2.  First thing that the reader will see and this will often determine whether they will read on  Capture their attention, so the title needs to succinctly encapsulate the subject of interest  Use KEY WORDS to highlight your research  For Example: ◦ Exposure (Acute or Chronic) ◦ Efficacy ◦ Review ◦ Name the organism(s), substance(s) of interest

3.  One of the most important parts of the paper ◦ Gives the reader an overview of your work  Summary of the work…..so its written LAST!!!  States hypothesis  Highlights the major findings  Includes a statement or two about how the data (or lack thereof) contributes to that specific field of study  Does not contain lengthy background, tables or figures, abbreviations

4.  Begin with…. ◦ Observation in nature ◦ Conclusion drawn from a survey of the literature that stimulated your interest  Recount (very concisely) the historical and current state of knowledge about the topic  Majority of statements made in the Introduction must be referenced  Written in third person using active voice  Last paragraph…. ◦ What question are you trying to answer, ◦ State Hypothesis ◦ Specific aims of research

5.  Establish the context of the work being reported. This is accomplished by discussing the relevant primary research literature (with citations) and summarizing our current understanding of the problem you are investigating; primary research literature citations  State the purpose of the work in the form of the hypothesis, question, or problem you investigated; and, State the purpose  Briefly explain your rationale and approach and, whenever possible, the possible outcomes your study can reveal.rationale

6.  The HOW, WHEN, WHO, WHAT of your research ◦ Field study, provide a description of the study site, including the significant physical and biological features, and the precise location (latitude and longitude, map, etc)description of the study site ◦ Experimental OR sampling design (i.e., how the experiment or study was structured. For example, controls, treatments, the variable(s) measured, how many samples were collected, replication, the final form of the data, etc.) Experimental OR sampling design ◦ Protocol for collecting data, i.e., how the experimental procedures were carried out Protocol for collecting data ◦ How the data were analyzed (qualitative analyses and/or statistical procedures used to determine significance). How the data were analyzed  Must be specific so its repeatable…  Can reference another paper that has already explained the method in detail if its similar to yours

7.  Objectively present your key results, without interpretation, in an orderly and logical sequenceresultslogical sequence  Using both illustrative materials and text Summarize the raw data utilizing written text, tables, and figuresillustrative materialstext ◦ Reader can observe any general patterns and gain a sense of the amount of variability within the data (refer to Table 1, Figure 1)  Divide into categories or subheadings  DO NOT DRAW ANY CONCLUSIONS YET……THESE GO IN DISCUSSION!

8.  Present each set of data in a graph or table  Each graph or table should have a title and a description ◦ Table (goes above) ◦ Figure (goes below)  Should be ordered within the text of your results or after your results  Legends for data points in graphs

9.  Most difficult to write  Write after your analyze ALL of your results  Will connect to Introduction  How does your data lend to the scientific community?  How is your data different than what is currently published?  What does your data tell us about the “whole picture”?  You will have many references here too!  Future research, or drawbacks of your study

10.  To interpret your results in light of what was already known about the subject of the investigationwhat was already known  To explain our new understanding of the problem after taking your results into consideration

11.  If you can answer "Yes" to the following questions you have written a good discussion section: ◦ Did you reach conclusions about the initial hypotheses? ◦ Did you compare conclusions to those of others? ◦ Did you identify sources of error and basic inadequacies of technique? ◦ Did you speculate upon broader meanings of the conclusions reached? ◦ Did you identify further steps needed in research on the problem? ◦ Did you suggest improvements of methods?

12.  Give credit to those who helped in the project by contributing work, advice, permission, technical assistance, funds for conducting the actual work, and help with preparation of the paper  It should not include those who contributed significantly to the paper and are listed as authors.

13.  MLA or APA format  Or whatever format is required by the journal to which you are submitting  Use RefWorks or one of the other reference databases…..EASY to store all of your sources!  CHECK your in text references with your list of references!!!!

14.  Scientific papers do not use footnotes.  Sources of information are referred to in the narrative or text of the paper. ◦ "Ornes (1996) found that...." ◦ “Aquatic plants can help clean up water (Ornes 1997)... ◦ "In aquatic plants (Ornes et al. 1995), mineral uptake...“  Methods: specific reagents or instruments used are normally cited ◦ Polybrene (Sigma, St. Louis, MO)

15.  All pages should be numbered.  Italicize all scientific names (indicate by underlining in typed manuscript when italic type is unavailable).  Once you abbreviate a word, you can use the abbreviation thru out ◦ High performance liquid chromatography (HPLC)  Use the metric system and other international units whenever possible.  Write numbers as numerals whenever they are associated with measurement units (e.g., 3meters) or are parts of dates or mathematical expressions.  In other cases, spell them out for numbers less than 10 (e.g., five rabbits), and give them as numerals for larger values (e.g., 14 rabbits).