction should include three main things, in this order:

An opening hook to catch the reader’s attention.
Relevant background information that the reader needs to know.
A thesis statement that presents your main point or argument.

The length of each part depends on the length and complexity of your essay .

A thesis statement is a sentence that sums up the central point of your paper or essay . Everything else you write should relate to this key idea.

A topic sentence is a sentence that expresses the main point of a paragraph . Everything else in the paragraph should relate to the topic sentence.

At college level, you must properly cite your sources in all essays , research papers , and other academic texts (except exams and in-class exercises).

Add a citation whenever you quote , paraphrase , or summarize information or ideas from a source. You should also give full source details in a bibliography or reference list at the end of your text.

The exact format of your citations depends on which citation style you are instructed to use. The most common styles are APA , MLA , and Chicago .

Cite this Scribbr article

If you want to cite this source, you can copy and paste the citation or click the “Cite this Scribbr article” button to automatically add the citation to our free Citation Generator.

Bryson, S. (2023, July 23). Example of a Great Essay | Explanations, Tips & Tricks. Scribbr. Retrieved April 15, 2024, from https://www.scribbr.com/academic-essay/example-essay-structure/

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Shane finished his master's degree in English literature in 2013 and has been working as a writing tutor and editor since 2009. He began proofreading and editing essays with Scribbr in early summer, 2014.

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Scientific Essay Format: Definition and Features

A scientific essay requires students to analyze a scientific problem. Based on the information they get, they have to develop a workable solution. The writer is expected to provide their opinion on the issue. The essay features an abstract, introduction, methodology, results, discussion, and references. The introduction provides the hypotheses to be tested. The methodology describes in detail how the problem was tested. All information provided should be scientifically verifiable. The writer must ensure they write a high-quality essay to get good grades.

What is a scientific essay?

A scientific essay is an article or journal that addresses a specific problem. It follows the standards of academic essay writing. The essay must include the main structure - introduction, body, and conclusion. The student captures more details, such as an abstract, methodology, and results. The essay exposes students to effective scientific writing. It helps build their academic profile and increase their credibility. It exposes them to scientific research and insights. Mainly, a scientific essay format follows the APA citation style.

Students are expected to write several essays every semester. Lecturers expect the writer to submit a paper that stands out. It is not easy to write a strong paper that is credible and informative. You can submit a paper that stands out by getting essay writing help online. You only need to chat with essay helper on EduBirdie and give him your essay details. The writer will follow your instructions and create a highly detailed essay. Every time you need essay help, you get to choose your writer based on your need.

Features of a scientific essay

A scientific essay is divided into several sections. Each discusses specific issues based on the defined science essay format. It features an introduction, abstract, methodology, results, discussions, and references.

Abstract/Summary

An abstract provides a summary of the problem. It highlights the key points to be investigated and discussed. It discusses the activities that were done but not in detail. It is necessary to understand well how to write a scientific essay. Usually, the abstract is written last.

Introduction

The introduction is brief information about the background of the problem. It helps the reader understand why the study was conducted. It gives an overview of the research that was previously done. It discusses the gaps that the current research will cover. The writer must state the goals plus the questions the research will answer. The hypotheses should be stated based on the type of essay at hand.

Methodology

It is necessary to understand what kind of writing is found in a scientific essay. The essay could be descriptive, narrative, or compare and contrast. The methodology explains several features.

Type of research conducted
The purpose of each procedure
How data was collected and analyzed
Reasons for using the tools

In the essay format definition, results discuss the outcomes. It presents what was found after the tests or study was done. The writer must discuss the results based on what was expected. It discusses their connection with previous studies.

Discussions

This section discusses the meaning of the results obtained. It provides details of their importance and relevance. It explains what was found and an evaluation of the supporting information.

If a writer learns how to start a science essay, references should not be a problem. The writer needs to be keen on the citation format required. References give the writer credibility. It proves they spent time in research and they didn’t copy another author’s work .

What makes a scientific essay good?

It is necessary to learn how to write a science essay before starting the writing process. These features make a scientific essay stand out.

Make it precise: Accuracy is crucial in scientific essay writing. The writer must capture detailed information. A scientific paper must be objective, thorough, and use the exact language.

Provide clarity: The reader should not struggle to understand what the writer meant . All information provided should be clear. The complex terms used should be explained in the index. To make information clear, use tables, charts, figures, and images.

Know the audience: Scientific papers are mostly written for a scientific audience. It’s scientists who will mostly be interested in research information. Other audiences might also be interested in reading the details.

Well organized: The essay should include all the components of an academic paper. It must contain clear sentences and paragraphs. The information should flow flawlessly from one point to the next.

A scientific essay requires students to research a certain problem. They must provide solutions and include their views or recommendations. The essay comprises an abstract, introduction, method, results, discussion, and references. The writer needs to use charts, tables, and figures to make the information clear. He must directly write to his audience and keep the essay well organized.

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Complete Guide: How to Write a Scientific Essay

Are you dealing with a science course in high school or college? Your professor will require you to write a paper that showcases the knowledge you’ve obtained, as well as your potential for research and logical conclusions.

The scientific essay format seems easy to maintain. However, you can’t simply follow an outline and come up with a unique paper. It takes a lot of work to complete a brilliant essay.

We have a few clear guidelines for you.

Tips on Writing Scientific Papers

Understand What a Scientific Essay Is

When you get this type of assignment for the first time, you have to understand it. Professors rarely spend enough time guiding you through the requirements. You should check if they published some instructions online. If not, you can follow this tutorial on how to write essays for science subjects, published by the University of Oxford.

In essence, a scientific essay sets up a problem and suggests potential solution. The solution has to be based on facts and scientific data. This is not the type of paper that requires your personal opinion.

For example, your professor may ask you to write a scientific essay about COVID-19. You will have to go through factual information and develop a pragmatic solution based on facts.

Choose a Topic

You can’t start writing on the general theme that your professor assigns. As an example, COVID-19 is a too broad team to be discussed in a five-paragraph paper. You’ll have to narrow it down to a specific problem, which you’ll try to solve.

Brainstorming is a good technique that helps you with the selection. Write down all scientific problems linked to the general issue. Then, use Google to see if you can find actual solutions for some of them. Choose a topic that gives you enough information to deal with. You don’t want to get stuck because you can’t find enough facts, so you’ll end up speculating.

Always Make an Outline

The scientific paper outline will guide you through an effortless process of writing. It’s a map for all facts and arguments that you plan to include. It’s pretty standard:

Introduction

Most professors don’t require you to follow the traditional five-paragraph format for scientific essays. However, you still need those three main elements in the paper, so you’ll maintain its logical flow. You still need a thesis statement supported with clear arguments.

Write notes on what you plan to include in each section of the paper. That’s your outline.

Find Scientific Articles to Reference

Research is an important part of a scientific essay. Use Google Scholar to find research studies related to your topic. You won’t find one discussing your exact topic. That would mean that your topic isn’t unique enough. Find studies that are related, and combine them to come down to your own conclusions.

Make sure to reference the sources you use. APA (American Psychological Association) is the preferred citation style for scientific papers. Analyze its guidelines and use them to format the references.

Go with the Flow

When you’re looking for writing tips, you’ll see a common recommendation: start writing early on .

That’s a good tip to follow. As soon as you get the instructions, you should start working on the paper.

But what if you don’t feel inspired? Don’t worry about it! You can’t sit in front of the computer and force yourself to write. Take it easy. Start with a light online search and take notes. That’s work, too. You’ll come to the outline in no time. Once you’re done with that part, it will be easy to carry on with the writing process.

Don’t Skip the Editing

It’s the easiest stage to skip, yet it’s the most important one. You may be pressured by time, but you can find half an hour to edit the paper, right?

Start with an evaluation of the logical flow. Read it from a beginner’s point of view. Are there some background details that you could add? Is there any wordiness or unnecessary argumentation? Don’t worry; you won’t butcher your work. You’ll only make it better.

You’re not done yet! Proofreading is the final stage. You have to check your spelling and grammar before you get to the final version of your paper. All that effort could go to waste for a silly mistake. You don’t want that.

You Can Do This

A scientific essay is not an easy challenge to undertake. You don’t know much about the topic, but you have to act like you’re an expert on it. To get to that level, you’ll need to read tons of research studies.

That’s why it’s important to give yourself enough time. When you do a good research, you’ll inevitably get inspired. You can find an interesting angle on any topic, no matter how boring it seems.

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A scientific essay is common writing among science students or anyone undertaking a science-related course.

Writing a well-curated and clear science essayservice is necessary if you’re aspiring to get good grades. This can only be achieved if one has a concise knowledge of how to write a good essay that contains all the necessary facts, details, and subject, although there are online essay writing services that can help you ace out the writing process with the help of their expert writers.

What is a scientific essay?

A scientific essay is an article, essay, or journal written to ascertain a particular problem, whereby you have analyzed and proffered a possible solution to the stated problem based on an experiment carried out by you or by utilizing available theories and experiments. This form of writing may involve reporting scientific observations, theories, and hypotheses in a manner that even a non-scientist can understand.

Characteristic of a scientific essay:

1.Well conventional and structured format: this simply explains the need to follow the scientific writing structural pattern, which includes:

Aim : This highlights the main purpose and reason why an experiment was carried out.
Abstract : This is a short and concise summary of everything contained in the report/writing.
Method : This involves the description of all the activities, the processes, and all events that were carried out to achieve the total end result.
Result : This is a clear explanation of all observations and interpretations of the project.
Discussion : This section discusses and critically analyzes, evaluates, and discusses your result’s significance. Also, it compares previous studies, discusses and also suggests solutions to weaknesses.
References : This depends on the type of scientific writing you’re engaging in. It follows a reference format, the citation is a must, and Harvard style is widely used in most scientific writing.

2. Contains a figure, charts, and images: A scientific essay contains a record of all data taken from the experiment, these can be illustrated in the writing with tables, charts, images, graphs e.t.c. Each illustration gives a quick description of the detailed report.

3.Comprehensive and conveys the idea discussed: prior to a different form of the report and essay writing, one thing that sets out a scientific essay is the complexity and compact writing is its ability to convey sequentially a particular idea. Each sentence focuses on the subject and the concept of the discussion.

4.Language use in scientific writing is different: Unlike other types of essay writing where slang and emotional phrases can be incorporated, scientific writing uses scientific terms and wordings. Examples include; use of “offsprings” instead of “babies” in genetic terms.

5.Conclusion: A good scientific writing contains a conclusion page. This page contains a validation or disagreement, interpretation, and outcome of the research. A good scientific essay interprets results and also states whether the report agrees or disagrees with existing work or the topic of other authors in the field.

Qualities of a good scientific essay

Unlike the other type of essay writings, scientific essays possess special qualities that make them more unique and different from other forms of essays, which include;

It is clear and concise
Use formal languages rather than informal
Avoids use of direct quotes
Uses up-to-date illustrations, data, and findings.
Arrives at a conclusion.

With the above-mentioned qualities of a good scientific essay, you might be interested in learning how to write a scientific essay, here is a guideline.

How to successfully write a good scientific essay

Topic selection.

Most universities give out topics of discussion to students or ask them to select a topic of choice and discuss.

Topic selection is the foundation of any scientific writing. It serves as a guide to what type of information you will be providing, what type of information you will be gathering, thereby allowing you to narrow your search.

When selecting a topic, you shouldn’t select a complex task. Selecting a complex task or topic, makes the whole process of writing, crafting, and research boring and time-consuming.

Draft your work plan : Drafting a work plan will help save you from unorganized writing. Create an outline, an outline acts as a road map for everything you plan on including in the essay.
Start : After concluding on your topic, drafting, the next step is to start writing. With an already established outline, writing your essay will be easier. Make sure to write in a formal tone, arrange your essay in such a way it follows the standard scientific essay writing guideline. Also, conclude your scientific essay by summing up all the points you have earlier highlighted in your essay body.
Conclude your essay : This is the final part of your scientific essay. This section summarizes the whole content of the essay, it includes all theories, relevant and irrelevant hypotheses, and implications of the result.
Proofread : This is also an important aspect of writing, it is the act of carefully checking out errors and mistakes in an essay before it is finally published. Proofreading allows you to identify errors you have probably overlooked in first writing. This is because submitting an essay filled with errors can affect your grade and overall performance, you can employ the help of a friend or Check out Ca.CustomWritings.com , they offer professional essay writing services.

With all carefully highlighted above, we have explained ways on how to successfully write a scientific essay. Writing a scientific essay involves you getting your facts, figures, and data right.

Also, it involves understanding the subject of which you are trying to address. A scientific essay is far different from any other form of writing, and formatting it the right way is the best option.

Thinking of giving the task out to a writing agency? Ca.CustomWritings.com is your best option to try out. They have over a thousand professionals, with reliable customer service.

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Nasa invites media to mars sample return update.

Abbey A. Donaldson

Nasa headquarters.

NASA will host a media teleconference at 1 p.m. EDT, Monday, April 15, to discuss the agency’s response to a Mars Sample Return Independent Review Board report from September 2023, including next steps for the program.

The teleconference will livestream at:

https://www.nasa.gov/nasatv

Mars Sample Return has been a major long-term goal of international planetary exploration for the past two decades. NASA’s Perseverance rover is collecting compelling science samples that will help scientists understand the geological history of Mars, the evolution of its climate, and prepare for future human explorers. The return of the samples will also help NASA’s search for signs of ancient life.

The media teleconference will share the agency’s recommendations regarding a path forward for Mars Sample Return within a balanced overall science program. The speakers include:

NASA Administrator Bill Nelson
Nicky Fox, associate administrator, Science Mission Directorate

Media who wish to participate in the teleconference should RSVP by 11 a.m. on April 15 by emailing [email protected] .

For more information on NASA’s Mars exploration, visit:

http://nasa.gov/mars

Dewayne Washington / Karen Fox Headquarters, Washington 202-358-1100 [email protected] / [email protected]

Related Terms

Mars Sample Return (MSR)

Too expensive, too slow: NASA asks for help with JPL’s Mars Sample Return mission

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After months of turmoil over the future of a vaunted mission to bring samples of the Red Planet back to Earth, NASA has its verdict on Mars Sample Return .

The space agency is “committed” to bringing those rocks back from Mars, Administrator Bill Nelson said Monday, but it will have to do it with way less money and in far less time than currently designed.

And how exactly is NASA going to pull that off? Right now it has no idea — and it’s looking for someone who does.

“I have asked our folks to reach out with a request for information to industry, to [the Jet Propulsion Laboratory] and to all NASA centers, and to report back this fall an alternate plan that will get [the samples] back quicker and cheaper,” Nelson said in a news conference at NASA headquarters.

His comments came in response to an independent review commissioned by NASA last year that declared there was “near zero probability” of Mars Sample Return making its proposed 2028 launch date, and “no credible” way to fulfill the mission within its current budget.

Pulling off the mission as designed would probably cost up to $11 billion, the review board found, with the samples not reaching Earth until at least 2040.

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“The bottom line is that $11 billion is too expensive, and not returning samples until 2040 is unacceptably too long,” Nelson said. “It’s the decade of the 2040s that we’re going to be landing astronauts on Mars.”

NASA will direct $310 million to Mars Sample Return this year, less than half of the amount it’s allowed to spend on the project and a fraction of last year’s $822.3-million budget.

Next year, the agency will request just $200 million from Congress for the mission — a head-spinning drop from the $949 million the Biden administration wanted to invest in Mars Sample Return in March 2023.

The announcement comes as something of a blow to JPL, the La Cañada Flintridge institution tasked with managing the mission. JPL has already laid off more than 600 employees and 40 contractors this year after NASA ordered it to reduce spending in anticipation of budget cuts spurred by the challenges of Mars Sample Return.

Proposals go out soon to all NASA centers and the private aerospace sector for “a revised plan that utilizes innovation and proven technology to lower risks, to lower costs and to lower mission complexity so we can return these really precious samples to Earth in the 2030s,” said Nicky Fox, associate administrator of the Science Mission Directorate. The due date for proposals is next month, and those selected for further study will get NASA grants this summer.

This essentially puts JPL in a position of having to compete for its own project.

“Right now if JPL were to come up with the answer, then I’d say JPL is gonna be sitting pretty good,” Nelson said during Monday’s news conference. “But we’re opening this up to everyone because we want to get every new and fresh idea that we can.”

NASA’s decision to outsource a solution to the Mars Sample Return problem frustrated some Mars scientists.

“What I expected is for NASA to step up and say, ‘These things are hard and we choose to do them,’ ” said Bethany L. Ehlmann , a planetary scientist at Caltech. “That is the leadership required to be the nation leading the world in space exploration.”

Several members of California’s congressional delegation expressed dismay.

“I am disappointed that after eight long months of review on the Mars Sample Return mission, NASA is only just now issuing a call for studies on the best path forward,” Rep. Judy Chu (D-Monterey Park) said in a statement.

Lawmakers have lobbied to preserve JPL’s funding, citing the need to protect jobs and keep the U.S. space program competitive. China has announced a sample return mission of its own to launch in 2028 or 2030.

“These cuts will delay the mission at a critical time, further diminish our highly skilled workforce, and significantly undermine California’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and our state’s globally leading science and space leadership as we face increasing competition with China,” California’s U.S. senators, Alex Padilla and Laphonza Butler , said in a joint statement.

“We strongly urge Administrator Nelson to work with Congress to better balance these cuts so that the JPL workforce is protected and the mission proceeds.”

Workers at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston remove the lid of the OSIRIS-REx sample return canister.

NASA finally figures out how to open a $1-billion canister

Late last year, a spacecraft containing samples of a 4.6-billion-year-old asteroid landed safely in the desert after a 1.2-billion mile journey.

Jan. 21, 2024

A joint project with the European Space Agency, Mars Sample Return would deliver rocks, rubble and dust that have already been gathered and sealed into tubes by the Perseverance rover.

The current design relies on a lander that would retrieve those tubes from the Red Planet’s Jezero Crater and use a small rocket to ferry them into Martian orbit, where they would rendezvous with a spacecraft that would make the journey back to Earth. That craft would touch down on Earth roughly five years after the orbiter’s launch.

The ultimate goal is to comb the samples for evidence that life has ever existed on Mars, and to help NASA plan for future crewed missions, Nelson said.

In the most recent planetary science decadal survey — a report prepared for NASA every 10 years by the National Academy of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine — planetary scientists named the Mars Sample Return mission as the “highest scientific priority of NASA’s robotic exploration efforts this decade” and argued that the program should be completed “as soon as is practicably possible with no increase or decrease in its current scope.”

But the authors cautioned that the ambitious mission shouldn’t come at the cost of other planetary science, suggesting a roughly $5-billion to $7-billion cap.

“Mars Sample Return is of fundamental strategic importance to NASA, U.S. leadership in planetary science, and international cooperation and should be completed as rapidly as possible,” the report stated . “However, its cost should not be allowed to undermine the long-term programmatic balance of the planetary portfolio.”

The agency is committing to keeping the mission within that recommended budget, Nelson said. Allowing Mars Sample Return’s costs to reach the $8 billion to $11 billion the review board estimated would require NASA “to cannibalize other programs, other science programs, and there are so many that are absolutely important,” Nelson said.

“JPL remains strongly committed to the Mars Sample Return mission, the highest priority in the past two planetary science decadal surveys,” the institution said in a statement. “We will continue to contribute our unique capabilities to NASA and all partners to ensure mission success.”

These tubes hold samples of rock cores and regolith collected by NASA's Perseverance rover.

Budget deal for NASA offers glimmer of hope for JPL’s Mars Sample Return mission

With a final 2024 budget for NASA in place, the space agency has directed JPL not to cut any more staff working on the Mars Sample Return mission.

March 6, 2024

Letters to the Editor: ‘Beat China’ is a bad justification for Mars exploration

March 13, 2024

NASA's Perseverance rover during its first drive on Mars, which totaled 21 feet.

Opinion: Mars rocks are a science prize the U.S. can’t afford to lose

March 7, 2024

These photos provided by NASA show images from NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera team which confirmed Odysseus completed its landing. After traveling more than 600,000 miles, Odysseus landed within 1.5 km of its intended Malapert A landing site, using a contingent laser range-finding system patched hours before landing. (NASA/Goddard/Arizona State University via AP)

Sideways moon landing cuts mission short, private U.S. lunar lander will stop working

Feb. 26, 2024

Corinne Purtill is a science and medicine reporter for the Los Angeles Times. Her writing on science and human behavior has appeared in the New Yorker, the New York Times, Time Magazine, the BBC, Quartz and elsewhere. Before joining The Times, she worked as the senior London correspondent for GlobalPost (now PRI) and as a reporter and assignment editor at the Cambodia Daily in Phnom Penh. She is a native of Southern California and a graduate of Stanford University.

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Donna Cooper holds up a dose of Wegovy, a drug used for weight loss.

‘Miracle’ weight-loss drugs could have reduced health disparities. Instead they got worse

April 15, 2024

SANTA CLARITA, CA - APRIL 9, 2024 - - Geriatrician Dr. Gene Dorio, left, and life partner Robin Clough enjoy a light moment in the kitchen of their home in Santa Clarita on April 9, 2024. Dr. Dorio, who mostly does house calls with senior patients, has been spending most of his time taking care of Clough who has been battling papillary carcinoma cancer. After weeks of cancer treatment Clough is currently diagnosed "no cancer determined/no evidence of cancer." "To me it's like bonus days," Clough said about her recent cancer diagnosis. "I was suppose to be gone," she concluded. (Genaro Molina/Los Angeles Times)

Column: A cancer survivor’s advice: research, persistence and second opinions

April 13, 2024

Long Beach, CA - March 29: NEWS EMBARGOED UNTIL 4/11: Visitors view one of two non-releasable sea otters swimming on its back inside the sea otter habitat at the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach. The Aquarium of the Pacific in is attempting for the first time to ready a baby sea otter for release back into the wild by pairing it with a "surrogate mom." The adopted mom, they hope, will teach the baby the skills needed to survive in her natural environment. No one is allowed to get close to the surrogate mom and baby - they are trying to prevent all human interaction so the baby has a better chance of being re-wilded. However, cameras are set up to view the pair and there are other otters at the aquarium that we can get closer to. Photo taken at Aquarium of The Pacific in Long Beach Friday, March 29, 2024. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

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Surrogate otter mom at Long Beach aquarium is rehabilitating pup ‘better than any human ever can’

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Los Angeles, CA - September 30: Kaiser Permanente's Los Angeles Medical Center on Sunset Blvd. on Thursday, Sept. 30, 2021 in Los Angeles, CA. (Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times)

Union accuses Kaiser of violations months after state fine on mental health care

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NASA announces major overhaul of ambitious Mars Sample Return mission

NASA announced Monday it is dramatically overhauling its highly anticipated but troubled mission to bring pieces of Mars to Earth, a move that experts say puts the project on life support. The space agency said it continues to support Mars Sample Return, but will operate the program under bare-bones budgets in the near-term while it seeks proposals for a faster and cheaper mission architecture.

The mission is an ambitious attempt to secure pristine chunks of the Red Planet that might help scientists reveal whether it ever hosted life. But the future of the project has been uncertain since last fall, when an independent review board produced a dire report saying the mission needed a management overhaul amid probable cost overruns and delays.

A 2020 report from the board had estimated sample return would cost $3.8 billion to $4.4 billion. Now the estimated cost over the lifetime of the mission is between $8.4 billion and $10.9 billion, with samples arriving on Earth in 2040.

That would put Mars Sample Return’s price tag similar to that of the James Webb Space Telescope, a scientific and engineering marvel now observing the universe from a solar orbit about a million miles from Earth. The Webb took decades to get off the ground and gobbled up more of NASA’s science dollars than anyone had hoped.

The estimated 2040 return date is “unacceptable,” NASA administrator Bill Nelson said Monday in a news briefing.

“It’s the decade of the 2040s that we’re going to be landing astronauts on Mars. It’s also unacceptable that it’s $11 billion,” Nelson said.

The costliness of Mars Sample Return comes at a time when NASA’s science budget isn’t sufficient to fund all the telescopes and space probes already underway or being planned. With congressional support for the mission unclear, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory earlier this year laid off about 8 percent of its workforce.

Still, Mars Sample Return has been the top priority of the planetary science community’s decadal survey process, which elevates the most promising missions from the blizzard of proposals. But retrieving pristine scraps of Mars for laboratory analysis on Earth requires unprecedented technological feats. NASA and its partners, including the European Space Agency, can’t simply send a spacecraft to the surface of Mars and expect it to blast off again and return to Earth. Instead, the mission calls for a fleet of spaceships operating as a team.

The Perseverance rover, which landed on Mars in 2021, has been collecting and storing samples of Martian rock and soil in Jezero Crater, where scientists believe a river flowed into a lake several billion years ago. The rover has separate funding from the sample return project.

“I think it’s fair to say we are committed to retrieving the samples that are there,” Nelson said.

The original plan called for NASA to send another vehicle to land on Mars and collect the samples from Perseverance. That lander will carry an ascent vehicle that will blast off Mars and carry the samples to orbit. There the material will be transferred to yet another spacecraft, a Mars orbiter built by the European Space Agency and charged with the task of hauling the samples back to Earth.

At the briefing, NASA officials called on the scientific community and industry to propose new ideas that use more existing, proven technologies — and possibly a simpler process — to retrieve the samples.

“We are looking at out-of-the-box possibilities that could return the samples earlier and at a lower cost,” NASA’s head of science Nicola “Nicky” Fox said during the briefing.

G. Scott Hubbard, a Stanford professor who formerly led NASA’s Mars program, said in an email he was pleased by the “robust drumbeat of support” for the mission expressed by Fox and other officials in a NASA town hall Monday. But he questioned whether a new architecture could bring down costs and speed up the mission.

“[A] magic-wand solution that dramatically reduces cost or schedule without substantially increasing risk is hard to imagine,” Hubbard said. “I would be happy to be proven wrong.”

Bethany Ehlmann, a planetary scientist at Caltech and president of the Planetary Society, said NASA needs to find the willpower to finish a job already started by Perseverance.

“I am confident that we have the technological pieces to put sample return together. But when we choose to do things that are hard, we need to decide to do them and overcome the challenges together,” Ehlmann said. “What we need is the leadership and the commitment to do it.”

What Solar Eclipse-Gazing Has Looked Like for the Past 2 Centuries

Millions of people on Monday will continue the tradition of experiencing and capturing solar eclipses, a pursuit that has spawned a lot of unusual gear.

Share full article

In a black-and-white photo from 1945, nine men, some in military uniforms, stand in the middle of a New York City street. They are holding a small piece of what looks like glass or a photographic negative above their heads to protect their eyes as they watch the eclipse. The original border of the print, as well as some numbers and crop marks drawn onto it, are visible.

By Sarah Eckinger

April 8, 2024

For centuries, people have been clamoring to glimpse solar eclipses. From astronomers with custom-built photographic equipment to groups huddled together with special glasses, this spectacle has captivated the human imagination.

Creating a Permanent Record

In 1860, Warren de la Rue captured what many sources describe as the first photograph of a total solar eclipse . He took it in Rivabellosa, Spain, with an instrument known as the Kew Photoheliograph . This combination of a telescope and camera was specifically built to photograph the sun.

Forty years later, Nevil Maskelyne, a magician and an astronomy enthusiast, filmed a total solar eclipse in North Carolina. The footage was lost, however, and only released in 2019 after it was rediscovered in the Royal Astronomical Society’s archives.

Telescopic Vision

For scientists and astronomers, eclipses provide an opportunity not only to view the moon’s umbra and gaze at the sun’s corona, but also to make observations that further their studies. Many observatories, or friendly neighbors with a telescope, also make their instruments available to the public during eclipses.

Fredrik Hjalmar Johansen, Fridtjof Nansen and Sigurd Scott Hansen observing a solar eclipse while on a polar expedition in 1894 .

Women from Wellesley College in Massachusetts and their professor tested out equipment ahead of their eclipse trip (to “catch old Sol in the act,” as the original New York Times article phrased it) to New London, Conn., in 1922.

A group from Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania traveled to Yerbaniz, Mexico, in 1923, with telescopes and a 65-foot camera to observe the sun’s corona .

Dr. J.J. Nassau, director of the Warner and Swasey Observatory at Case School of Applied Science in Cleveland, prepared to head to Douglas Hill, Maine, to study an eclipse in 1932. An entire freight car was required to transport the institution’s equipment.

Visitors viewed a solar eclipse at an observatory in Berlin in the mid-1930s.

A family set up two telescopes in Bar Harbor, Maine, in 1963. The two children placed stones on the base to help steady them.

An astronomer examined equipment for an eclipse in a desert in Mauritania in June 1973. We credit the hot climate for his choice in outfit.

Indirect Light

If you see people on Monday sprinting to your local park clutching pieces of paper, or with a cardboard box of their head, they are probably planning to reflect or project images of the solar eclipse onto a surface.

Cynthia Goulakos demonstrated a safe way to view a solar eclipse , with two pieces of cardboard to create a reflection of the shadowed sun, in Lowell, Mass., in 1970.

Another popular option is to create a pinhole camera. This woman did so in Central Park in 1963 by using a paper cup with a small hole in the bottom and a twin-lens reflex camera.

Amateur astronomers viewed a partial eclipse, projected from a telescope onto a screen, from atop the Empire State Building in 1967 .

Back in Central Park, in 1970, Irving Schwartz and his wife reflected an eclipse onto a piece of paper by holding binoculars on the edge of a garbage basket.

Children in Denver in 1979 used cardboard viewing boxes and pieces of paper with small pinholes to view projections of a partial eclipse.

A crowd gathered around a basin of water dyed with dark ink, waiting for the reflection of a solar eclipse to appear, in Hanoi, Vietnam, in 1995.

Staring at the Sun (or, How Not to Burn Your Retinas)

Eclipse-gazers have used different methods to protect their eyes throughout the years, some safer than others .

In 1927, women gathered at a window in a building in London to watch a total eclipse through smoked glass. This was popularized in France in the 1700s , but fell out of favor when physicians began writing papers on children whose vision was damaged.

Another trend was to use a strip of exposed photographic film, as seen below in Sydney, Australia, in 1948 and in Turkana, Kenya, in 1963. This method, which was even suggested by The Times in 1979 , has since been declared unsafe.

Solar eclipse glasses are a popular and safe way to view the event ( if you use models compliant with international safety standards ). Over the years there have been various styles, including these large hand-held options found in West Palm Beach, Fla., in 1979.

Parents and children watched a partial eclipse through their eclipse glasses in Tokyo in 1981.

Slimmer, more colorful options were used in Nabusimake, Colombia, in 1998.

In France in 1999.

And in Iran and England in 1999.

And the best way to see the eclipse? With family and friends at a watch party, like this one in Isalo National Park in Madagascar in 2001.

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read articles about science in newspapers and magazines, as well as popular science books. It's important that you realize that there is a distinction between writing for non-specialists and the style that you will need for your essays. In explaining scientific discoveries, popular science writers and journalists want to:
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A descriptive science essay aims to describe a certain scientific phenomenon according to established knowledge. On the other hand, the exploratory science essay requires you to go beyond the current theories and explore new interpretations. So before you set out to write your essay, always check out the instructions given by your instructor.
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Dr. J.J. Nassau, director of the Warner and Swasey Observatory at Case School of Applied Science in Cleveland, prepared to head to Douglas Hill, Maine, to study an eclipse in 1932.

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