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Scientific Reports
What this handout is about.
This handout provides a general guide to writing reports about scientific research you’ve performed. In addition to describing the conventional rules about the format and content of a lab report, we’ll also attempt to convey why these rules exist, so you’ll get a clearer, more dependable idea of how to approach this writing situation. Readers of this handout may also find our handout on writing in the sciences useful.
Background and pre-writing
Why do we write research reports.
You did an experiment or study for your science class, and now you have to write it up for your teacher to review. You feel that you understood the background sufficiently, designed and completed the study effectively, obtained useful data, and can use those data to draw conclusions about a scientific process or principle. But how exactly do you write all that? What is your teacher expecting to see?
To take some of the guesswork out of answering these questions, try to think beyond the classroom setting. In fact, you and your teacher are both part of a scientific community, and the people who participate in this community tend to share the same values. As long as you understand and respect these values, your writing will likely meet the expectations of your audience—including your teacher.
So why are you writing this research report? The practical answer is “Because the teacher assigned it,” but that’s classroom thinking. Generally speaking, people investigating some scientific hypothesis have a responsibility to the rest of the scientific world to report their findings, particularly if these findings add to or contradict previous ideas. The people reading such reports have two primary goals:
- They want to gather the information presented.
- They want to know that the findings are legitimate.
Your job as a writer, then, is to fulfill these two goals.
How do I do that?
Good question. Here is the basic format scientists have designed for research reports:
- Introduction
Methods and Materials
This format, sometimes called “IMRAD,” may take slightly different shapes depending on the discipline or audience; some ask you to include an abstract or separate section for the hypothesis, or call the Discussion section “Conclusions,” or change the order of the sections (some professional and academic journals require the Methods section to appear last). Overall, however, the IMRAD format was devised to represent a textual version of the scientific method.
The scientific method, you’ll probably recall, involves developing a hypothesis, testing it, and deciding whether your findings support the hypothesis. In essence, the format for a research report in the sciences mirrors the scientific method but fleshes out the process a little. Below, you’ll find a table that shows how each written section fits into the scientific method and what additional information it offers the reader.
Thinking of your research report as based on the scientific method, but elaborated in the ways described above, may help you to meet your audience’s expectations successfully. We’re going to proceed by explicitly connecting each section of the lab report to the scientific method, then explaining why and how you need to elaborate that section.
Although this handout takes each section in the order in which it should be presented in the final report, you may for practical reasons decide to compose sections in another order. For example, many writers find that composing their Methods and Results before the other sections helps to clarify their idea of the experiment or study as a whole. You might consider using each assignment to practice different approaches to drafting the report, to find the order that works best for you.
What should I do before drafting the lab report?
The best way to prepare to write the lab report is to make sure that you fully understand everything you need to about the experiment. Obviously, if you don’t quite know what went on during the lab, you’re going to find it difficult to explain the lab satisfactorily to someone else. To make sure you know enough to write the report, complete the following steps:
- What are we going to do in this lab? (That is, what’s the procedure?)
- Why are we going to do it that way?
- What are we hoping to learn from this experiment?
- Why would we benefit from this knowledge?
- Consult your lab supervisor as you perform the lab. If you don’t know how to answer one of the questions above, for example, your lab supervisor will probably be able to explain it to you (or, at least, help you figure it out).
- Plan the steps of the experiment carefully with your lab partners. The less you rush, the more likely it is that you’ll perform the experiment correctly and record your findings accurately. Also, take some time to think about the best way to organize the data before you have to start putting numbers down. If you can design a table to account for the data, that will tend to work much better than jotting results down hurriedly on a scrap piece of paper.
- Record the data carefully so you get them right. You won’t be able to trust your conclusions if you have the wrong data, and your readers will know you messed up if the other three people in your group have “97 degrees” and you have “87.”
- Consult with your lab partners about everything you do. Lab groups often make one of two mistakes: two people do all the work while two have a nice chat, or everybody works together until the group finishes gathering the raw data, then scrams outta there. Collaborate with your partners, even when the experiment is “over.” What trends did you observe? Was the hypothesis supported? Did you all get the same results? What kind of figure should you use to represent your findings? The whole group can work together to answer these questions.
- Consider your audience. You may believe that audience is a non-issue: it’s your lab TA, right? Well, yes—but again, think beyond the classroom. If you write with only your lab instructor in mind, you may omit material that is crucial to a complete understanding of your experiment, because you assume the instructor knows all that stuff already. As a result, you may receive a lower grade, since your TA won’t be sure that you understand all the principles at work. Try to write towards a student in the same course but a different lab section. That student will have a fair degree of scientific expertise but won’t know much about your experiment particularly. Alternatively, you could envision yourself five years from now, after the reading and lectures for this course have faded a bit. What would you remember, and what would you need explained more clearly (as a refresher)?
Once you’ve completed these steps as you perform the experiment, you’ll be in a good position to draft an effective lab report.
Introductions
How do i write a strong introduction.
For the purposes of this handout, we’ll consider the Introduction to contain four basic elements: the purpose, the scientific literature relevant to the subject, the hypothesis, and the reasons you believed your hypothesis viable. Let’s start by going through each element of the Introduction to clarify what it covers and why it’s important. Then we can formulate a logical organizational strategy for the section.
The inclusion of the purpose (sometimes called the objective) of the experiment often confuses writers. The biggest misconception is that the purpose is the same as the hypothesis. Not quite. We’ll get to hypotheses in a minute, but basically they provide some indication of what you expect the experiment to show. The purpose is broader, and deals more with what you expect to gain through the experiment. In a professional setting, the hypothesis might have something to do with how cells react to a certain kind of genetic manipulation, but the purpose of the experiment is to learn more about potential cancer treatments. Undergraduate reports don’t often have this wide-ranging a goal, but you should still try to maintain the distinction between your hypothesis and your purpose. In a solubility experiment, for example, your hypothesis might talk about the relationship between temperature and the rate of solubility, but the purpose is probably to learn more about some specific scientific principle underlying the process of solubility.
For starters, most people say that you should write out your working hypothesis before you perform the experiment or study. Many beginning science students neglect to do so and find themselves struggling to remember precisely which variables were involved in the process or in what way the researchers felt that they were related. Write your hypothesis down as you develop it—you’ll be glad you did.
As for the form a hypothesis should take, it’s best not to be too fancy or complicated; an inventive style isn’t nearly so important as clarity here. There’s nothing wrong with beginning your hypothesis with the phrase, “It was hypothesized that . . .” Be as specific as you can about the relationship between the different objects of your study. In other words, explain that when term A changes, term B changes in this particular way. Readers of scientific writing are rarely content with the idea that a relationship between two terms exists—they want to know what that relationship entails.
Not a hypothesis:
“It was hypothesized that there is a significant relationship between the temperature of a solvent and the rate at which a solute dissolves.”
Hypothesis:
“It was hypothesized that as the temperature of a solvent increases, the rate at which a solute will dissolve in that solvent increases.”
Put more technically, most hypotheses contain both an independent and a dependent variable. The independent variable is what you manipulate to test the reaction; the dependent variable is what changes as a result of your manipulation. In the example above, the independent variable is the temperature of the solvent, and the dependent variable is the rate of solubility. Be sure that your hypothesis includes both variables.
Justify your hypothesis
You need to do more than tell your readers what your hypothesis is; you also need to assure them that this hypothesis was reasonable, given the circumstances. In other words, use the Introduction to explain that you didn’t just pluck your hypothesis out of thin air. (If you did pluck it out of thin air, your problems with your report will probably extend beyond using the appropriate format.) If you posit that a particular relationship exists between the independent and the dependent variable, what led you to believe your “guess” might be supported by evidence?
Scientists often refer to this type of justification as “motivating” the hypothesis, in the sense that something propelled them to make that prediction. Often, motivation includes what we already know—or rather, what scientists generally accept as true (see “Background/previous research” below). But you can also motivate your hypothesis by relying on logic or on your own observations. If you’re trying to decide which solutes will dissolve more rapidly in a solvent at increased temperatures, you might remember that some solids are meant to dissolve in hot water (e.g., bouillon cubes) and some are used for a function precisely because they withstand higher temperatures (they make saucepans out of something). Or you can think about whether you’ve noticed sugar dissolving more rapidly in your glass of iced tea or in your cup of coffee. Even such basic, outside-the-lab observations can help you justify your hypothesis as reasonable.
Background/previous research
This part of the Introduction demonstrates to the reader your awareness of how you’re building on other scientists’ work. If you think of the scientific community as engaging in a series of conversations about various topics, then you’ll recognize that the relevant background material will alert the reader to which conversation you want to enter.
Generally speaking, authors writing journal articles use the background for slightly different purposes than do students completing assignments. Because readers of academic journals tend to be professionals in the field, authors explain the background in order to permit readers to evaluate the study’s pertinence for their own work. You, on the other hand, write toward a much narrower audience—your peers in the course or your lab instructor—and so you must demonstrate that you understand the context for the (presumably assigned) experiment or study you’ve completed. For example, if your professor has been talking about polarity during lectures, and you’re doing a solubility experiment, you might try to connect the polarity of a solid to its relative solubility in certain solvents. In any event, both professional researchers and undergraduates need to connect the background material overtly to their own work.
Organization of this section
Most of the time, writers begin by stating the purpose or objectives of their own work, which establishes for the reader’s benefit the “nature and scope of the problem investigated” (Day 1994). Once you have expressed your purpose, you should then find it easier to move from the general purpose, to relevant material on the subject, to your hypothesis. In abbreviated form, an Introduction section might look like this:
“The purpose of the experiment was to test conventional ideas about solubility in the laboratory [purpose] . . . According to Whitecoat and Labrat (1999), at higher temperatures the molecules of solvents move more quickly . . . We know from the class lecture that molecules moving at higher rates of speed collide with one another more often and thus break down more easily [background material/motivation] . . . Thus, it was hypothesized that as the temperature of a solvent increases, the rate at which a solute will dissolve in that solvent increases [hypothesis].”
Again—these are guidelines, not commandments. Some writers and readers prefer different structures for the Introduction. The one above merely illustrates a common approach to organizing material.
How do I write a strong Materials and Methods section?
As with any piece of writing, your Methods section will succeed only if it fulfills its readers’ expectations, so you need to be clear in your own mind about the purpose of this section. Let’s review the purpose as we described it above: in this section, you want to describe in detail how you tested the hypothesis you developed and also to clarify the rationale for your procedure. In science, it’s not sufficient merely to design and carry out an experiment. Ultimately, others must be able to verify your findings, so your experiment must be reproducible, to the extent that other researchers can follow the same procedure and obtain the same (or similar) results.
Here’s a real-world example of the importance of reproducibility. In 1989, physicists Stanley Pons and Martin Fleischman announced that they had discovered “cold fusion,” a way of producing excess heat and power without the nuclear radiation that accompanies “hot fusion.” Such a discovery could have great ramifications for the industrial production of energy, so these findings created a great deal of interest. When other scientists tried to duplicate the experiment, however, they didn’t achieve the same results, and as a result many wrote off the conclusions as unjustified (or worse, a hoax). To this day, the viability of cold fusion is debated within the scientific community, even though an increasing number of researchers believe it possible. So when you write your Methods section, keep in mind that you need to describe your experiment well enough to allow others to replicate it exactly.
With these goals in mind, let’s consider how to write an effective Methods section in terms of content, structure, and style.
Sometimes the hardest thing about writing this section isn’t what you should talk about, but what you shouldn’t talk about. Writers often want to include the results of their experiment, because they measured and recorded the results during the course of the experiment. But such data should be reserved for the Results section. In the Methods section, you can write that you recorded the results, or how you recorded the results (e.g., in a table), but you shouldn’t write what the results were—not yet. Here, you’re merely stating exactly how you went about testing your hypothesis. As you draft your Methods section, ask yourself the following questions:
- How much detail? Be precise in providing details, but stay relevant. Ask yourself, “Would it make any difference if this piece were a different size or made from a different material?” If not, you probably don’t need to get too specific. If so, you should give as many details as necessary to prevent this experiment from going awry if someone else tries to carry it out. Probably the most crucial detail is measurement; you should always quantify anything you can, such as time elapsed, temperature, mass, volume, etc.
- Rationale: Be sure that as you’re relating your actions during the experiment, you explain your rationale for the protocol you developed. If you capped a test tube immediately after adding a solute to a solvent, why did you do that? (That’s really two questions: why did you cap it, and why did you cap it immediately?) In a professional setting, writers provide their rationale as a way to explain their thinking to potential critics. On one hand, of course, that’s your motivation for talking about protocol, too. On the other hand, since in practical terms you’re also writing to your teacher (who’s seeking to evaluate how well you comprehend the principles of the experiment), explaining the rationale indicates that you understand the reasons for conducting the experiment in that way, and that you’re not just following orders. Critical thinking is crucial—robots don’t make good scientists.
- Control: Most experiments will include a control, which is a means of comparing experimental results. (Sometimes you’ll need to have more than one control, depending on the number of hypotheses you want to test.) The control is exactly the same as the other items you’re testing, except that you don’t manipulate the independent variable-the condition you’re altering to check the effect on the dependent variable. For example, if you’re testing solubility rates at increased temperatures, your control would be a solution that you didn’t heat at all; that way, you’ll see how quickly the solute dissolves “naturally” (i.e., without manipulation), and you’ll have a point of reference against which to compare the solutions you did heat.
Describe the control in the Methods section. Two things are especially important in writing about the control: identify the control as a control, and explain what you’re controlling for. Here is an example:
“As a control for the temperature change, we placed the same amount of solute in the same amount of solvent, and let the solution stand for five minutes without heating it.”
Structure and style
Organization is especially important in the Methods section of a lab report because readers must understand your experimental procedure completely. Many writers are surprised by the difficulty of conveying what they did during the experiment, since after all they’re only reporting an event, but it’s often tricky to present this information in a coherent way. There’s a fairly standard structure you can use to guide you, and following the conventions for style can help clarify your points.
- Subsections: Occasionally, researchers use subsections to report their procedure when the following circumstances apply: 1) if they’ve used a great many materials; 2) if the procedure is unusually complicated; 3) if they’ve developed a procedure that won’t be familiar to many of their readers. Because these conditions rarely apply to the experiments you’ll perform in class, most undergraduate lab reports won’t require you to use subsections. In fact, many guides to writing lab reports suggest that you try to limit your Methods section to a single paragraph.
- Narrative structure: Think of this section as telling a story about a group of people and the experiment they performed. Describe what you did in the order in which you did it. You may have heard the old joke centered on the line, “Disconnect the red wire, but only after disconnecting the green wire,” where the person reading the directions blows everything to kingdom come because the directions weren’t in order. We’re used to reading about events chronologically, and so your readers will generally understand what you did if you present that information in the same way. Also, since the Methods section does generally appear as a narrative (story), you want to avoid the “recipe” approach: “First, take a clean, dry 100 ml test tube from the rack. Next, add 50 ml of distilled water.” You should be reporting what did happen, not telling the reader how to perform the experiment: “50 ml of distilled water was poured into a clean, dry 100 ml test tube.” Hint: most of the time, the recipe approach comes from copying down the steps of the procedure from your lab manual, so you may want to draft the Methods section initially without consulting your manual. Later, of course, you can go back and fill in any part of the procedure you inadvertently overlooked.
- Past tense: Remember that you’re describing what happened, so you should use past tense to refer to everything you did during the experiment. Writers are often tempted to use the imperative (“Add 5 g of the solid to the solution”) because that’s how their lab manuals are worded; less frequently, they use present tense (“5 g of the solid are added to the solution”). Instead, remember that you’re talking about an event which happened at a particular time in the past, and which has already ended by the time you start writing, so simple past tense will be appropriate in this section (“5 g of the solid were added to the solution” or “We added 5 g of the solid to the solution”).
- Active: We heated the solution to 80°C. (The subject, “we,” performs the action, heating.)
- Passive: The solution was heated to 80°C. (The subject, “solution,” doesn’t do the heating–it is acted upon, not acting.)
Increasingly, especially in the social sciences, using first person and active voice is acceptable in scientific reports. Most readers find that this style of writing conveys information more clearly and concisely. This rhetorical choice thus brings two scientific values into conflict: objectivity versus clarity. Since the scientific community hasn’t reached a consensus about which style it prefers, you may want to ask your lab instructor.
How do I write a strong Results section?
Here’s a paradox for you. The Results section is often both the shortest (yay!) and most important (uh-oh!) part of your report. Your Materials and Methods section shows how you obtained the results, and your Discussion section explores the significance of the results, so clearly the Results section forms the backbone of the lab report. This section provides the most critical information about your experiment: the data that allow you to discuss how your hypothesis was or wasn’t supported. But it doesn’t provide anything else, which explains why this section is generally shorter than the others.
Before you write this section, look at all the data you collected to figure out what relates significantly to your hypothesis. You’ll want to highlight this material in your Results section. Resist the urge to include every bit of data you collected, since perhaps not all are relevant. Also, don’t try to draw conclusions about the results—save them for the Discussion section. In this section, you’re reporting facts. Nothing your readers can dispute should appear in the Results section.
Most Results sections feature three distinct parts: text, tables, and figures. Let’s consider each part one at a time.
This should be a short paragraph, generally just a few lines, that describes the results you obtained from your experiment. In a relatively simple experiment, one that doesn’t produce a lot of data for you to repeat, the text can represent the entire Results section. Don’t feel that you need to include lots of extraneous detail to compensate for a short (but effective) text; your readers appreciate discrimination more than your ability to recite facts. In a more complex experiment, you may want to use tables and/or figures to help guide your readers toward the most important information you gathered. In that event, you’ll need to refer to each table or figure directly, where appropriate:
“Table 1 lists the rates of solubility for each substance”
“Solubility increased as the temperature of the solution increased (see Figure 1).”
If you do use tables or figures, make sure that you don’t present the same material in both the text and the tables/figures, since in essence you’ll just repeat yourself, probably annoying your readers with the redundancy of your statements.
Feel free to describe trends that emerge as you examine the data. Although identifying trends requires some judgment on your part and so may not feel like factual reporting, no one can deny that these trends do exist, and so they properly belong in the Results section. Example:
“Heating the solution increased the rate of solubility of polar solids by 45% but had no effect on the rate of solubility in solutions containing non-polar solids.”
This point isn’t debatable—you’re just pointing out what the data show.
As in the Materials and Methods section, you want to refer to your data in the past tense, because the events you recorded have already occurred and have finished occurring. In the example above, note the use of “increased” and “had,” rather than “increases” and “has.” (You don’t know from your experiment that heating always increases the solubility of polar solids, but it did that time.)
You shouldn’t put information in the table that also appears in the text. You also shouldn’t use a table to present irrelevant data, just to show you did collect these data during the experiment. Tables are good for some purposes and situations, but not others, so whether and how you’ll use tables depends upon what you need them to accomplish.
Tables are useful ways to show variation in data, but not to present a great deal of unchanging measurements. If you’re dealing with a scientific phenomenon that occurs only within a certain range of temperatures, for example, you don’t need to use a table to show that the phenomenon didn’t occur at any of the other temperatures. How useful is this table?
As you can probably see, no solubility was observed until the trial temperature reached 50°C, a fact that the text part of the Results section could easily convey. The table could then be limited to what happened at 50°C and higher, thus better illustrating the differences in solubility rates when solubility did occur.
As a rule, try not to use a table to describe any experimental event you can cover in one sentence of text. Here’s an example of an unnecessary table from How to Write and Publish a Scientific Paper , by Robert A. Day:
As Day notes, all the information in this table can be summarized in one sentence: “S. griseus, S. coelicolor, S. everycolor, and S. rainbowenski grew under aerobic conditions, whereas S. nocolor and S. greenicus required anaerobic conditions.” Most readers won’t find the table clearer than that one sentence.
When you do have reason to tabulate material, pay attention to the clarity and readability of the format you use. Here are a few tips:
- Number your table. Then, when you refer to the table in the text, use that number to tell your readers which table they can review to clarify the material.
- Give your table a title. This title should be descriptive enough to communicate the contents of the table, but not so long that it becomes difficult to follow. The titles in the sample tables above are acceptable.
- Arrange your table so that readers read vertically, not horizontally. For the most part, this rule means that you should construct your table so that like elements read down, not across. Think about what you want your readers to compare, and put that information in the column (up and down) rather than in the row (across). Usually, the point of comparison will be the numerical data you collect, so especially make sure you have columns of numbers, not rows.Here’s an example of how drastically this decision affects the readability of your table (from A Short Guide to Writing about Chemistry , by Herbert Beall and John Trimbur). Look at this table, which presents the relevant data in horizontal rows:
It’s a little tough to see the trends that the author presumably wants to present in this table. Compare this table, in which the data appear vertically:
The second table shows how putting like elements in a vertical column makes for easier reading. In this case, the like elements are the measurements of length and height, over five trials–not, as in the first table, the length and height measurements for each trial.
- Make sure to include units of measurement in the tables. Readers might be able to guess that you measured something in millimeters, but don’t make them try.
- Don’t use vertical lines as part of the format for your table. This convention exists because journals prefer not to have to reproduce these lines because the tables then become more expensive to print. Even though it’s fairly unlikely that you’ll be sending your Biology 11 lab report to Science for publication, your readers still have this expectation. Consequently, if you use the table-drawing option in your word-processing software, choose the option that doesn’t rely on a “grid” format (which includes vertical lines).
How do I include figures in my report?
Although tables can be useful ways of showing trends in the results you obtained, figures (i.e., illustrations) can do an even better job of emphasizing such trends. Lab report writers often use graphic representations of the data they collected to provide their readers with a literal picture of how the experiment went.
When should you use a figure?
Remember the circumstances under which you don’t need a table: when you don’t have a great deal of data or when the data you have don’t vary a lot. Under the same conditions, you would probably forgo the figure as well, since the figure would be unlikely to provide your readers with an additional perspective. Scientists really don’t like their time wasted, so they tend not to respond favorably to redundancy.
If you’re trying to decide between using a table and creating a figure to present your material, consider the following a rule of thumb. The strength of a table lies in its ability to supply large amounts of exact data, whereas the strength of a figure is its dramatic illustration of important trends within the experiment. If you feel that your readers won’t get the full impact of the results you obtained just by looking at the numbers, then a figure might be appropriate.
Of course, an undergraduate class may expect you to create a figure for your lab experiment, if only to make sure that you can do so effectively. If this is the case, then don’t worry about whether to use figures or not—concentrate instead on how best to accomplish your task.
Figures can include maps, photographs, pen-and-ink drawings, flow charts, bar graphs, and section graphs (“pie charts”). But the most common figure by far, especially for undergraduates, is the line graph, so we’ll focus on that type in this handout.
At the undergraduate level, you can often draw and label your graphs by hand, provided that the result is clear, legible, and drawn to scale. Computer technology has, however, made creating line graphs a lot easier. Most word-processing software has a number of functions for transferring data into graph form; many scientists have found Microsoft Excel, for example, a helpful tool in graphing results. If you plan on pursuing a career in the sciences, it may be well worth your while to learn to use a similar program.
Computers can’t, however, decide for you how your graph really works; you have to know how to design your graph to meet your readers’ expectations. Here are some of these expectations:
- Keep it as simple as possible. You may be tempted to signal the complexity of the information you gathered by trying to design a graph that accounts for that complexity. But remember the purpose of your graph: to dramatize your results in a manner that’s easy to see and grasp. Try not to make the reader stare at the graph for a half hour to find the important line among the mass of other lines. For maximum effectiveness, limit yourself to three to five lines per graph; if you have more data to demonstrate, use a set of graphs to account for it, rather than trying to cram it all into a single figure.
- Plot the independent variable on the horizontal (x) axis and the dependent variable on the vertical (y) axis. Remember that the independent variable is the condition that you manipulated during the experiment and the dependent variable is the condition that you measured to see if it changed along with the independent variable. Placing the variables along their respective axes is mostly just a convention, but since your readers are accustomed to viewing graphs in this way, you’re better off not challenging the convention in your report.
- Label each axis carefully, and be especially careful to include units of measure. You need to make sure that your readers understand perfectly well what your graph indicates.
- Number and title your graphs. As with tables, the title of the graph should be informative but concise, and you should refer to your graph by number in the text (e.g., “Figure 1 shows the increase in the solubility rate as a function of temperature”).
- Many editors of professional scientific journals prefer that writers distinguish the lines in their graphs by attaching a symbol to them, usually a geometric shape (triangle, square, etc.), and using that symbol throughout the curve of the line. Generally, readers have a hard time distinguishing dotted lines from dot-dash lines from straight lines, so you should consider staying away from this system. Editors don’t usually like different-colored lines within a graph because colors are difficult and expensive to reproduce; colors may, however, be great for your purposes, as long as you’re not planning to submit your paper to Nature. Use your discretion—try to employ whichever technique dramatizes the results most effectively.
- Try to gather data at regular intervals, so the plot points on your graph aren’t too far apart. You can’t be sure of the arc you should draw between the plot points if the points are located at the far corners of the graph; over a fifteen-minute interval, perhaps the change occurred in the first or last thirty seconds of that period (in which case your straight-line connection between the points is misleading).
- If you’re worried that you didn’t collect data at sufficiently regular intervals during your experiment, go ahead and connect the points with a straight line, but you may want to examine this problem as part of your Discussion section.
- Make your graph large enough so that everything is legible and clearly demarcated, but not so large that it either overwhelms the rest of the Results section or provides a far greater range than you need to illustrate your point. If, for example, the seedlings of your plant grew only 15 mm during the trial, you don’t need to construct a graph that accounts for 100 mm of growth. The lines in your graph should more or less fill the space created by the axes; if you see that your data is confined to the lower left portion of the graph, you should probably re-adjust your scale.
- If you create a set of graphs, make them the same size and format, including all the verbal and visual codes (captions, symbols, scale, etc.). You want to be as consistent as possible in your illustrations, so that your readers can easily make the comparisons you’re trying to get them to see.
How do I write a strong Discussion section?
The discussion section is probably the least formalized part of the report, in that you can’t really apply the same structure to every type of experiment. In simple terms, here you tell your readers what to make of the Results you obtained. If you have done the Results part well, your readers should already recognize the trends in the data and have a fairly clear idea of whether your hypothesis was supported. Because the Results can seem so self-explanatory, many students find it difficult to know what material to add in this last section.
Basically, the Discussion contains several parts, in no particular order, but roughly moving from specific (i.e., related to your experiment only) to general (how your findings fit in the larger scientific community). In this section, you will, as a rule, need to:
Explain whether the data support your hypothesis
- Acknowledge any anomalous data or deviations from what you expected
Derive conclusions, based on your findings, about the process you’re studying
- Relate your findings to earlier work in the same area (if you can)
Explore the theoretical and/or practical implications of your findings
Let’s look at some dos and don’ts for each of these objectives.
This statement is usually a good way to begin the Discussion, since you can’t effectively speak about the larger scientific value of your study until you’ve figured out the particulars of this experiment. You might begin this part of the Discussion by explicitly stating the relationships or correlations your data indicate between the independent and dependent variables. Then you can show more clearly why you believe your hypothesis was or was not supported. For example, if you tested solubility at various temperatures, you could start this section by noting that the rates of solubility increased as the temperature increased. If your initial hypothesis surmised that temperature change would not affect solubility, you would then say something like,
“The hypothesis that temperature change would not affect solubility was not supported by the data.”
Note: Students tend to view labs as practical tests of undeniable scientific truths. As a result, you may want to say that the hypothesis was “proved” or “disproved” or that it was “correct” or “incorrect.” These terms, however, reflect a degree of certainty that you as a scientist aren’t supposed to have. Remember, you’re testing a theory with a procedure that lasts only a few hours and relies on only a few trials, which severely compromises your ability to be sure about the “truth” you see. Words like “supported,” “indicated,” and “suggested” are more acceptable ways to evaluate your hypothesis.
Also, recognize that saying whether the data supported your hypothesis or not involves making a claim to be defended. As such, you need to show the readers that this claim is warranted by the evidence. Make sure that you’re very explicit about the relationship between the evidence and the conclusions you draw from it. This process is difficult for many writers because we don’t often justify conclusions in our regular lives. For example, you might nudge your friend at a party and whisper, “That guy’s drunk,” and once your friend lays eyes on the person in question, she might readily agree. In a scientific paper, by contrast, you would need to defend your claim more thoroughly by pointing to data such as slurred words, unsteady gait, and the lampshade-as-hat. In addition to pointing out these details, you would also need to show how (according to previous studies) these signs are consistent with inebriation, especially if they occur in conjunction with one another. To put it another way, tell your readers exactly how you got from point A (was the hypothesis supported?) to point B (yes/no).
Acknowledge any anomalous data, or deviations from what you expected
You need to take these exceptions and divergences into account, so that you qualify your conclusions sufficiently. For obvious reasons, your readers will doubt your authority if you (deliberately or inadvertently) overlook a key piece of data that doesn’t square with your perspective on what occurred. In a more philosophical sense, once you’ve ignored evidence that contradicts your claims, you’ve departed from the scientific method. The urge to “tidy up” the experiment is often strong, but if you give in to it you’re no longer performing good science.
Sometimes after you’ve performed a study or experiment, you realize that some part of the methods you used to test your hypothesis was flawed. In that case, it’s OK to suggest that if you had the chance to conduct your test again, you might change the design in this or that specific way in order to avoid such and such a problem. The key to making this approach work, though, is to be very precise about the weakness in your experiment, why and how you think that weakness might have affected your data, and how you would alter your protocol to eliminate—or limit the effects of—that weakness. Often, inexperienced researchers and writers feel the need to account for “wrong” data (remember, there’s no such animal), and so they speculate wildly about what might have screwed things up. These speculations include such factors as the unusually hot temperature in the room, or the possibility that their lab partners read the meters wrong, or the potentially defective equipment. These explanations are what scientists call “cop-outs,” or “lame”; don’t indicate that the experiment had a weakness unless you’re fairly certain that a) it really occurred and b) you can explain reasonably well how that weakness affected your results.
If, for example, your hypothesis dealt with the changes in solubility at different temperatures, then try to figure out what you can rationally say about the process of solubility more generally. If you’re doing an undergraduate lab, chances are that the lab will connect in some way to the material you’ve been covering either in lecture or in your reading, so you might choose to return to these resources as a way to help you think clearly about the process as a whole.
This part of the Discussion section is another place where you need to make sure that you’re not overreaching. Again, nothing you’ve found in one study would remotely allow you to claim that you now “know” something, or that something isn’t “true,” or that your experiment “confirmed” some principle or other. Hesitate before you go out on a limb—it’s dangerous! Use less absolutely conclusive language, including such words as “suggest,” “indicate,” “correspond,” “possibly,” “challenge,” etc.
Relate your findings to previous work in the field (if possible)
We’ve been talking about how to show that you belong in a particular community (such as biologists or anthropologists) by writing within conventions that they recognize and accept. Another is to try to identify a conversation going on among members of that community, and use your work to contribute to that conversation. In a larger philosophical sense, scientists can’t fully understand the value of their research unless they have some sense of the context that provoked and nourished it. That is, you have to recognize what’s new about your project (potentially, anyway) and how it benefits the wider body of scientific knowledge. On a more pragmatic level, especially for undergraduates, connecting your lab work to previous research will demonstrate to the TA that you see the big picture. You have an opportunity, in the Discussion section, to distinguish yourself from the students in your class who aren’t thinking beyond the barest facts of the study. Capitalize on this opportunity by putting your own work in context.
If you’re just beginning to work in the natural sciences (as a first-year biology or chemistry student, say), most likely the work you’ll be doing has already been performed and re-performed to a satisfactory degree. Hence, you could probably point to a similar experiment or study and compare/contrast your results and conclusions. More advanced work may deal with an issue that is somewhat less “resolved,” and so previous research may take the form of an ongoing debate, and you can use your own work to weigh in on that debate. If, for example, researchers are hotly disputing the value of herbal remedies for the common cold, and the results of your study suggest that Echinacea diminishes the symptoms but not the actual presence of the cold, then you might want to take some time in the Discussion section to recapitulate the specifics of the dispute as it relates to Echinacea as an herbal remedy. (Consider that you have probably already written in the Introduction about this debate as background research.)
This information is often the best way to end your Discussion (and, for all intents and purposes, the report). In argumentative writing generally, you want to use your closing words to convey the main point of your writing. This main point can be primarily theoretical (“Now that you understand this information, you’re in a better position to understand this larger issue”) or primarily practical (“You can use this information to take such and such an action”). In either case, the concluding statements help the reader to comprehend the significance of your project and your decision to write about it.
Since a lab report is argumentative—after all, you’re investigating a claim, and judging the legitimacy of that claim by generating and collecting evidence—it’s often a good idea to end your report with the same technique for establishing your main point. If you want to go the theoretical route, you might talk about the consequences your study has for the field or phenomenon you’re investigating. To return to the examples regarding solubility, you could end by reflecting on what your work on solubility as a function of temperature tells us (potentially) about solubility in general. (Some folks consider this type of exploration “pure” as opposed to “applied” science, although these labels can be problematic.) If you want to go the practical route, you could end by speculating about the medical, institutional, or commercial implications of your findings—in other words, answer the question, “What can this study help people to do?” In either case, you’re going to make your readers’ experience more satisfying, by helping them see why they spent their time learning what you had to teach them.
Works consulted
We consulted these works while writing this handout. This is not a comprehensive list of resources on the handout’s topic, and we encourage you to do your own research to find additional publications. Please do not use this list as a model for the format of your own reference list, as it may not match the citation style you are using. For guidance on formatting citations, please see the UNC Libraries citation tutorial . We revise these tips periodically and welcome feedback.
American Psychological Association. 2010. Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association . 6th ed. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
Beall, Herbert, and John Trimbur. 2001. A Short Guide to Writing About Chemistry , 2nd ed. New York: Longman.
Blum, Deborah, and Mary Knudson. 1997. A Field Guide for Science Writers: The Official Guide of the National Association of Science Writers . New York: Oxford University Press.
Booth, Wayne C., Gregory G. Colomb, Joseph M. Williams, Joseph Bizup, and William T. FitzGerald. 2016. The Craft of Research , 4th ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Briscoe, Mary Helen. 1996. Preparing Scientific Illustrations: A Guide to Better Posters, Presentations, and Publications , 2nd ed. New York: Springer-Verlag.
Council of Science Editors. 2014. Scientific Style and Format: The CSE Manual for Authors, Editors, and Publishers , 8th ed. Chicago & London: University of Chicago Press.
Davis, Martha. 2012. Scientific Papers and Presentations , 3rd ed. London: Academic Press.
Day, Robert A. 1994. How to Write and Publish a Scientific Paper , 4th ed. Phoenix: Oryx Press.
Porush, David. 1995. A Short Guide to Writing About Science . New York: Longman.
Williams, Joseph, and Joseph Bizup. 2017. Style: Lessons in Clarity and Grace , 12th ed. Boston: Pearson.
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How To Write A Lab Report | Step-by-Step Guide & Examples
Published on May 20, 2021 by Pritha Bhandari . Revised on July 15, 2022.
A lab report conveys the aim, methods, results, and conclusions of a scientific experiment. The main purpose of a lab report is to demonstrate your understanding of the scientific method by performing and evaluating a hands-on lab experiment. This type of assignment is usually shorter than a research paper .
Lab reports are commonly used in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields. This article focuses on how to structure and write a lab report.
Table of contents
Structuring a lab report, introduction, frequently asked questions about lab reports.
The sections of a lab report can vary between scientific fields and course requirements, but they usually contain the purpose, methods, and findings of a lab experiment .
Each section of a lab report has its own purpose.
- Title: expresses the topic of your study
- Abstract : summarizes your research aims, methods, results, and conclusions
- Introduction: establishes the context needed to understand the topic
- Method: describes the materials and procedures used in the experiment
- Results: reports all descriptive and inferential statistical analyses
- Discussion: interprets and evaluates results and identifies limitations
- Conclusion: sums up the main findings of your experiment
- References: list of all sources cited using a specific style (e.g. APA )
- Appendices : contains lengthy materials, procedures, tables or figures
Although most lab reports contain these sections, some sections can be omitted or combined with others. For example, some lab reports contain a brief section on research aims instead of an introduction, and a separate conclusion is not always required.
If you’re not sure, it’s best to check your lab report requirements with your instructor.
Your title provides the first impression of your lab report – effective titles communicate the topic and/or the findings of your study in specific terms.
Create a title that directly conveys the main focus or purpose of your study. It doesn’t need to be creative or thought-provoking, but it should be informative.
- The effects of varying nitrogen levels on tomato plant height.
- Testing the universality of the McGurk effect.
- Comparing the viscosity of common liquids found in kitchens.
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An abstract condenses a lab report into a brief overview of about 150–300 words. It should provide readers with a compact version of the research aims, the methods and materials used, the main results, and the final conclusion.
Think of it as a way of giving readers a preview of your full lab report. Write the abstract last, in the past tense, after you’ve drafted all the other sections of your report, so you’ll be able to succinctly summarize each section.
To write a lab report abstract, use these guiding questions:
- What is the wider context of your study?
- What research question were you trying to answer?
- How did you perform the experiment?
- What did your results show?
- How did you interpret your results?
- What is the importance of your findings?
Nitrogen is a necessary nutrient for high quality plants. Tomatoes, one of the most consumed fruits worldwide, rely on nitrogen for healthy leaves and stems to grow fruit. This experiment tested whether nitrogen levels affected tomato plant height in a controlled setting. It was expected that higher levels of nitrogen fertilizer would yield taller tomato plants.
Levels of nitrogen fertilizer were varied between three groups of tomato plants. The control group did not receive any nitrogen fertilizer, while one experimental group received low levels of nitrogen fertilizer, and a second experimental group received high levels of nitrogen fertilizer. All plants were grown from seeds, and heights were measured 50 days into the experiment.
The effects of nitrogen levels on plant height were tested between groups using an ANOVA. The plants with the highest level of nitrogen fertilizer were the tallest, while the plants with low levels of nitrogen exceeded the control group plants in height. In line with expectations and previous findings, the effects of nitrogen levels on plant height were statistically significant. This study strengthens the importance of nitrogen for tomato plants.
Your lab report introduction should set the scene for your experiment. One way to write your introduction is with a funnel (an inverted triangle) structure:
- Start with the broad, general research topic
- Narrow your topic down your specific study focus
- End with a clear research question
Begin by providing background information on your research topic and explaining why it’s important in a broad real-world or theoretical context. Describe relevant previous research on your topic and note how your study may confirm it or expand it, or fill a gap in the research field.
This lab experiment builds on previous research from Haque, Paul, and Sarker (2011), who demonstrated that tomato plant yield increased at higher levels of nitrogen. However, the present research focuses on plant height as a growth indicator and uses a lab-controlled setting instead.
Next, go into detail on the theoretical basis for your study and describe any directly relevant laws or equations that you’ll be using. State your main research aims and expectations by outlining your hypotheses .
Based on the importance of nitrogen for tomato plants, the primary hypothesis was that the plants with the high levels of nitrogen would grow the tallest. The secondary hypothesis was that plants with low levels of nitrogen would grow taller than plants with no nitrogen.
Your introduction doesn’t need to be long, but you may need to organize it into a few paragraphs or with subheadings such as “Research Context” or “Research Aims.”
A lab report Method section details the steps you took to gather and analyze data. Give enough detail so that others can follow or evaluate your procedures. Write this section in the past tense. If you need to include any long lists of procedural steps or materials, place them in the Appendices section but refer to them in the text here.
You should describe your experimental design, your subjects, materials, and specific procedures used for data collection and analysis.
Experimental design
Briefly note whether your experiment is a within-subjects or between-subjects design, and describe how your sample units were assigned to conditions if relevant.
A between-subjects design with three groups of tomato plants was used. The control group did not receive any nitrogen fertilizer. The first experimental group received a low level of nitrogen fertilizer, while the second experimental group received a high level of nitrogen fertilizer.
Describe human subjects in terms of demographic characteristics, and animal or plant subjects in terms of genetic background. Note the total number of subjects as well as the number of subjects per condition or per group. You should also state how you recruited subjects for your study.
List the equipment or materials you used to gather data and state the model names for any specialized equipment.
List of materials
35 Tomato seeds
15 plant pots (15 cm tall)
Light lamps (50,000 lux)
Nitrogen fertilizer
Measuring tape
Describe your experimental settings and conditions in detail. You can provide labelled diagrams or images of the exact set-up necessary for experimental equipment. State how extraneous variables were controlled through restriction or by fixing them at a certain level (e.g., keeping the lab at room temperature).
Light levels were fixed throughout the experiment, and the plants were exposed to 12 hours of light a day. Temperature was restricted to between 23 and 25℃. The pH and carbon levels of the soil were also held constant throughout the experiment as these variables could influence plant height. The plants were grown in rooms free of insects or other pests, and they were spaced out adequately.
Your experimental procedure should describe the exact steps you took to gather data in chronological order. You’ll need to provide enough information so that someone else can replicate your procedure, but you should also be concise. Place detailed information in the appendices where appropriate.
In a lab experiment, you’ll often closely follow a lab manual to gather data. Some instructors will allow you to simply reference the manual and state whether you changed any steps based on practical considerations. Other instructors may want you to rewrite the lab manual procedures as complete sentences in coherent paragraphs, while noting any changes to the steps that you applied in practice.
If you’re performing extensive data analysis, be sure to state your planned analysis methods as well. This includes the types of tests you’ll perform and any programs or software you’ll use for calculations (if relevant).
First, tomato seeds were sown in wooden flats containing soil about 2 cm below the surface. Each seed was kept 3-5 cm apart. The flats were covered to keep the soil moist until germination. The seedlings were removed and transplanted to pots 8 days later, with a maximum of 2 plants to a pot. Each pot was watered once a day to keep the soil moist.
The nitrogen fertilizer treatment was applied to the plant pots 12 days after transplantation. The control group received no treatment, while the first experimental group received a low concentration, and the second experimental group received a high concentration. There were 5 pots in each group, and each plant pot was labelled to indicate the group the plants belonged to.
50 days after the start of the experiment, plant height was measured for all plants. A measuring tape was used to record the length of the plant from ground level to the top of the tallest leaf.
In your results section, you should report the results of any statistical analysis procedures that you undertook. You should clearly state how the results of statistical tests support or refute your initial hypotheses.
The main results to report include:
- any descriptive statistics
- statistical test results
- the significance of the test results
- estimates of standard error or confidence intervals
The mean heights of the plants in the control group, low nitrogen group, and high nitrogen groups were 20.3, 25.1, and 29.6 cm respectively. A one-way ANOVA was applied to calculate the effect of nitrogen fertilizer level on plant height. The results demonstrated statistically significant ( p = .03) height differences between groups.
Next, post-hoc tests were performed to assess the primary and secondary hypotheses. In support of the primary hypothesis, the high nitrogen group plants were significantly taller than the low nitrogen group and the control group plants. Similarly, the results supported the secondary hypothesis: the low nitrogen plants were taller than the control group plants.
These results can be reported in the text or in tables and figures. Use text for highlighting a few key results, but present large sets of numbers in tables, or show relationships between variables with graphs.
You should also include sample calculations in the Results section for complex experiments. For each sample calculation, provide a brief description of what it does and use clear symbols. Present your raw data in the Appendices section and refer to it to highlight any outliers or trends.
The Discussion section will help demonstrate your understanding of the experimental process and your critical thinking skills.
In this section, you can:
- Interpret your results
- Compare your findings with your expectations
- Identify any sources of experimental error
- Explain any unexpected results
- Suggest possible improvements for further studies
Interpreting your results involves clarifying how your results help you answer your main research question. Report whether your results support your hypotheses.
- Did you measure what you sought out to measure?
- Were your analysis procedures appropriate for this type of data?
Compare your findings with other research and explain any key differences in findings.
- Are your results in line with those from previous studies or your classmates’ results? Why or why not?
An effective Discussion section will also highlight the strengths and limitations of a study.
- Did you have high internal validity or reliability?
- How did you establish these aspects of your study?
When describing limitations, use specific examples. For example, if random error contributed substantially to the measurements in your study, state the particular sources of error (e.g., imprecise apparatus) and explain ways to improve them.
The results support the hypothesis that nitrogen levels affect plant height, with increasing levels producing taller plants. These statistically significant results are taken together with previous research to support the importance of nitrogen as a nutrient for tomato plant growth.
However, unlike previous studies, this study focused on plant height as an indicator of plant growth in the present experiment. Importantly, plant height may not always reflect plant health or fruit yield, so measuring other indicators would have strengthened the study findings.
Another limitation of the study is the plant height measurement technique, as the measuring tape was not suitable for plants with extreme curvature. Future studies may focus on measuring plant height in different ways.
The main strengths of this study were the controls for extraneous variables, such as pH and carbon levels of the soil. All other factors that could affect plant height were tightly controlled to isolate the effects of nitrogen levels, resulting in high internal validity for this study.
Your conclusion should be the final section of your lab report. Here, you’ll summarize the findings of your experiment, with a brief overview of the strengths and limitations, and implications of your study for further research.
Some lab reports may omit a Conclusion section because it overlaps with the Discussion section, but you should check with your instructor before doing so.
A lab report conveys the aim, methods, results, and conclusions of a scientific experiment . Lab reports are commonly assigned in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields.
The purpose of a lab report is to demonstrate your understanding of the scientific method with a hands-on lab experiment. Course instructors will often provide you with an experimental design and procedure. Your task is to write up how you actually performed the experiment and evaluate the outcome.
In contrast, a research paper requires you to independently develop an original argument. It involves more in-depth research and interpretation of sources and data.
A lab report is usually shorter than a research paper.
The sections of a lab report can vary between scientific fields and course requirements, but it usually contains the following:
- Abstract: summarizes your research aims, methods, results, and conclusions
- References: list of all sources cited using a specific style (e.g. APA)
- Appendices: contains lengthy materials, procedures, tables or figures
The results chapter or section simply and objectively reports what you found, without speculating on why you found these results. The discussion interprets the meaning of the results, puts them in context, and explains why they matter.
In qualitative research , results and discussion are sometimes combined. But in quantitative research , it’s considered important to separate the objective results from your interpretation of them.
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How to Write a Scientific Report | Step-by-Step Guide
- How to Write a Scientific Report | Step-by-Step Guide1111
Matrix Blog
Science 7-10.
Got to document an experiment but don't know how? In this post, we'll guide you step-by-step through how to write a scientific report and provide you with an example.
Is your teacher expecting you to write an experimental report for every class experiment? Are you still unsure about how to write a scientific report properly? Don’t fear! We will guide you through all the parts of a scientific report, step-by-step.
How to write a scientific report:
- What is a scientific report
- General rules to write Scientific reports
- Syllabus dot point
- Introduction/Background information
- Risk assessment
What is a scientific report?
A scientific report documents all aspects of an experimental investigation. This includes:
- The aim of the experiment
- The hypothesis
- An introduction to the relevant background theory
- The methods used
- The results
- A discussion of the results
- The conclusion
Scientific reports allow their readers to understand the experiment without doing it themselves. In addition, scientific reports give others the opportunity to check the methodology of the experiment to ensure the validity of the results.
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A scientific report is written in several stages. We write the introduction, aim, and hypothesis before performing the experiment, record the results during the experiment, and complete the discussion and conclusions after the experiment.
But, before we delve deeper into how to write a scientific report, we need to have a science experiment to write about! Read our 7 Simple Experiments You Can Do At Home article and see which one you want to do.
General rules about writing scientific reports
Learning how to write a scientific report is different from writing English essays or speeches!
You have to use:
- Passive voice (which you should avoid when writing for other subjects like English!)
- Past-tense language
- Headings and subheadings
- A pencil to draw scientific diagrams and graphs
- Simple and clear lines for scientific diagrams
- Tables and graphs where necessary
Structure of scientific reports:
Now that you know the general rules on how to write scientific reports, let’s look at the conventions for their structure!
The title should simply introduce what your experiment is about.
The Role of Light in Photosynthesis
2. Introduction/Background information
Write a paragraph that gives your readers background information to understand your experiment.
This includes explaining scientific theories, processes and other related knowledge.
Photosynthesis is a vital process for life. It occurs when plants intake carbon dioxide, water, and light, and results in the production of glucose and water. The light required for photosynthesis is absorbed by chlorophyll, the green pigment of plants, which is contained in the chloroplasts.
The glucose produced through photosynthesis is stored as starch, which is used as an energy source for the plant and its consumers.
The presence of starch in the leaves of a plant indicates that photosynthesis has occurred.
The aim identifies what is going to be tested in the experiment. This should be short, concise and clear.
The aim of the experiment is to test whether light is required for photosynthesis to occur.
4. Hypothesis
The hypothesis is a prediction of the outcome of the experiment. You have to use background information to make an educated prediction.
It is predicted that photosynthesis will occur only in leaves that are exposed to light and not in leaves that are not exposed to light. This will be indicated by the presence or absence of starch in the leaves.
5. Risk assessment
Identify the hazards associated with the experiment and provide a method to prevent or minimise the risks. A hazard is something that can cause harm, and the risk is the likelihood that harm will occur from the hazard.
A table is an excellent way to present your risk assessment.
Remember, you have to specify the type of harm that can occur because of the hazard. It is not enough to simply identify the hazard.
- Do not write: “Scissors are sharp”
- Instead, you have to write: “Scissors are sharp and can cause injury”
The method has 3 parts:
- A list of every material used
- Steps of what you did in the experiment
- A scientific diagram of the experimental apparatus
Let’s break down what you need to do for each section.
6a. Materials
This must list every piece of equipment and material you used in the experiment.
Remember, you need to also specify the amount of each material you used.
- 1 geranium plant
- Aluminium foil
- 2 test tubes
- 1 test tube rack
- 1 pair of scissors
- 1 250 mL beaker
- 1 pair of forceps
- 1 10 mL measuring cylinder
- Iodine solution (5 mL)
- Methylated spirit (50ml)
- Boiling water
- 2 Petri dishes
The rule of thumb is that you should write the method in a clear way so that readers are able to repeat the experiment and get similar results.
Using a numbered list for the steps of your experimental procedure is much clearer than writing a whole paragraph of text. The steps should:
- Be written in a sequential order, based on when they were performed.
- Specify any equipment that was used.
- Specify the quantity of any materials that were used.
You also need to use past tense and passive voice when you are writing your method. Scientific reports are supposed to show the readers what you did in the experiment, not what you will do.
- Aluminium foil was used to fully cover a leaf of the geranium plant. The plant was left in the sun for three days.
- On the third day, the covered leaf and 1 non-covered leaf were collected from the plant. The foil was removed from the covered leaf, and a 1 cm square was cut from each leaf using a pair of scissors.
- 150 mL of water was boiled in a kettle and poured into a 250 mL beaker.
- Using forceps, the 1 cm square of covered leaf was placed into the beaker of boiling water for 2 minutes. It was then placed in a test tube labelled “dark”.
- The water in the beaker was discarded and replaced with 150 mL of freshly boiled water.
- Using forceps, the 1 cm square non-covered leaf was placed into the beaker of boiling water for 2 minutes. It was then placed in a test tube labelled “light”
- 5 mL of methylated spirit was measured with a measuring cylinder and poured into each test tube so that the leaves were fully covered.
- The water in the beaker was replaced with 150 mL of freshly boiled water and both the “light” and “dark” test tubes were immersed in the beaker of boiling water for 5 minutes.
- The leaves were collected from each test tube with forceps, rinsed under cold running water, and placed onto separate labelled Petri dishes.
- 3 drops of iodine solution were added to each leaf.
- Both Petri dishes were placed side by side and observations were recorded.
- The experiment was repeated 5 times, and results were compared between different groups.
6c. Diagram
After you finish your steps, it is time to draw your scientific diagrams! Here are some rules for drawing scientific diagrams:
- Always use a pencil to draw your scientific diagrams.
- Use simple, sharp, 2D lines and shapes to draw your diagram. Don’t draw 3D shapes or use shading.
- Label everything in your diagram.
- Use thin, straight lines to label your diagram. Do not use arrows.
- Ensure that the label lines touch the outline of the equipment you are labelling and not cross over it or stop short of it
- The label lines should never cross over each other.
- Use a ruler for any straight lines in your diagram.
- Draw a sufficiently large diagram so all components can be seen clearly.
This is where you document the results of your experiment. The data that you record for your experiment will generally be qualitative and/or quantitative.
Qualitative data is data that relates to qualities and is based on observations (qualitative – quality). This type of data is descriptive and is recorded in words. For example, the colour changed from green to orange, or the liquid became hot.
Quantitative data refers to numerical data (quantitative – quantity). This type of data is recorded using numbers and is either measured or counted. For example, the plant grew 5.2 cm, or there were 5 frogs.
You also need to record your results in an appropriate way. Most of the time, a table is the best way to do this.
Here are some rules to using tables
- Use a pencil and a ruler to draw your table
- Draw neat and straight lines
- Ensure that the table is closed (connect all your lines)
- Don’t cross your lines (erase any lines that stick out of the table)
- Use appropriate columns and rows
- Properly name each column and row (including the units of measurement in brackets)
- Do not write your units in the body of your table (units belong in the header)
- Always include a title
Note : If your results require calculations, clearly write each step.
Observations of the effects of light on the amount of starch in plant leaves.
If quantitative data was recorded, the data is often also plotted on a graph.
8. Discussion
The discussion is where you analyse and interpret your results, and identify any experimental errors or possible areas of improvements.
You should divide your discussion as follows.
1. Trend in the results
Describe the ‘trend’ in your results. That is, the relationship you observed between your independent and dependent variables.
The independent variable is the variable that you are changing in the experiment. In this experiment, it is the amount of light that the leaves are exposed to.
The dependent variable is the variable that you are measuring in the experiment, In this experiment, it is the presence of starch in the leaves.
Explain how a particular result is achieved by referring to scientific knowledge, theories and any other scientific resources you find. 2. Scientific explanation:
The presence of starch is indicated when the addition of iodine causes the leaf to turn dark purple. The results show that starch was present in the leaves that were exposed to light, while the leaves that were not exposed to light did not contain starch.
2. Scientific explanation:
Provide an explanation of the results using scientific knowledge, theories and any other scientific resources you find.
As starch is produced during photosynthesis, these results show that light plays a key role in photosynthesis.
3. Validity
Validity refers to whether or not your results are valid. This can be done by examining your variables.
VA lidity = VA riables
Identify the independent, dependent, controlled variables and the control experiment (if you have one).
The controlled variables are the variables that you keep the same across all tests e.g. the size of the leaf sample.
The control experiment is where you don’t apply an independent variable. It is untouched for the whole experiment.
Ensure that you never change more than one variable at a time!
The independent variable of the experiment was amount of light that the leaves were exposed to (the covered and uncovered geranium leaf), while the dependent variable was the presence of starch. The controlled variables were the size of the leaf sample, the duration of the experiment, the amount of time the solutions were heated, and the amount of iodine solution used.
4. Reliability
Identify how you ensured the reliability of the results.
RE liability = RE petition
Show that you repeated your experiments, cross-checked your results with other groups or collated your results with the class.
The reliability of the results was ensured by repeating the experiment 5 times and comparing results with other groups. Since other groups obtained comparable results, the results are reliable.
5. Accuracy
Accuracy should be discussed if your results are in the form of quantitative data, and there is an accepted value for the result.
Accuracy would not be discussed for our example photosynthesis experiment as qualitative data was collected, however it would if we were measuring gravity using a pendulum:
The measured value of gravity was 9.8 m/s 2 , which is in agreement with the accepted value of 9.8 m/s 2 .
6. Possible improvements
Identify any errors or risks found in the experiment and provide a method to improve it.
If there are none, then suggest new ways to improve the experimental design, and/or minimise error and risks.
Possible improvements could be made by including control experiments. For example, testing whether the iodine solution turns dark purple when added to water or methylated spirits. This would help to ensure that the purple colour observed in the experiments is due to the presence of starch in the leaves rather than impurities.
9. Conclusion
State whether the aim was achieved, and if your hypothesis was supported.
The aim of the investigation was achieved, and it was found that light is required for photosynthesis to occur. This was evidenced by the presence of starch in leaves that had been exposed to light, and the absence of starch in leaves that had been unexposed. These results support the proposed hypothesis.
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Formatting Science Reports
This section describes an organizational structure commonly used to report experimental research in many scientific disciplines, the IMRAD format: I ntroduction, M ethods, R esults, And D iscussion.
When and when not to use the IMRAD format
Although most scientific reports use the IMRAD format, there are some exceptions.
This format is usually not used in reports describing other kinds of research, such as field or case studies, in which headings are more likely to differ according to discipline. Although the main headings are standard for many scientific fields, details may vary; check with your instructor, or, if submitting an article to a journal, refer to the instructions to authors.
Developing a Title
Titles should.
- Describe contents clearly and precisely, so that readers can decide whether to read the report
- Provide key words for indexing
Titles should NOT
- Include wasted words such as “studies on,” “an investigation of”
- Use abbreviations and jargon
- Use “cute” language
Good Titles
The Relationship of Luteinizing Hormone to Obesity in the Zucker Rat
Poor Titles
An Investigation of Hormone Secretion and Weight in Rats Fat Rats: Are Their Hormones Different?
The Abstract
The guidelines below address issues to consider when writing an abstract.
What is the report about, in miniature and without specific details?
- State main objectives. (What did you investigate? Why?)
- Describe methods. (What did you do?)
- Summarize the most important results. (What did you find out?)
- State major conclusions and significance. (What do your results mean? So what?)
What to avoid:
- Do not include references to figures, tables, or sources.
- Do not include information not in report.
Additional tips:
- Find out maximum length (may vary from 50 to 300+ words).
- Process: Extract key points from each section. Condense in successive revisions.
The Introduction
Guidelines for effective scientific report introductions.
What is the problem?
- Describe the problem investigated.
- Summarize relevant research to provide context, key terms, and concepts so your reader can understand the experiment.
Why is it important?
- Review relevant research to provide rationale. (What conflict or unanswered question, untested population, untried method in existing research does your experiment address? What findings of others are you challenging or extending?)
What solution (or step toward a solution) do you propose?
- Briefly describe your experiment: hypothesis(es), research question(s); general experimental design or method; justification of method if alternatives exist.
- Move from general to specific: problem in real world/research literature –> your experiment.
- Engage your reader: answer the questions, “What did you do?” “Why should I care?”
- Make clear the links between problem and solution, question asked and research design, prior research and your experiment.
- Be selective, not exhaustive, in choosing studies to cite and amount of detail to include. (In general, the more relevant an article is to your study, the more space it deserves and the later in the Introduction it appears.)
- Ask your instructor whether to summarize results and/or conclusions in the Introduction.
Methods Section
Below are some questions to consider for effective methods sections in scientific reports.
How did you study the problem?
- Briefly explain the general type of scientific procedure you used.
What did you use?
(May be subheaded as Materials)
- Describe what materials, subjects, and equipment (chemicals, experimental animals, apparatus, etc.) you used. (These may be subheaded Animals, Reagents, etc.)
How did you proceed?
(May be subheaded as Methods or Procedures)
- Explain the steps you took in your experiment. (These may be subheaded by experiment, types of assay, etc.)
- Provide enough detail for replication. For a journal article, include, for example, genus, species, strain of organisms; their source, living conditions, and care; and sources (manufacturer, location) of chemicals and apparatus.
- Order procedures chronologically or by type of procedure (subheaded) and chronologically within type.
- Use past tense to describe what you did.
- Quantify when possible: concentrations, measurements, amounts (all metric); times (24-hour clock); temperatures (centigrade)
- Don’t include details of common statistical procedures.
- Don’t mix results with procedures.
Results Section
The section below offers some questions asked for effective results sections in scientific reports.
What did you observe?
For each experiment or procedure:
- Briefly describe experiment without detail of Methods section (a sentence or two).
- Representative: most common
- Best Case: best example of ideal or exception
- from most to least important
- from simple to complex
- organ by organ; chemical class by chemical class
- Use past tense to describe what happened.
- Don’t simply repeat table data; select .
- Don’t interpret results.
- Avoid extra words: “It is shown in Table 1 that X induced Y” –> “X induced Y (Table 1).”
Discussion Section
The table below offers some questions effective discussion sections in scientific reports address.
What do your observations mean?
- Summarize the most important findings at the beginning.
What conclusions can you draw?
For each major result:
- Describe the patterns, principles, relationships your results show.
- Explain how your results relate to expectations and to literature cited in your Introduction. Do they agree, contradict, or are they exceptions to the rule?
- Explain plausibly any agreements, contradictions, or exceptions.
- Describe what additional research might resolve contradictions or explain exceptions.
How do your results fit into a broader context?
- Suggest the theoretical implications of your results.
- Suggest practical applications of your results?
- Extend your findings to other situations or other species.
- Give the big picture: do your findings help us understand a broader topic?
- Move from specific to general: your finding(s) –> literature, theory, practice.
- Don’t ignore or bury the major issue. Did the study achieve the goal (resolve the problem, answer the question, support the hypothesis) presented in the Introduction?
- Give evidence for each conclusion.
- Discuss possible reasons for expected and unexpected findings.
- Don’t overgeneralize.
- Don’t ignore deviations in your data.
- Avoid speculation that cannot be tested in the foreseeable future.
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Writing up the results from an experiment can be difficult, as the nature of scientific research requires rigorous testing techniques and accurate recordings of data. The scientific report allows researchers to record their findings and publish them out into the world, expanding on the area of expertise. So, what comprises a scientific report?
- We are going to establish and explore scientific reports in psychological research.
- We will start by looking at scientific reports in psychology and how scientific report writing should be conducted.
- Then we will explore the scientific report structure, including the introduction, method, results, scientific report conclusion and discussion.
- Finally, we will delve into scientific report examples.
Scientific Reports: Psychology
Research can be identified as primary or secondary research; whether the researcher collects the data used for analysis or uses previously published findings determines this. The different types of research produce different types of scientific reports, such as:
Primary research is data collected from the researcher, e.g., when carrying out an experiment.
For example, a laboratory produces a primary scientific psychology report.
On the other hand, secondary research is carried out using previously published research.
For example, a meta-analysis uses statistical means to combine and analyse data from similar studies.
Or, a systematic review uses a systematic approach (clearly defining variables and creating extensive inclusion and exclusion criteria to find research in databases) to gather empirical data to answer a research question.
Scientific Report: Importance
The reason why research should follow the APA recommendations for writing up psychological scientific research is that:
- It ensures the researcher adds enough information to replicate and peer-review the study.
- It makes it easier to read and find relevant information.
- It ensures the report is written to a good standard.
- It ensures any secondary research used acknowledges and credits the original author.
Scientfic Report: Writing
When conducting scientific report writing, several things must be kept in mind. A scientific report aims to help readers understand the study's procedure, findings and what this means for psychology. A scientific report should be clear and logical to make it easier to understand the research.
The American Psychological Association (APA) has created guidelines on how a scientific report should be written, including the scientific report structure and format.
APA suggests several headings for use in psychology reports. The scientific report structure and details included in the report will vary based on the researcher's experiment. However, a general framework is used as a template for research.
Scientific Report Structure
Psychology research should always start with an abstract. This section briefly summarises the whole study, typically 150-200 words. The crucial details the abstract should give include an overview of the hypothesis, sample, procedure, results, details regarding data analysis, and the conclusions drawn.
This section allows readers to read the summary and decide if the research is relevant to them.
The purpose of the introduction is to justify why the research is carried out. This is usually done by writing a literature review of relevant information to the phenomena and showing that your study will fill a gap in research.
The information described in the literature review must show how the researcher it was used to formulate and derived the hypothesis investigated.
The literature review will reflect research supporting and negating the hypothesis.
In this section, the investigated hypotheses should be reported.
The introduction should consist of a third of the psychology research report.
Scientific Report Structure: Method
The method consists of multiple subsections to ensure the report covers enough details to replicate the research. It is important to replicate investigations to identify if it is reliable. The details included in the methodology are important for peer-reviewing the quality of the study.
It allows the person peer-reviewing it to determine if the research is scientific, reliable, and valid and if it should be published in a psychological journal.
The subsections written in the methods section of a scientific report are:
State the experimental design.
State all of the (operationalised) variables investigated.
If multiple conditions are investigated, e.g., people treated for one, two, and four weeks, researchers should report it.
It is also important to note how researchers allocated participants into groups and whether they used counterbalancing methods.
The research design used, e.g., correlational research.
Counterbalancing is used to combat order effects. In some designs, participants repeat the same experiment counterbalancing techniques deal with these.
Sample/ Participants
The sampling method should be noted, e.g., opportunity.
Researchers should state the number of participants and the number of males and females participating in the study.
They should state the demographics of the participants used in the research, e.g., age (including the mean and standard deviation), ethnicity, nationality, and any other details relevant to the investigation.
Materials/Apparatus
This section should state all the relevant equipment used in the study, i.e., equipment/materials used to measure the variables , e.g., questionnaires (researchers should include a copy of this in the appendix).
Some research does not use this subsection if it does not use any specialised materials, e.g., researchers do not need to state if participants used pens or a stopwatch.
- This section should describe what researchers did in the research in the order they conducted it.
They should include details about standardised instruction, informed consent, and debriefing.
This section should be concise but provide enough details so it is replicable.
This section states which ethical committee reviewed and granted the research.
It should state any ethical issues that could have occurred in the research and how researchers dealt with them.
Scientific Report Conclusion and Results
The results section is where you state your findings. This section only states what you have found and does not discuss or explain it. You can present the data found through numerical values, tables, and figures. However, there are specific guidelines on reporting data per APA guidelines when reporting or adding these.
Researchers should not use the raw data collected. Instead, it should be analysed first. The results should start with descriptive data followed by inferential statistics (the type of statistical test used to identify whether a hypothesis should be accepted or rejected).
These statistics should include effect size and significance level (p).
Researchers should report data regardless of whether it is significant or not. They should report the p-value to three decimal places but everything else to two.
After the results, the scientific report conclusion should be reported; this summarises what was found in the study.
- The scientific report conclusion provides a less detailed summary of the study's results which is built on in the discussion section.
Scientific Report: Discussion
This section should discuss and conclude with the research results. The first thing researchers should write about in the discussion is whether the findings support the proposed hypothesis.
If the results support the hypothesis, researchers should compare the findings to previously published findings in the introduction that also found the same results.
You should add very little new research to the discussion section. If the hypothesis is not supported, the discussion should explain from research why this may be. Here, adding new research to present the findings is acceptable (perhaps another theory better explains it).
Critiquing this research, such as its strengths and weaknesses, how it contributed to the psychology field, and its next direction is essential. In the discussion, researchers should not add statistical values.
Scientific Report Example
An example of a scientific report includes any of those seen in studies, such as when a laboratory produces a primary scientific psychology report, or a meta-analysis which uses statistical means to combine and analyse data from similar studies.
The purpose of the reference section is to give credit to all the research used in writing the report. Researchers list this section in alphabetical order based on the author's last name – t he references listed need to be reported per the APA format.
Researchers use background information, e.g. data or theories from previous publications, to form hypotheses, support, criticise findings and learn how research should progress.
The two most common secondary sources used in scientific reports are findings from published journals or books.
Let's look at some scientific report examples of how books and journals should be referenced following APA guidelines.
Book : Author, initial (year of publication). Book title in italics. Publisher. DOI if available (digital object identifier).
Example: Comer, R. J. (2007). Abnormal psychology . New York: Worth Publishers.
Journal: Author, initial (year). Article title. Journal title in italics, volume number in italics , issue number, page range. DOI if available.
Example: Fjell, A. M., Walhovd, K. B., Fischl, B., & Reinvang, I. (2007). Cognitive function, P3a/P3b brain potentials, and cortical thickness in ageing. Human Brain Mapping, 28 (11), 1098-1116. https://doi.org/10.1002/hbm.20335
Scientific Report - Key takeaways
A scientific report consists of details regarding scientists reporting what their research entailed and reporting the results and conclusions drawn from the study.
- Researchers should write scientific psychology reports per the APA format to ensure the scientists report enough information. It makes the report easier to read and find relevant information and ensures that the original authors of the research are acknowledged and credited.
- The scientific report structure should use the following subheadings: abstract, introduction, method (design, participants, materials, procedure and ethics), results, discussion, references and occasionally appendix, in this order.
Frequently Asked Questions about Scientific Report
--> how do you write a scientific report in psychology.
When psychologists carry out research, an essential part of the process involves reporting what the research entails and the results and conclusions drawn from the study. The American Psychological Association (APA) provides guidelines for the correct format researchers should use when writing psychology research reports.
--> How do you write a scientific introduction to a report?
It is usually done by writing a literature review of relevant information to the phenomena and showing that your study will fill a gap in research.
--> How do you structure a scientific report?
The structure of a scientific report should use the following subheadings: abstract, introduction, method (design, participants, materials, procedure and ethics), results, discussion, references and occasionally appendix, in this order.
--> What is a scientific report?
A scientific report consists of details regarding scientists reporting what their research entailed and reporting the results and conclusions drawn from the study.
--> What are the types of a scientific report?
Scientific reports can be primary or secondary. A primary scientific report is produced when the researchers conduct the research themselves. However, secondary scientific reports such as peer reviews, meta-analyses and systematic reviews are a type of scientific report that scientists produce when the researcher answers their proposed research question using previously published findings.
Final Scientific Report Quiz
What is a scientific report?
Show answer
Show question
Why is scientific research reported per APA in psychology?
- It ensures the scientists report enough information.
- It makes the report easier to read and find relevant information.
- It ensures the original research authors are acknowledged and credited.
How should the following book be reported per APA guidelines? The book is called Abnormal psychology, Worth Publishers published it in New York in 2007. Ronald J Comer wrote the book.
Comer, R. J. (2007). Abnormal psychology . New York: Worth Publishers.
What structure should a scientific report follow?
The structure of a scientific report should use the following subheadings:
- Introduction.
- Discussion.
- References.
- Occasionally appendix.
What are potential subheadings we can find in the methods section of a scientific report?
- Participants.
Where can readers find the hypothesis of research?
In the abstract and introduction.
What is the purpose of the abstract?
The purpose of the abstract is to provide an overview of the research so that the reader can quickly identify if the research is relevant or of interest to them.
How long should an abstract be?
250-300 words.
Is the following reference reported in accordance with APA guidelines ‘Fjell, A. M., Walhovd, K. B., Fischl, B., & Reinvang, I. Cognitive function, P3a/P3b brain potentials, and cortical thickness in ageing. Human Brain Mapping, 28 (11), 1098-1116. doi:10.1002/hbm.20335’?
No, the publication year is missing.
Do researchers have to report insignificant data?
Yes, they need to report all data, whether significant or not.
What is the difference between the information that should be put in the results and discussion section?
In the results section, the researcher should insert the inferential data analysed, which could take the form of numerical numbers, graphs and figures. In this section, they should not discuss or explain the results. Instead, they should write it under the discussion heading. However, the data reported in the results section should not be repeated here.
What is a primary scientific report?
A primary scientific report is produced when the researchers conduct the research themselves.
What is a secondary scientific report?
Secondary scientific reports such as peer-reviews, meta-analysis and systematic reviews are a type of scientific report that scientists produce when the researcher answers their proposed research question using previously published findings.
What kind of details should be added in the discussion section?
- The first thing that researchers should write about in the discussion is whether the findings support the hypothesis proposed or not.
- They should then discuss and explain the results the research found.
- They should then compare the findings to previously published findings that investigated the phenomena.
- It is essential to critique this research, such as the strengths and weaknesses, how it contributed to the psychology field and its next direction.
What information should be provided in the procedure section of a scientific report?
- They should include the details about standardised instruction, informed consent, and debriefing.
Researchers need to add enough details of their study so that it can be .....
replicated.
When referring to another study the researcher should always the original .
credit, author.
Meta-analyses and systematic reports are both examples of research.
According to APA, six main headings should be included in a report, true or false?
According to APA, the way to reference a book and journal is the same, true or false?
After a paper is written, what is done?
The paper is peer-reviewed.
What does peer-reviewing ensure?
Identify if the research is scientific, reliable, and valid and if it should be published in a psychological journal.
Can researchers refer to raw data in their scientific report?
Should researchers refer to their statistical findings to back what they are saying?
No, data should not be referred to in the discussion. Instead, the researcher can describe what was found and the inferences that can be made from observed trends.
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41+ SAMPLE Science Research Report in PDF
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The science research report can be segregated into three significant sections such as the process, progress of the research, results of the technical or the scientific research. There are various type of the method implemented in the scientific research study such as the qualitative, quantitative, applied, applied, basic etc. Through the usage of report , it is easy to share the information with other scientists, reviewing, showcasing the progress, and persuasion through logic.
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Science is Knowledge
Lab-Leak Intelligence Reports Aren’t Scientific Conclusions
Intelligence reports supporting the lab-leak theory for COVID are not based in science
- By Cheryl Rofer on March 3, 2023
Intelligence reports have a checkered history. They have recently seized center stage in the debate over the origin of the pandemic virus . With a change of mind at the Department of Energy, and a mere restatement of position at the FBI , those arguing that the SARS-CoV-2 virus leaked from a lab at the Wuhan Institute of Virology are pressing their case. Most agencies still favor the natural route or say they don’t know.
This latest twist comes courtesy of an update to a 90-day intelligence agency review that President Biden received in 2021. The review weighed whether the virus had jumped from experiments at China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology, the “lab-leak” theory , or from a nearby animal market in that city where the outbreak first started, the “natural-origin” one .
We now know that the DOE was previously one of four agencies, along with the National Intelligence Council, that assessed, with “low confidence,” that the natural route was more likely. The reversal by the department on this point has the DOE supporting a lab origin, again with “low confidence.” Meanwhile the FBI’s statement reveals it was the one agency from the review’s unclassified summary that felt, with “moderate confidence,” that a lab leak was likely—unlike the others, which were neutral or leaned the opposite way.
An intelligence assessment isn’t a scientific conclusion. They are different beasts. The summary itself observes that different agencies weigh intelligence reporting and scientific publications differently. The important factor for intelligence assessments is the veracity of sources, whereas scientific conclusions depend on data and the coherence of the argument the data support. However, data from a scientist who has proved unreliable in the past will weigh less heavily in scientific conclusions, and intelligence analysts will regard fanciful stories from an otherwise reliable informant skeptically. The scientific data are available to the public, unlike the reporting that underlies the intelligence assessments.
Scientists share information widely, but intelligence professionals prefer to keep theirs to themselves. We don’t know whether new information changed the DOE’s position, or what that new information might be. The latest explanation of the DOE’s change remains unspecific. Switching from one low-confidence assessment to another is not a big step. The definition of low confidence is “that the information’s credibility and/or plausibility is uncertain, that the information is too fragmented or poorly corroborated to make solid analytical inferences, or that reliability of the sources is questionable.”
In the weeks after September 11, 2001, letters containing anthrax spores were mailed to NBC News, the New York Post and the offices of then-Senators Tom Daschle and Patrick Leahy. The FBI had primary responsibility for investigating who sent those letters. The investigation required seven years to develop a primarily circumstantial case against Bruce Ivins, a microbiologist and researcher at the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases. That’s seven years for a more straightforward investigation than the one into the origins of SARS-CoV-2. Ivins killed himself in 2008, just as the Department of Justice was about to indict him.
Two later investigations, by a panel of scientists convened by the National Research Council of the National Academies and by the Government Accountability Office , found the FBI’s handling of samples inadequate to support their conclusions. An independent investigation by news organizations came to the same conclusions. Solving the mystery of the anthrax letters required cutting-edge science , which is not the FBI’s expertise.
Cutting-edge science is the expertise of the Department of Energy, however, which runs 17 national laboratories, several studying SARS-CoV-2 and its origins . Intelligence professionals in the national laboratories work with scientists to develop assessments. Because they are embedded in the laboratories, they can develop working relationships to explore puzzles of science and intelligence. Because I was responsible for a similar environmental cleanup site at Los Alamos National Laboratory, a question that I was involved in during the 1990s was whether the Soviets had done hydrodynamic tests at the Semipalatinsk Nuclear Test Site, scattering metallic plutonium chunks. Members of the intelligence division came to me and other chemists, and our physicist colleagues, to learn how and why such tests would have been performed, and what clues they would leave behind for analysts to spot. Eventually, we found that indeed tests were run in this way. A joint program with Russia and Kazakhstan recovered 100 kilograms of plutonium that might have gone to scavengers, as a result of this detective work.
Even the experts have a difficult problem in determining how diseases jump to humans. We still do not know the origin of the Ebola virus in humans, and it took three decades for scientists to trace the HIV virus , first identified in humans in the early 1980s, to a jump from wild monkeys in the 1920s.
Genetic markers for the possible pathways of SARS-CoV-2 to humans can be studied by DNA analysis and comparison to other viruses. No definitive evidence of laboratory manipulation has been presented. No connections have been found to known experiments at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, although China has not been forthcoming. There are gaps in the ancestry of SARS-CoV-2 that need to be closed before a definitive scientific conclusion can be made.
An intelligence estimate, particularly one developed in only 90 days, is simply not enough to determine how a virus leaped into humans. Science requires more. So far, the scientific evidence leans toward an accidental transfer from animals to humans, probably at the Wuhan animal market . The intelligence assessment continues to point in that direction—even with the DOE reversal— with admittedly not enough evidence for a reliable conclusion. “Trust me” is the inclination of the intelligence professional in arguing to the public and the basis for the lab leak origin, but a natural origin is backed by public data in scientific journals.
If there is new information or a new reason to believe otherwise, public confidence would be best served if that information is made known.
This is an opinion and analysis article, and the views expressed by the author or authors are not necessarily those of Scientific American.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR(S)
Cheryl Rofer is a former nuclear research scientist at the Los Alamos National Laboratory. She writes at the Nuclear Diner and Lawyers, Guns & Money blogs, and has published in scientific journals. Follow her on Twitter on nuclear subjects @CherylRofer
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- Introduction Sections in Scientific Research Reports (IMRaD)
The goal of the introduction in an IMRaD* report is to give the reader an overview of the literature in the field, show the motivation for your study, and share what unique perspective your research adds. To introduce readers to your material and convince them of the research value, we have some suggestions (based on Swales, 1990) to help your introduction meet the expectations of the academic community.
* IMRaD refers to reports with the structure Introduction-Method-Results-Discussion used in empirical research in natural and social sciences. Please refer to the Writing Center quick guide “Writing an IMRaD Report” for more explanations.
Generally, introductions are broken into three moves. However, depending on the discipline, journal, or purpose of the paper, they may be used in different ways. The table below details these three moves.
1 Sample language above is taken directly from the University of Manchester’s Academic Phrasebank: http://www.phrasebank.manchester.ac.uk/introducing-work/.
Sample introduction
Below is an example of an introduction from a published research article. Notice how the three moves are utilized throughout the introduction.
Electronic cigarettes (also known as vapes, vaporizers, or vape pens) were introduced into the US market in 2007. They are generally battery-powered products that heat liquid into an aerosol that is inhaled by the user. These devices are designed to deliver nicotine and flavors; they also contain chemicals such as propylene glycol, glycerin, and many other constituents. Use of e-cigarettes has dramatically increased over the past 4 years, tripling among high school students from a rate of 4.5% in 2011 to 27.4% in 2014 (CDC, 2015, 2016). Further, 27.4% of adolescents in the U.S. have ever used e-cigarettes (CDC, 2015), with 30% of California youth reporting ever using an e-cigarette (California Department of Public Health, 2015)…
The literature on e-cigarette attitudes thus far has predominantly focused on harm perceptions and general acceptability of and attitudes towards e-cigarettes and cigarettes. To our knowledge, there are few studies that have more comprehensively examined adolescents' specific attitudes towards and knowledge about e-cigarettes, and/or whether such attitudes differ between those who have and have not used e-cigarettes or other tobacco...
We thus examined a broad array of adolescents' knowledge and attitudes regarding e-cigarette ingredients, addictive properties, safety, cessation, perceived prevalence, accessibility, price, and regulation. We also examined whether these attitudes differ between adolescents who have and have not used cigarettes and/or e-cigarettes. Based on the small body of literature on e-cigarette attitudes, the larger set of literature on adolescents' attitudes towards cigarettes, and the relationship between such attitudes and tobacco use (e.g., Halpern-Felsher et al., 2004; Krosnick et al., 2006; Song et al., 2009; Roditis et al., 2016), we hypothesized that: (1) adolescents will believe that a greater number of parents, siblings, and peers are using e-cigarettes compared to cigarettes; (2)...
(adapted from https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0091743516303413 )
Italics = Establishing the research territory
Underlined = Establishing the niche
Bold = Occupying the niche
Activity to help you prepare for writing IMRaD introductions
Choose a journal in your discipline and read a few different articles, paying close attention to the Introduction sections. Identify the three moves and the ways they are expressed, and answer the following questions.
- How closely do these introductions mirror the structure laid out above? If they deviate, do you think this was a good decision on the authors’ part? Why or why not?
- How is each move expressed? What language helped you identify these moves?
- Are there some features of these introductions that you would use in your own paper? Any you would not?
- How are the citations laid out across the different introductions? In which moves are citations predominantly used? How can you explain this use?
Exercise adapted from Swales, J. M., & Feak, C. B. (2004). Academic writing for graduate students: Essential tasks and skills . Ann Arbor, Michigan: University of Michigan Press.
Last updated 4/26/2018
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Learn how to prepare, write and structure a science report.
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The purpose of a scientific report is to talk the reader through an experiment or piece of research you’ve done where you’ve generated some data, the decisions you made, what you found and what it means.
Lab or experimental reports in the Sciences have a very specific structure, which is often known as IMRAD :
- I ntroduction
- R esults and
- D iscussion.
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Whether it’s a shorter lab report or a longer research project or dissertation, science writing of this kind tends to be structured into those sections (or chapters, if it’s a long project or thesis). Empirical research in the Social Sciences which is based on data collection might also use this structure. You’ll probably recognise it too in many of the journal articles you’re reading. There are sometimes variations from this pattern – sometimes results and discussion are combined into one section, sometimes in a longer research project there is a separate literature review in addition to the introduction, or there might be a conclusion as well as the discussion. Social sciences reports might have a theory section too. Always look at the brief for the assignment you have been set, or ask your lecturer or supervisor if you aren’t sure.
As there is a conventional set structure to follow for scientific reports, the main issue tends to be not how to structure it, but knowing what to write in each section, and making sure the right things are in the right places. Each section is clearly marked out with subheadings with a distinct purpose and role in the report, and the reader will expect to find particular things in each part. To help you follow this structure and know which of your points goes where, it might be useful to think about what question each section answers for your reader, and also what type of writing is characteristic of that section – more descriptive (factual), or more analytical (interpretation).
Introduction
The introduction answers two questions, and is mostly descriptive, with more analysis if you’re writing up a research project rather than a lab report:
“What’s the issue here? What do we know about it?” DESCRIPTIVE
The introduction is usually around 15-20% of the report. It offers the reader some context and background information about the issue you’re exploring or the principle you’re verifying, to establish what we’re talking about and to outline what is known about the topic. In a shorter lab report, this is where you might use references to scientific literature, to show you have read about the subject and what you’re basing your understanding on. Keep this part as tightly focussed as you can and don’t be tempted to include lots of detail or go too broad. Think about what the reader needs to know to follow your report, rather than showing everything you’ve learned about the topic. The kind of writing you’re doing here is descriptive – mostly factual statements, backed up with references, to demonstrate your understanding of the background of your experiment or research.
“What are you trying to do and why?” ANALYTICAL
The introduction quickly moves on to the nature of the problem you’re trying to solve, hypothesis you are testing or research question you’re trying to answer. Again, you might want to make reference to other people’s research to demonstrate why this is a problem, what the debate might be or what exactly we don’t know. This kind of writing is higher level, as you’re analysing a problem and evaluating why this research needs to be done. In a research project, this is a very important section, as it’s the justification for your research, but in a lab experiment, you are demonstrating that you understand why this activity has been set rather than just following instructions. You would also state briefly what model, theory, approach or method you have chosen to take and why, what kind of research this is, but not in any detail yet.
Literature review
“What is the current state of knowledge and what don’t we know?” ANALYTICAL
If you are writing up a longer research project or dissertation, you will be doing far more reading with much more critical analysis of existing research and discussion of why yours needs to be undertaken. The introduction might therefore contain so much reference to the literature and so much more analysis that it’s better to add it as a separate section in its own right – the literature review. In a shorter lab report, the references to the literature are integrated within the introduction and tend to be more descriptive -what the literature says rather than what you think about it. In a social sciences report, the literature review might also contain a discussion of the theory you’re using.
“How did you do the research?” DESCRIPTIVE
The methods section really is a pretty straightforward description of what you did to perform the experiment, or collect and process the data. It is often relatively short, about 15-20% of the report, and because it describes what you did, it is written in the past tense, whereas the rest of the report is in the present tense. In a lab resport, it might even be largely based on the experiment brief you were given. Its purpose is to allow your research to be replicated, so it needs to be clear and detailed enough to let another researcher follow it and reproduce what you did, like a recipe. This allows the reader to know exactly how you gathered and processed your data and judge whether your method was appropriate, or if it has any limitations or flaws. The methods section describes what you actually did rather than what you ideally intended to do, so it also includes any places where you departed from your planned approach and things might have gone a bit wrong or unexpectedly. This will help you explain any unusual elements in your results. Depending on the kind of research you are doing, a methods section might list equipment or software used, describe a set up or process, list steps you took, detail models, theories or parameters you employed, describe experiment design, outline survey questions or explain how you chose the sample you studied.
In a longer research project, you might include some more analytical discussion of why you chose those methods over alternative options, perhaps with some references to other studies which have used those approaches, but this would be part of your introduction or literature review.
“What did you find? What do the findings say?” DESCRIPTIVE
This section is where you present your findings, or data. This could take a number of forms, depending on the kind of research you’re doing -it could be text, but very often the data is presented as graphs, tables, images, or other kinds of figure. You might choose to include representative data, rather than all of the results. The results section is a meaty one, perhaps 30-40% of the report in terms of space and importance, but it is dense rather than long and wordy, as figures are often richer and more concise than words. How you represent your data is up to you, and depends on the observations you want to draw out of it.
The results section is one which many people find confusing to write. Its purpose is to present the data, but in a form which is easy for the reader to digest. The results section therefore has some explanation, so the reader knows what they are looking at. For example, it isn’t enough simply to give them a graph or table; there needs to be an explanation of what the figure is, what it contains and how to read it (for example, what the image is of and its scale, what the graph axes are or what the columns and rows in the table represent). You might also draw the reader’s attention to the main features of the data that you want them to notice, such as trends, patterns, correlations, noteworthy aspects or significant areas. However, the results section is mostly descriptive – it’s a slightly digested form of your raw data. It says what the findings are, what the data says, but it doesn’t tell the reader what the results mean – that’s the job of the discussion.
“What do the findings mean?” ANALYSIS
Results in themselves aren’t the full story. Two people can look at the same data, see two different things and interpret it in two different ways. The discussion is where you explain what you think the data means and what it proves. In doing so, you are making an argument, explaining the reasons why you think your interpretation of the data is correct, so this section is very analytical and therefore substantial, about 15-20%. In a discussion, you might be arguing that something is significant, or that it shows a connection, or is due to particular causes. You could comment on the impact of any limitations, how far the findings support your hypothesis, or what further work needs to be done and speculate on what it might find. You might also bring some references to the literature in here, to help support your arguments, explain your findings or show how they are consistent with other studies. The discussion section is likely to be one of the longer ones, as this is where your main argument is.
In some reports, the results and discussion sections are combined, but in general, resist the temptation to comment on your results as you present them, and save this for the later discussion section. Keep the factual results and the more subjective interpretation separate. If you are writing up a longer project, dissertation or thesis, you might have more than one results or discussion chapter to cover different aspects of your research.
“What’s the overall point you’re making? So what?” ANALYTICAL
If you have been asked to write a conclusion separately to the discussion, this is where you take a big step back from the detailed analysis of the data in your discussion, and summarise overall what you think your research has shown. You might comment on its significance or implications for our understanding of the topic you outlined in the introduction, or where it agrees or disagrees with other literature. You are making a judgement statement about the validity, quality and significance of your study and how it fits with existing knowledge. Some reports combine this with the discussion though. The conclusion is fairly short, about 5%, as you’re not adding new information, just summing it all up into your main overall message. It is analytical though, so although you are restating the points you’ve already made, you are synthesising it in a new way so your reader understands what the research has demonstrated and what has been learned from it.
Other elements
If you are writing a longer research project, dissertation or thesis, you would include an abstract at the beginning, summarising the whole report for the reader. The abstract is read separately from the report itself, as it helps the reader get a sense of what it contains and whether they want to read the whole thing.
At the end of the main report, you would include elements such as your reference list, and any appendices if you are using them. An appendix is generally used for elements which are long and detailed information, but which are not central to your points and which would disrupt the flow of the report if you included them in the main body.
Writing an IMRAD report
Although this order is the way a science report is structured, you don’t have to write it in this order. Many people begin with the more descriptive elements, the methods and results, and then write the more analytical sections around them. The method and results can be written up at an earlier stage of the research too, as you go, whereas the discussion can only be written once you’ve done the research and collected and analysed the data.
Checking your structure
When planning your writing or editing a draft, you could use this approach to help you check that you are following this structure.
- Take the question that each section poses. Is there anything in the section which does not directly answer this question? This will help you decide if there’s anything irrelevant you need to delete. Is there anything which answers the question raised by a different section? In this case, it’s in the wrong place and needs moving.
- Highlight which parts of your writing are more descriptive and factual, and which are more analytical, justifying or interpreting. Does that fit with the kind of writing expected in each section? If not, you may need to move some of your points around or change the balance of the kinds of points you’re making.
Download this guide as a PDF
Structuring a science report.
Learn how to prepare, write and structure a science report. **PDF Download**
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- How to Write Discussions and Conclusions
The discussion section contains the results and outcomes of a study. An effective discussion informs readers what can be learned from your experiment and provides context for the results.
What makes an effective discussion?
When you’re ready to write your discussion, you’ve already introduced the purpose of your study and provided an in-depth description of the methodology. The discussion informs readers about the larger implications of your study based on the results. Highlighting these implications while not overstating the findings can be challenging, especially when you’re submitting to a journal that selects articles based on novelty or potential impact. Regardless of what journal you are submitting to, the discussion section always serves the same purpose: concluding what your study results actually mean.
A successful discussion section puts your findings in context. It should include:
- the results of your research,
- a discussion of related research, and
- a comparison between your results and initial hypothesis.
Tip: Not all journals share the same naming conventions.
You can apply the advice in this article to the conclusion, results or discussion sections of your manuscript.
Our Early Career Researcher community tells us that the conclusion is often considered the most difficult aspect of a manuscript to write. To help, this guide provides questions to ask yourself, a basic structure to model your discussion off of and examples from published manuscripts.
Questions to ask yourself:
- Was my hypothesis correct?
- If my hypothesis is partially correct or entirely different, what can be learned from the results?
- How do the conclusions reshape or add onto the existing knowledge in the field? What does previous research say about the topic?
- Why are the results important or relevant to your audience? Do they add further evidence to a scientific consensus or disprove prior studies?
- How can future research build on these observations? What are the key experiments that must be done?
- What is the “take-home” message you want your reader to leave with?
How to structure a discussion
Trying to fit a complete discussion into a single paragraph can add unnecessary stress to the writing process. If possible, you’ll want to give yourself two or three paragraphs to give the reader a comprehensive understanding of your study as a whole. Here’s one way to structure an effective discussion:
Writing Tips
While the above sections can help you brainstorm and structure your discussion, there are many common mistakes that writers revert to when having difficulties with their paper. Writing a discussion can be a delicate balance between summarizing your results, providing proper context for your research and avoiding introducing new information. Remember that your paper should be both confident and honest about the results!
- Read the journal’s guidelines on the discussion and conclusion sections. If possible, learn about the guidelines before writing the discussion to ensure you’re writing to meet their expectations.
- Begin with a clear statement of the principal findings. This will reinforce the main take-away for the reader and set up the rest of the discussion.
- Explain why the outcomes of your study are important to the reader. Discuss the implications of your findings realistically based on previous literature, highlighting both the strengths and limitations of the research.
- State whether the results prove or disprove your hypothesis. If your hypothesis was disproved, what might be the reasons?
- Introduce new or expanded ways to think about the research question. Indicate what next steps can be taken to further pursue any unresolved questions.
- If dealing with a contemporary or ongoing problem, such as climate change, discuss possible consequences if the problem is avoided.
- Be concise. Adding unnecessary detail can distract from the main findings.
Don’t
- Rewrite your abstract. Statements with “we investigated” or “we studied” generally do not belong in the discussion.
- Include new arguments or evidence not previously discussed. Necessary information and evidence should be introduced in the main body of the paper.
- Apologize. Even if your research contains significant limitations, don’t undermine your authority by including statements that doubt your methodology or execution.
- Shy away from speaking on limitations or negative results. Including limitations and negative results will give readers a complete understanding of the presented research. Potential limitations include sources of potential bias, threats to internal or external validity, barriers to implementing an intervention and other issues inherent to the study design.
- Overstate the importance of your findings. Making grand statements about how a study will fully resolve large questions can lead readers to doubt the success of the research.
Snippets of Effective Discussions:
Consumer-based actions to reduce plastic pollution in rivers: A multi-criteria decision analysis approach
Identifying reliable indicators of fitness in polar bears
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Here’s what the COVID ‘lab leak’ report really says — and doesn’t say
- Updated: Mar. 02, 2023, 7:27 a.m. |
- Published: Feb. 28, 2023, 9:19 a.m.
FILE - This 2020 electron microscope image made available by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows SARS-CoV-2 virus particles which cause COVID-19. (Hannah A. Bullock, Azaibi Tamin/CDC via AP, File) AP
- The Associated Press
A crucial question has eluded governments and health agencies around the world since the COVID-19 pandemic began: How did the virus originate?
Two main theories have emerged: First, the coronavirus originated in animals and eventually spread to humans -- something that happens fairly frequently in nature, like in some cases of bird flu . Second, that an accidental leak from a Chinese laboratory in Wuhan that researched coronaviruses spread the virus among humans.
Now, the U.S. Department of Energy has assessed with “low confidence” in that it began with a lab leak, according to a person familiar with the report who wasn’t authorized to discuss it. The report has not been made public.
But others in the U.S. intelligence community disagree.
“There is not a consensus right now in the U.S. government about exactly how COVID started,” John Kirby, the spokesman for the National Security Council, said Monday. “There is just not an intelligence community consensus.”
The DOE’s conclusion was first reported over the weekend in the Wall Street Journal, which said the classified report was based on new intelligence and noted in an update to a 2021 document. The DOE oversees a national network of labs.
White House officials on Monday declined to confirm press reports about the assessment.
In 2021, officials released an intelligence report summary that said four members of the U.S. intelligence community believed with low confidence that the virus was first transmitted from an animal to a human, and a fifth believed with moderate confidence that the first human infection was linked to a lab.
While some scientists are open to the lab-leak theory, others continue to believe the virus came from animals, mutated, and jumped into people — as has happened in the past with viruses. Experts say the true origin of the pandemic may not be known for many years — if ever.
CALLS FOR MORE INVESTIGATION
The U.S. Office of the Director of National Intelligence declined to comment on the report. All 18 offices of the U.S. intelligence community had access to the information the DOE used in reaching its assessment.
Alina Chan, a molecular biologist at the Broad Institute of Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard, said she isn’t sure what new intelligence the agencies had, but “it’s reasonable to infer” it relates to activities at the Wuhan Institute of Virology in China. She said a 2018 research proposal co-authored by scientists there and their U.S. collaborators “essentially described a blueprint for COVID-like viruses.”
“Less than two years later, such a virus was causing an outbreak in the city,” she said.
The Wuhan institute had been studying coronaviruses for years, in part because of widespread concerns — tracing back to SARS — that coronaviruses could be the source of the next pandemic.
No intelligence agency has said they believe the coronavirus that caused COVID-19 was released intentionally. The unclassified 2021 summary was clear on this point, saying: “We judge the virus was not developed as a biological weapon.”
“Lab accidents happen at a surprising frequency. A lot of people don’t really hear about lab accidents because they’re not talked about publicly,” said Chan, who co-authored a book about the search for COVID-19 origins. Such accidents “underscore a need to make work with highly dangerous pathogens more transparent and more accountable.”
Last year, the World Health Organization recommended a deeper probe into a possible lab accident. Chan said she hopes the latest report sparks more investigation in the United States.
China has called the suggestion that COVID-19 came from a Chinese laboratory " baseless.”
SUPPORT FOR ANIMAL THEORY
Many scientists believe the animal-to-human theory of the coronavirus remains much more plausible. They theorize it emerged in the wild and jumped from bats to humans, either directly or through another animal.
In a 2021 research paper in the journal Cell, scientists said the COVID-19 virus is the ninth documented coronavirus to infect humans — and all the previous ones originated in animals.
Two studies, published last year by the journal Science, bolstered the animal origin theory. That research found that the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in Wuhan was likely the early epicenter. Scientists concluded that the virus likely spilled from animals into people two separate times.
“The scientific literature contains essentially nothing but original research articles that support a natural origin of this virus pandemic,” said Michael Worobey, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Arizona who has extensively studied COVID-19′s origins.
He said the fact that others in the intelligence community looked at the same information as the DOE and “it apparently didn’t move the needle speaks volumes.” He said he takes such intelligence assessments with a grain of salt because he doesn’t think the people making them “have the scientific expertise ... to really understand the most important evidence that they need to understand.”
The U.S. should be more transparent and release the new intelligence that apparently swayed the DOE, Worobey said.
REACTION TO THE REPORT
The DOE conclusion comes to light as House Republicans have been using their new majority power to investigate all aspects of the pandemic, including the origin, as well as what they contend were officials’ efforts to conceal the fact that it leaked from a lab in Wuhan. Earlier this month, Republicans sent letters to Dr. Anthony Fauci, National Intelligence Director Avril Haines, Health Secretary Xavier Beccera and others as part of their investigative efforts.
The now retired Fauci, who served as the country’s top infectious disease expert under both Republican and Democratic presidents, has called the GOP criticism nonsense.
Rep. Mike McCaul, R-Texas, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, has asked the Biden administration to provide Congress with “a full and thorough” briefing on the report and the evidence behind it.
Kirby, the National Security Council spokesman, emphasized that President Joe Biden believes it’s important to know what happened “so we can better prevent future pandemics” but that such research “must be done in a safe and secure manner and as transparent as possible to the rest of the world.”
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Skeptical science new research for week #9 2023.
- At a glance - What has global warming done since 1998?
- Which state is winning at renewable energy production?
- 2023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #8
- Filling an editorial policy hole
- Skeptical Science New Research for Week #8 2023
- The Problem with Percentages Errata
- At a glance - What were climate scientists predicting in the 1970s?
- Climate change is increasing the risk of a California megaflood
- 2023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #7
- Skeptical Science New Research for Week #7 2023
- The Problem with Percentages
- Skeptical Science News: The Rebuttal Update Project
- Dana Nuccitelli wins environmental journalism award
- 2023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #6
- Skeptical Science New Research for Week #6 2023
- Myths about fossil fuels and renewable energy are circulating again. Don’t buy them.
- Clean energy permitting reform needed to boost economy, protect climate and burn less coal
- 2023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #5
- Cranky Uncle could use your help to learn more languages!
- Skeptical Science New Research for Week #5 2023
- The escalator rises again
- 2023 self-paced run of Denial101x starts on February 7
- The other ‘big one’: How a megaflood could swamp California’s Central Valley
- 2023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #4
- Skeptical Science New Research for Week #4 2023
- Checklist: How to take advantage of brand-new clean energy tax credits
- The U.S. had 18 different billion-dollar weather disasters in 2022
- Input to USDA about how to allocate IRA climate-smart agriculture funds
Posted on 2 March 2023 by Doug Bostrom, Marc Kodack
Open access notables.
From this week's government/NGO section , a welcome report from the United Nations: One Atmosphere : An independent expert review on Solar Radiation Modification research and deployment . For many of us— given the report's provenance— the foreword alone may be enough to form policy conclusions. For those who'd like to know more this is a comprehensive synthesis built on 126 key academic papers on the topic. Has SRM's time arrived? Hardly— the open question book is vast: " The review finds that there is little information on the risks of SRM and limited literature on the environmental and social impacts of these technologies. Even as a temporary response option, large-scale SRM deployment is fraught with scientific uncertainties and ethical issues. The evidence base is simply not there to make informed decisions."
Continuing with solar geoengineering but more in the nature of a matter of historical interest, Soviet and Russian perspectives on geoengineering and climate management starts with a brief recap of where the world stands with regard to our ambiguous relationship geoengineering especially with concern to solar radiation modfication, then leads us through a fascinating history of the Soviet Union's and latterly the Russian Federation's arc of scientific work in this arena. Mikhail Budyko and his work feature as what might be termed an intellectual axis of the entire enterprise.
Not a research paper but rather a news item from PNAS richly supported by citations, How to expand solar power without using precious land summarizes research on what's in the title, starting with a sunny lede: " Solar power can be a land-hungry competitor to farming. But deployed in the right way, solar installations can boost crop yields, save water, and protect biodiversity."
What's the cost on international climate mitigation of cargon leakage possibly caused by parochial climate legislation? That's what Eskander & Fankhauser investigate in The Impact of Climate Legislation on Trade-Related Carbon Emissions 1996–2018 . They don't consider their findings to be the last word but do offer this encouraging conclusion: " We find that the passage of new climate laws has had no significant impact on trade-related carbon emissions and a negative long-term effect on international production emissions."
Practically speaking, public preferences predicate public policy. Here's a trifecta of papers of special use to poilcymakers guiding citizens through what needs to be a rapid process of modernization— at risk of retardation by various factors of human nature— with useful information on public thinking on these topics:
- Public acceptance of fossil fuel subsidy removal can be reinforced with revenue recycling
- I ncreasing intention to reduce fossil fuel use: a protection motivation theory-based experimental study
- Fossil fuel divestment and public climate change policy preferences: an experimental test in three countries
Often heard of in the abstract, loss and damage resolves into specific case histories. Nand, Bardsley & Suh lead us through such a story, in Addressing unavoidable climate change loss and damage: A case study from Fiji’s sugar industry . "Despite implementing climate change adaptation measures, Fiji’s sugar industry has faced devastating L&D from frequent and severe cyclones. Much of the climate change L&D to crops, property, and income was irreversible and unavoidable. Non-economic loss and damage (NELD) was found insurmountable in both field sites, including the loss of homes and places of worship, cascading and flow-on effects as well as the heightening of uncertainty, fear, and trauma."
109 articles in 51 journals by 682 contributing authors
Observations of climate change, effects
A spatiotemporal analysis of precipitation anomalies using rainfall Gini index between 1980 and 2022 Sahbeni et al., Atmospheric Science Letters, Open Access 10.1002/asl.1161
Global evaluation of the “dry gets drier, and wet gets wetter” paradigm from a terrestrial water storage change perspective Xiong et al., Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, Open Access pdf 10.5194/hess-26-6457-2022
Has There Been a Recent Shallowing of Tropical Cyclones? Lai & Toumi Toumi, Geophysical Research Letters, Open Access 10.1029/2022gl102184
Historical Climate Trends over High Mountain Asia Derived from ERA5 Reanalysis Data Khanal et al., Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology, Open Access pdf 10.1175/jamc-d-21-0045.1
Increase in the wave power caused by decreasing sea ice over the Sea of Okhotsk in winter Iwasaki, Scientific Reports, Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41598-023-29692-9
Patterns and drivers of anaerobic sediment nitrogen transformations across thermokarst lakes Mao et al., Global Change Biology, 10.1111/gcb.16654
Remarkable Changes in the Dominant Modes of North Pacific Sea Surface Temperature Werb & Rudnick, Geophysical Research Letters, Open Access pdf 10.1029/2022gl101078
Sedimentation on the Siberian Arctic Shelf as an indicator of the Arctic hydrological cycle Rusakov & Borisov, Anthropocene, 10.1016/j.ancene.2023.100370
Instrumentation & observational methods of climate change, effects
Soil moisture and atmospheric aridity impact spatio-temporal changes in evapotranspiration at a global scale Zhang et al., Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, 10.1029/2022jd038046
Modeling, simulation & projection of climate change, effects
Hadley circulation dynamics in the IITM-Earth System Model simulations: evaluation and future projections Mathew & Kumar, Theoretical and Applied Climatology, 10.1007/s00704-023-04397-1
Historical Changes in Wind-Driven Ocean Circulation Can Accelerate Global Warming McMonigal et al., Geophysical Research Letters, Open Access 10.1029/2023gl102846
Increasing sequential tropical cyclone hazards along the US East and Gulf coasts Xi et al., Nature Climate Change, Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41558-023-01595-7
Rapid 21st Century Weakening of the Agulhas Current in a Warming Climate Zhang et al., Geophysical Research Letters, Open Access 10.1029/2022gl102070
Soil moisture-evaporation coupling shifts into new gears under increasing CO2 Hsu & Dirmeyer, [journal not provided], Open Access pdf 10.21203/rs.3.rs-1713539/v1
The impacts of global warming on arid climate and drought features Kim et al., Theoretical and Applied Climatology, 10.1007/s00704-022-04348-2
The Role of the Circulation Patterns in Projected Changes in Spring and Summer Precipitation Extremes in the U.S. Midwest Chen et al., Journal of Climate, 10.1175/jcli-d-22-0245.1
Two Distinct Phases of North Atlantic Eastern Subpolar Gyre and Warming Hole Evolution under Global Warming Ghosh et al., Journal of Climate, 10.1175/jcli-d-22-0222.1
Weakened interannual Tropical Atlantic variability in CMIP6 historical simulations Sobral Verona et al., Climate Dynamics, 10.1007/s00382-023-06696-9
Advancement of climate & climate effects modeling, simulation & projection
A statistical perspective on the signal–to–noise paradox Bröcker et al., Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society, 10.1002/qj.4440
Assessment of Large-Scale Indices of Surface Temperature during the Historical Period in the CMIP6 Ensemble Bodas-Salcedo et al., Journal of Climate, Open Access pdf 10.1175/jcli-d-22-0398.1
Biophysical Impact of Land-Use and Land-Cover Change on Subgrid Temperature in CMIP6 Models Tang et al., Journal of Hydrometeorology, 10.1175/jhm-d-22-0073.1
Cloud transition across the daily cycle illuminates model responses of trade cumuli to warming Vial et al., Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Open Access 10.1073/pnas.2209805120
Evaluation of CLM5.0 for simulating surface energy budget and soil hydrothermal regime in permafrost regions of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau Ma et al., Agricultural and Forest Meteorology, 10.1016/j.agrformet.2023.109380
Temperature and precipitation biases in CORDEX RCM simulations over South America: possible origin and impacts on the regional climate change signal Blázquez & Solman, [journal not provided], Open Access pdf 10.21203/rs.3.rs-2078549/v1
Understanding and Reducing Warm and Dry Summer Biases in the Central United States: Improving Cumulus Parameterization Sun & Liang, Journal of Climate, 10.1175/jcli-d-22-0254.1
Understanding Models' Global Sea Surface Temperature Bias in Mean State: From CMIP5 to CMIP6 Zhang et al., Geophysical Research Letters, 10.1029/2022gl100888
Cryosphere & climate change
Drying of tundra landscapes will limit subsidence-induced acceleration of permafrost thaw Painter et al., Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Open Access 10.1073/pnas.2212171120
Sea level & climate change
Reducing the uncertainty in the satellite altimetry estimates of global mean sea level trends using highly stable water vapour climate data records Barnoud et al., Journal of Geophysical Research: Oceans, 10.1029/2022jc019378
Sensitivity of MPI-ESM Sea Level Projections to Its Ocean Spatial Resolution Wickramage et al., Journal of Climate, 10.1175/jcli-d-22-0418.1
Biology & climate change, related geochemistry
A review of factors controlling Southern Hemisphere treelines and the implications of climate change on future treeline dynamics Hansson et al., Agricultural and Forest Meteorology, 10.1016/j.agrformet.2023.109375
Aquatic ecosystem response to climate, fire, and the demise of montane rainforest, Tasmania, Australia Beck et al., Global and Planetary Change, 10.1016/j.gloplacha.2023.104077
Climate change as a global amplifier of human–wildlife conflict Abrahms et al., Nature Climate Change, 10.1038/s41558-023-01608-5
Compound droughts slow down the greening of the Earth Xianfeng et al., Global Change Biology, 10.1111/gcb.16657
Concordant and opposing effects of climate and land-use change on avian assemblages in California’s most transformed landscapes Beissinger et al., Science Advances, Open Access pdf 10.1126/sciadv.abn0250
Current and future distribution of a parasite with complex life cycle under global change scenarios: Echinococcus multilocularis in Europe Cenni et al., Global Change Biology, Open Access pdf 10.1111/gcb.16616
Distinct responses and range shifts of lizards populations across an elevational gradient under climate change Jiang et al., Global Change Biology, 10.1111/gcb.16656
Effects of warming on the structure of aquatic communities in tropical bromeliad microecosystems Progênio et al., Ecology and Evolution, 10.1002/ece3.9824
Environmental conditions and marine heatwaves influence blue whale foraging and reproductive effort Barlow et al., Ecology and Evolution, Open Access 10.1002/ece3.9770
Extremely low seasonal prey capture efficiency in a deep-diving whale, the narwhal Chambault et al., Biology Letters, Open Access 10.1098/rsbl.2022.0423
Increased dominance of heat-tolerant symbionts creates resilient coral reefs in near-term ocean warming Palacio-Castro et al., Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Open Access 10.1073/pnas.2202388120
Juvenile Atlantic sea scallop, Placopecten magellanicus, energetic response to increased carbon dioxide and temperature changes Pousse et al., PLOS Climate, Open Access pdf 10.1371/journal.pclm.0000142
Long-term adaptation to elevated temperature but not CO2 alleviates the negative effects of ultraviolet-B radiation in a marine diatom Jin et al., Marine Environmental Research, 10.1016/j.marenvres.2023.105929
Loss of functionally important and regionally endemic species from streams forced into intermittency by global warming Carey et al., Global Change Biology, 10.1111/gcb.16650
Modeling present and future distribution of plankton populations in a coastal upwelling zone: the copepod Calanus chilensis as a study case Rivera et al., Scientific Reports, Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41598-023-29541-9
More warm-adapted species in soil seed banks than in herb layer plant communities across Europe Auffret et al., Journal of Ecology, 10.1111/1365-2745.14074
Seasonal variability in resilience of a coral reef fish to marine heatwaves and hypoxia Tran & Johansen, Global Change Biology, 10.1111/gcb.16624
GHG sources & sinks, flux, related geochemistry
Climate warming has direct and indirect effects on microbes associated with carbon cycling in northern lakes Winder et al., Global Change Biology, Open Access pdf 10.1111/gcb.16655
Drivers of marine CO2-carbonate chemistry in the northern Antarctic Peninsula Santos?Andrade et al., Global Biogeochemical Cycles, 10.1029/2022gb007518
Forecasting CO2 emissions using a novel fractional discrete grey Bernoulli model: A case of Shaanxi in China Wang & Wang, Urban Climate, 10.1016/j.uclim.2023.101452
Gap-filling carbon dioxide, water, energy, and methane fluxes in challenging ecosystems: Comparing between methods, drivers, and gap-lengths Zhu et al., Agricultural and Forest Meteorology, 10.1016/j.agrformet.2023.109365
High carbon emissions from thermokarst lakes and their determinants in the Tibet Plateau Mu et al., Global Change Biology, 10.1111/gcb.16658
Microbial methane cycling in sediments of Arctic thermokarst lagoons Yang et al., Global Change Biology, 10.1111/gcb.16649
New estimate of organic carbon export from optical measurements reveals the role of particle size distribution and export horizon Clements et al., Global Biogeochemical Cycles, 10.1029/2022gb007633
Robust probabilities of detection and quantification uncertainty for aerial methane detection: Examples for three airborne technologies Conrad et al., Remote Sensing of Environment, Open Access 10.1016/j.rse.2023.113499
Sodium as a subsidy in the spring: evidence for a phenology of sodium limitation Clay et al., Oecologia, Open Access pdf 10.1007/s00442-023-05336-7
Soil carbon stocks in stable tropical landforms are dominated by geochemical controls and not by land use Reichenbach et al., Global Change Biology, Open Access 10.1111/gcb.16622
Submesoscale effects on changes to export production under global warming Brett et al., [journal not provided], Open Access pdf 10.1002/essoar.10512865.1
Temperature sensitivity of soil organic carbon respiration along a forested elevation gradient in the Rwenzori Mountains, Uganda Okello et al., Biogeosciences, Open Access pdf 10.5194/bg-20-719-2023
Urbanization can accelerate climate change by increasing soil N2O emission while reducing CH4 uptake Zhan et al., Global Change Biology, 10.1111/gcb.16652
CO2 capture, sequestration science & engineering
Designing covalent organic frameworks with Co-O4 atomic sites for efficient CO2 photoreduction Zhang et al., Nature Communications, Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-023-36779-4
Evenness of soil organic carbon chemical components changes with tree species richness, composition and functional diversity across forests in China Wang et al., Global Change Biology, 10.1111/gcb.16653
Growth response, climate sensitivity and carbon storage vary with wood porosity in a southern Appalachian mixed hardwood forest Grover et al., Agricultural and Forest Meteorology, 10.1016/j.agrformet.2023.109358
Public evaluations of four approaches to ocean-based carbon dioxide removal Nawaz et al., Climate Policy, Open Access 10.1080/14693062.2023.2179589
Decarbonization
A search for new back contacts for CdTe solar cells Gorai et al., Science Advances, Open Access 10.1126/sciadv.ade3761
Challenges in speeding up solid-state battery development Janek & Zeier, Nature Energy, 10.1038/s41560-023-01208-9
Climate ambitions for European aviation: Where can sustainable aviation fuels bring us? Mayeres et al., Energy Policy, 10.1016/j.enpol.2023.113502
Comprehensive study on cascade hydropower stations in the lower reaches of Yalong river for power generation and ecology Ren et al., Energy for Sustainable Development, 10.1016/j.esd.2022.12.013
Intraday markets, wind integration and uplift payments in a regional U.S. power system Hohl et al., Energy Policy, 10.1016/j.enpol.2023.113503
L. Michelle Moore. Rural Renaissance; revitalizing America’s hometowns through clean power Smardon, Journal of Environmental Studies and Sciences, 10.1007/s13412-023-00825-w
On the wake deflection of vertical axis wind turbines by pitched blades Huang et al., Wind Energy, Open Access pdf 10.1002/we.2803
Planet-compatible pathways for transitioning the chemical industry Meng et al., [journal not provided], Open Access pdf 10.26434/chemrxiv-2022-hx17h
Stability beyond lead Nie, Nature Energy, Open Access 10.1038/s41560-023-01203-0
Stabilization of 3D/2D perovskite heterostructures via inhibition of ion diffusion by cross-linked polymers for solar cells with improved performance Luo et al., Nature Energy, 10.1038/s41560-023-01205-y
Sustainable and green energy development to support women's empowerment in rural areas of Indonesia: Case of micro-hydro power implementation Hermawati et al., Energy for Sustainable Development, 10.1016/j.esd.2023.02.001
Geoengineering climate
Process-Level Experiments and Policy-Relevant Scenarios in Future GeoMIP Iterations Visioni et al., Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, Open Access pdf 10.1175/bams-d-22-0281.1
Soviet and Russian perspectives on geoengineering and climate management Oldfield & Poberezhskaya, WIREs Climate Change, Open Access pdf 10.1002/wcc.829
Distributions and Trends of the Aerosol Direct Radiative Effect in the 21st Century: Aerosol and Environmental Contributions Yu & Huang, Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, Open Access 10.1029/2022jd037716
Climate change communications & cognition
Climate change anxiety in China, India, Japan, and the United States Tam et al., Journal of Environmental Psychology, Open Access 10.1016/j.jenvp.2023.101991
Increasing intention to reduce fossil fuel use: a protection motivation theory-based experimental study Kothe et al., Climatic Change, Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10584-023-03489-1
Political divide in climate change opinions is stronger in some countries and some U.S. states than others: Testing the self-expression hypothesis and the fossil fuel reliance hypothesis Chan & Tam, Journal of Environmental Psychology, 10.1016/j.jenvp.2023.101992
Promoting Behaviors to Mitigate the Effects of Climate Change: Using the Extended Parallel Process Model at the Personal and Collective Level in China , Journal of Development and Social Sciences, Open Access pdf 10.47205/jdss.2021(2-iv)74
Public opinion on climate change in China—Evidence from two national surveys Liu, PLOS Climate, Open Access pdf 10.1371/journal.pclm.0000065
Reducing personal climate risk to reduce personal climate anxiety Fyke & Weaver , Nature Climate Change, Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41558-023-01617-4
Agronomy, animal husbundry, food production & climate change
Towards climate action at farm-level: Distinguishing complements and substitutes among climate-smart agricultural practices (CSAPs) in flood prone areas Akter et al., Climate Risk Management, 10.1016/j.crm.2023.100491
Water trading as a tool to combat economic losses in agriculture under climate change Han et al., Sustainability Science, 10.1007/s11625-023-01298-0
Hydrology, hydrometeorology & climate change
The role of adaptive capacity in incremental and transformative adaptation in three large U.S. Urban water systems Dilling et al., Global Environmental Change, Open Access 10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2023.102649
Climate change economics
Addressing unavoidable climate change loss and damage: A case study from Fiji’s sugar industry Nand et al., Climatic Change, Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10584-023-03482-8
The Impact of Climate Legislation on Trade-Related Carbon Emissions 1996–2018 Eskander & Fankhauser, Environmental and Resource Economics, Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10640-023-00762-w
Climate change mitigation public policy research
Assessment of local climate strategies in Hungarian cities Óvári et al., Urban Climate, Open Access 10.1016/j.uclim.2023.101465
Breaking the “income-waiting dilemma” to decrease residential building carbon emissions Ke & Cai, Energy Policy, 10.1016/j.enpol.2023.113463
Can’t buy me love: billionaire entrepreneurs’ legitimation strategies in transnational climate governance Papin & Beauregard, Environmental Politics, 10.1080/09644016.2023.2180909
Cross-national analysis of attitudes towards fossil fuel subsidy removal Harring et al., Nature Climate Change, Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41558-023-01597-5
Fossil fuel divestment and public climate change policy preferences: an experimental test in three countries Schwartz et al., Environmental Politics, Open Access 10.1080/09644016.2023.2178351
How spatial policies can leverage energy transitions − Finding Pareto-optimal solutions for wind turbine locations with evolutionary multi-objective optimization Spielhofer et al., Environmental Science & Policy, 10.1016/j.envsci.2023.02.016
Persuasive innovators for environmental policy: green business influence through technology-based arguing Hofmann, Environmental Politics, Open Access 10.1080/09644016.2023.2178515
Public acceptance of fossil fuel subsidy removal can be reinforced with revenue recycling Harring et al., Nature Climate Change, Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41558-023-01609-4
Climate change adaptation & adaptation public policy research
Coastal Erosion Risk: Population Adaptation to Climate Change—A Case Study of the Pays de la Loire Coastline Chadenas et al., Weather, Climate, and Society, 10.1175/wcas-d-22-0011.1
Health and wellbeing implications of adaptation to flood risk Quinn et al., Ambio, Open Access pdf 10.1007/s13280-023-01834-3
Influence of rooftop mitigation strategies on the thermal environment in a subtropical city Chen et al., Urban Climate, 10.1016/j.uclim.2023.101450
Multi-scale climate-sensitive planning framework to mitigate urban heat island effect: A case study in Singapore Zhang & Yuan, Urban Climate, 10.1016/j.uclim.2023.101451
Threatification, riskification, or normal politics? A review of Swedish climate adaptation policy 2005-2022 Englund & Barquet, Climate Risk Management, 10.1016/j.crm.2023.100492
Climate change impacts on human health
Disasters collide at the intersection of extreme weather and infectious diseases Drake et al., Ecology Letters, Open Access 10.1111/ele.14188
Informed opinion, nudges & major initiatives
How to expand solar power without using precious land Battersby, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Open Access 10.1073/pnas.2301355120
Human responses to climate change will likely determine the fate of biodiversity Brodie & Watson, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Open Access 10.1073/pnas.2205512120
Articles/Reports from Agencies and Non-Governmental Organizations Addressing Aspects of Climate Change
National Transmission Needs Study. Draft for Public Comment , Department of Energy
A robust transmission system is critical to the Nation’s economic, energy, and national security. The electric grid continues to face challenges from aging infrastructure and insufficient transmission capacity. The authors identify needs that could be alleviated by transmission solutions. The findings will inform the Department of Energy as it coordinates the use of its authorities and funding related to electric transmission, including implementing the many grid resilience and technology investment provisions of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and Inflation Reduction Act. The authors review publicly available data and over 50 different industry reports published in the past five years that consider current and anticipated future needs to give a range of electricity demand, public policy, and market conditions.
Energy Transition in PJM: Resource Retirements, Replacements & Risks , PJM
Driven by industry trends and their associated challenges, PJM developed the following strategic pillars to ensure an efficient and reliable energy transition: facilitating decarbonization policies reliably and cost-effectively; planning/operating the grid of the future; and fostering innovation. The research highlights four trends below that, in combination, present increasing reliability risks during the transition, due to a potential timing mismatch between resource retirements, load growth, and the pace of new generation entry under a possible “low new entry” scenario. The growth rate of electricity demand is likely to continue to increase from electrification coupled with the proliferation of high-demand data centers in the region. Thermal generators are retiring at a rapid pace due to government and private sector policies as well as economics. Retirements are at risk of outpacing the construction of new resources, due to a combination of industry forces, including siting and supply chain, whose long-term impacts are not fully known. PJM’s interconnection queue is composed primarily of intermittent and limited-duration resources. Given the operating characteristics of these resources, multiple megawatts of these resources are needed to replace 1 MW of thermal generation.
The 7th National Risk Assessment. Worsening Winds , Amodeo et al., First Street Foundation
Properties in the United States have an increased risk of tropical cyclone winds due to climate change. Driving this increased risk is severe hurricanes that are more likely to occur when hurricanes form in the future, increasing the estimated damage to buildings and infrastructure. The authors use a model that combines open data, open science, and engineering expertise to create a new tropical cyclone wind model that assesses hyper-local climate wind risk across the Nation, and can inform actions to address that risk. The model uses high-resolution topography, computer-modeled hurricane tracks, and property data to create tropical cyclone wind hazard information for the contiguous United States, allowing a detailed evaluation of probable wind speeds by return period, and a comparison of this wind risk between the current year and 30 years in the future. When coupled with archetype-specific damage curves, property level losses are also estimated. The model reveals extensive risk along the Gulf and Southeast Atlantic Coasts, with significant growing risk in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast regions of the country. Overall, in the next 30 years, the expected Average Annual Loss (AAL) resulting from this risk increases from $18.5 billion to $19.9 billion, and 13.4 million properties are likely to face tropical cyclone wind risk that does not currently face such risk. Most alarming is the economic risk in the state of Florida, where current levels of expected annual losses are already over 4 times the economic risk of the rest of the Gulf Coast and account for approximately 73% of all expected damages nationwide.
Out of Control, The Deadly Impact of Coal Pollution , Daniel Prull, Sierra Club
The author explores the extent and impact of particulate pollution from the country’s remaining coal-fired power plants to understand where that pollution is felt, which plants and parent companies are the most responsible, and what authority and responsibility resides with the Environmental Protection Agency to fully implement the Clean Air Act’s protections to ensure all communities have access to clean air. The author estimates that the remaining fleet of coal-fired power plants is still responsible for 3,800 premature deaths per year due to particulate pollution. 10% of plants are super-polluters responsible for over 50% of these deaths. The author focuses on premature mortality as a proxy for the relative burden attributable to particulate pollution from each coal-fired power plant. This burden is a function of the total emissions from a given plant as well as wind patterns and population density downwind. On average only 4% of premature deaths from remaining coal-fired power plants occur in the same county where the plant is located. Alleghany County in Pennsylvania and Cook County in Illinois roughly tie for the most premature deaths from coal. Yet Cook County is hundreds of miles away from any large coal-fired power plants — an example of how particulate pollution from coal blankets the country. In fact, particulate pollution from the remaining coal fleet causes an estimated 234 premature deaths per year in New York, despite the state having retired all of its own coal plants.
One Atmosphere: An independent expert review on Solar Radiation Modification research and deployment , Bala et al., United Nations Environment Programme
Since the beginning of the industrial era, carbon dioxide (CO2) and other greenhouse gases (GHGs) have been accumulating in the atmosphere due to fossil fuel burning and changes in land use such as deforestation. As a result, anthropogenic climate change is now affecting every region across the globe. The consequences of continued GHG emissions will be severe and long-lasting, including exceedance of temperature targets; increases in the frequency, intensity and persistence of extreme weather and climate events; reductions in sea and land ice, snow cover, and permafrost; and sea level rise. Through the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and other processes, the international community has been working to reduce GHG emissions. However, action and current commitments are not yet sufficient to meet the Paris Agreement’s temperature goals. This situation has led to increased interest in understanding whether an operational large-scale Solar Radiation Modification (SRM) or sometimes called ‘solar geoengineering’ deployment might be able to help protect humans and the ecosystems upon which humanity depends. An operational SRM deployment would introduce new risks to people and ecosystems. With many unknowns and risks, there is a strong need to establish an international scientific review process to identify scenarios, consequences, uncertainties, and knowledge gaps.
Resolving Key Uncertainties of Seabird Flight and Avoidance Behaviours at Offshore Wind Farms , Tjørnløv et al., DHI
Research using pioneering radar and artificial intelligence technology to track bird flight at the European Offshore Wind Deployment Centre (EOWDC) at Aberdeen has revealed remarkable insights into the flight behaviour of seabird species. The radar tracked birds flying towards Vattenfall’s Aberdeen offshore wind farm which then activated cameras and generated 3-dimensional flight tracks and video footage. This was used to identify the species of birds as they moved through the wind farm, as well as monitor whether they altered their flight path around the turbines. The study produced invaluable data about the flying patterns of kittiwakes, herring gulls, black-backed gulls and gannets around the wind farm. No collisions or even narrow escapes were recorded in over 10,000 bird videos. Nearly all species of tracked seabirds avoided the zone of the turbine blades by adjusting their flight paths to fly in between the turbines. This pattern was similar for all three species of large gulls. Of those birds that came within 10 m of the zone swept by the blades, more than 96% adjusted their flight paths to avoid a collision, often by flying parallel to the plane of the rotor. The research also revealed different patterns of behaviour for different species of birds. Kittiwakes displayed avoidance behaviour from around 150m from the rotors, commuting herring gulls from around 100m and feeding herring gulls from 70m. In general, gannets and small and large gulls showed a strong tendency to avoid flying into the area swept by the turbine blades.
Agrivoltaic Leading Practices , Electric Power Research Institute, New York Power Authority
To evaluate land use potential for solar development and help New York achieve its ambitious clean energy goals, the authors examined the feasibility of “agrivoltaics” (AV) as a dual land-use solution. In the context of this research, agrivoltaics is a technological evolution of solar ecosystem stewardship, looking at agricultural crops, livestock grazing, and wildlife cohabitation as an aspect of solar co-land management to maintain the natural environment and agricultural benefit while generating solar energy. This study uses a compendium of agrivoltaics research to explore ways to optimize both agricultural yield and solar photovoltaic (PV) energy capacity.
The Impact of Climate Change on u.S. Subnational economies , Adam Kamins, Moody’s Analytics
The long-term economic risks associated with climate change have rapidly moved to the forefront for banks and policymakers. From a national perspective, a view for the U.S. is important but regional variation has traditionally gone unaccounted for—until now. Understanding regional nuance is critical in a nation with significant economic and geographic diversity and nearly 100,000 miles of shoreline. This is especially true given the slow pace at which U.S. policymakers are responding to the threat posed by a changing climate, especially in comparison to their European counterparts. The authors account for regional climate change. In early 2023, the first set of U.S. regional climate scenarios based on parameters from the Network for Greening the Financial System was published. The authors summarize key takeaways, with an eye toward which parts of the U.S. will suffer most under a variety of climate change scenarios.
Texas Legislative Issues 2023 Energy , Renée Cross and Mark Jones, Hobby School of Public Affairs, University of Houston
The authors conducted an online survey of Texans ages 18 and older to assess their preferences and opinions regarding legislation that will be considered by the Texas Legislature during the 2023 legislative session. The survey was in January 2023, in English and Spanish, with 1,200 YouGov respondents. The respondents were matched to a sampling frame on gender, age, race/ethnicity, and education and are representative of the population of Texas adults. The survey addressed preferences regarding energy sources in the United States, support for using state funds to provide incentives for the construction of natural gas power plants, support for home solar power-related legislation, and interest in installing solar panels and an energy storage system among homeowners. For example, 64% of Texans favor expanding U.S. reliance on solar power plants as an energy source while 12% favor reducing U.S. reliance on solar power plants. 57% of Texans favor expanding U.S. reliance on wind turbine farms as an energy source while 19% favor reducing U.S. reliance on wind turbine farms.
The Impacts on California of Expanded Regional Cooperation to Operate the Western Grid , Hurlbut et al., National Renewable Energy Laboratory
Changes inside and outside the power sector are making the potential benefits of regional cooperation in operating the electricity grid more compelling than ever before. To keep California policymakers abreast of the most current information, the authors synthesized the studies, policies, and papers on the potential benefits of expanded regional cooperation in California, with a focus on key issues that will most effectively advance the state’s energy and environmental goals. This includes any available studies that reflect the impact of regionalization on transmission costs and reliability for California ratepayers.
All Brands On Deck: Top Furniture, Fashion, Retail & Technology Companies Must Act to Abandon Dirty Ships , Rose et al., Ship IT ZERO
The authors find that Walmart, Target, and Home Depot were the largest ocean import polluters of 2021, as e-commerce demands skyrocketed in the U.S. and globally. The authors take an in-depth look at the nation’s largest major companies that import goods into the U.S. — including Walmart, Home Depot, LG Electronics, Nike, Target, Amazon, and IKEA — and provide new data on ocean shipping emissions generated from the transportation of goods from the technology, furniture, and fashion sectors.
Are Companies Developing Credible Climate Transition Plans? , Sokolowski et al., CDP
The authors present an overview of the current state of climate transition plan information disclosed through CDP's 2022 climate change questionnaire. The data analyzed in this report spans over 18,600 organizations in 13 industries and across 135 countries. The report is an evaluation of whether an organization’s disclosure is sufficient and credible. In 2022, 18,600+ organizations disclosed through CDP’s climate change questionnaire, of which 4,100 of them disclosed that they had already developed a 1.5°C-aligned climate transition plan. Of these 4,100 organizations, 81 of them reported sufficient detail to all 21 key indicators in the climate change questionnaire that align with a credible climate transition plan. These 81 organizations represent 0.4% of the entire disclosure sample in 2022 (18,600+).
Obtaining articles without journal subscriptions
We know it's frustrating that many articles we cite here are not free to read. One-off paid access fees are generally astronomically priced, suitable for such as " On a Heuristic Point of View Concerning the Production and Transformation of Light " but not as a gamble on unknowns. With a median world income of US$ 9,373, for most of us US$ 42 is significant money to wager on an article's relevance and importance.
- Here's an excellent collection of tips and techniques for obtaining articles, legally.
- Unpaywall offers a browser extension for Chrome and Firefox that automatically indicates when an article is freely accessible and provides immediate access without further trouble. Unpaywall is also unscammy, works well, is itself offered free to use. The organizers (a legitimate nonprofit) report about a 50% success rate
- The weekly New Research catch is checked against the Unpaywall database with accessible items being flagged. Especially for just-published articles this mechansim may fail. If you're interested in an article title and it is not listed here as "open access," be sure to check the link anyway.
How is New Research assembled?
Most articles appearing here are found via RSS feeds from journal publishers, filtered by search terms to produce raw output for assessment of relevance.
Relevant articles are then queried against the Unpaywall database, to identify open access articles and expose useful metadata for articles appearing in the database.
The objective of New Research isn't to cast a tinge on scientific results, to color readers' impressions. Hence candidate articles are assessed via two metrics only:
- Was an article deemed of sufficient merit by a team of journal editors and peer reviewers? The fact of journal RSS output assigns a "yes" to this automatically.
- Is an article relevant to the topic of anthropogenic climate change? Due to filter overlap with other publication topics of inquiry, of a typical week's 550 or so input articles about 1/4 of RSS output makes the cut.
The section "Informed opinion, nudges & major initiatives" includes some items that are not scientific research per se but fall instead into the category of "perspectives," observations of implications of research findings, areas needing attention, etc.
Suggestions
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A list of journals we cover may be found here . We welcome pointers to omissions, new journals etc.
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Braxia Scientific Reports Q3 2023 Financial Results and Provides Update on Acquisition Under LOI with Irwin Naturals
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Braxia Health ketamine treatments up 29% YoY in Q3 2023 and revenue up 50.5% YoY
Toronto, Ontario--(Newsfile Corp. - March 1, 2023) - Braxia Scientific Corp. (CSE: BRAX) (OTC Pink: BRAXF) (FSE: 4960), ("Braxia Scientific", or the "Company"), a medical research and telemedicine company with clinics providing innovative ketamine and psilocybin treatments for depression and related disorders, today announced the filing of its financial statements and management discussion and analysis for the third quarter ended December 31, 2023. The Company also provided an update on the proposed acquisition of the Company by Irwin Naturals Inc. (CSE: IWIN) (OTCQB: IWINF) (FSE: 97X) ("Irwin") as outlined in the non-binding Letter of Intent ("LOI") announced January 27, 2023. Complete financial statements along with related management discussion and analysis and the LOI can be found in the System for Electronic Document Analysis and Retrieval (SEDAR), the electronic filing system for the disclosure documents of issuers across Canada, at www.SEDAR.com .
"We continued to make progress on our priorities to scale our clinics, technology and people in order to address increasing demand for treatments. At the same time, we have completed and funded our psilocybin clinical trial and are preparing to publish our results," said Dr. Roger McIntyre, CEO Braxia Scientific. "Looking ahead, we are focused on accelerating our strategic initiatives with Irwin to create the market leader in North American mental health treatment. Together, we are aiming to build a large network of clinics, enhanced by our KetaMD telehealth platform, that will provide access to innovative treatments while also serving pharmaceutical sponsors by carrying out in-human clinical trials to assist in the development of novel therapeutics for potential future marketing authorization from FDA and other health regulators globally."
Corporate Update and Recent Highlights
The Company previously announced it had entered into an LOI to be acquired by Irwin. The Company's management team has continued to work diligently with Irwin towards completing a definitive and binding arrangement agreement (the "Arrangement Agreement") for the transaction and anticipates executing the Arrangement Agreement with Irwin within the quarter ending March 31, 2023. The closing is expected to occur upon the receipt of regulatory, court and securityholder approvals within normal time frames following execution of the Arrangement Agreement.
As indicated previously, Irwin has been one of North America's leading health and wellness companies for nearly three decades and has recently developed a rapidly growing network of mental health clinics in the US. The LOI sets forth the material terms and conditions upon which Irwin will acquire all of the issued and outstanding common shares (the "Braxia Shares") of Braxia (the "Proposed Transaction").
Over the last year, Irwin has established a strong foothold in mental health with 22 clinics acquired or under LOI for acquisition. The combination of Irwin and Braxia's businesses would create a new market leader with operations in multiple markets in the US (~40+ markets) and in Canada across three important business verticals;
Clinics: A large network of clinics providing much needed mental health services. The network of clinics will act as highly specialized hubs of excellence with several deployed in larger population centers, while others will be deployed more regionally to greatly improve and expand access to mental health services throughout the North American market;
International Clinical Research Services: A leading mental health clinical research organization (CRO) providing in-human clinical study services to a growing pipeline of strategic pharmaceutical sponsors and partners looking to develop innovative therapeutic and diagnostic products to secure marketing authorization from FDA and other health regulators;
Telehealth: A telehealth platform (KetaMD) designed to expand access to patients virtually, extending the operational reach of the clinics within the network, providing services to patients directly in their own home, and multiplying the supply of mental health services available in the market today. KetaMD is currently available in Florida. The plan would be to expand to approximately 40 states.
The LOI is non-binding and there is no assurance that the Proposed Transaction will be completed as proposed. The completion of the Proposed Transaction is subject to, among other things (i) completion of satisfactory due diligence by each of Braxia and Irwin; (ii) negotiation of and the entering into of a binding definitive Arrangement Agreement in connection with the Proposed Transaction; (iii) receipt of all required corporate approvals from the board of directors of Braxia and Irwin, respectively, and all regulatory and shareholder approvals, including the approval of the CSE and any required third-party consents: and (iv) Braxia having at least C$575,000 in working capital immediately before closing on the Closing Date.
Braxia Scientific Q3 2023 Financial Summary and Recent Highlights
Q3 2023 Braxia Health in-clinic ketamine treatments increased 29% year-over-year. In the first 9 months of 2023, in-clinic treatments increased 30% compared to the prior year period.
Q3 2023 revenue increased 50.5% year-over-year to $0.48 million for the period ending December 31, 2022. In first nine months of 2023, revenues increased 21.9% to $1.36 million compared to prior year period.
Braxia Health's clinic performance is expected to see steady improvement as three new clinics, Ottawa, Toronto and Kitchener-Waterloo, continue to ramp up operations and deploy new technology to drive patient acquisition and fill newly added capacity. Additionally, Braxia's Toronto clinic has commenced psilocybin treatments under its special access program which is expected to continue to ramp up in 2023.
During the quarter, KetaMD, the Company's U.S. telemedicine platform, continued to expand the initial pilot of its virtual ketamine treatments along with multiple marketing initiatives to drive new patient referrals. Additionally, the KetaMD has made excellent progress in building a pipeline of potential clinic partnerships.
Net loss was $2.17 million for the three months ended December 31, 2022, compared to a net loss of $2.5 million for the three months ended December 31, 2021. Net loss during the quarter includes non-cash share-based compensation of $0.15 million.
In the first nine months of 2023, net loss was $5.48 million compared to a net loss of $5.32 million in the prior year period. Net loss includes non-cash share-based compensation of $0.75 million.
As at December 31, 2022, the Company's cash and cash equivalents were $1.49 million and working capital was $0.72 million. Subsequent to the quarter-end, the Company completed a non-brokered offering which closed February 27, 2023 resulting in aggregate proceeds of $1.26 million.
The Company is pleased to report it received final court approval on February 28, 2023, on terms previously disclosed, to settle claims alleged in a securities class action (the "US Class Action") against the Company and certain of its former officers filed in the United States District Court for the Central District of California in April 2021.
About Braxia Scientific Corp.
Braxia Scientific is a medical research and telemedicine company with clinics that provide innovative ketamine treatments for persons with depression and related disorders. Braxia also launched its U.S. based end-to-end telemedicine platform KetaMD, that utilizes leading technology to provide access to safe, affordable, and potentially life-changing at-home ketamine treatments for people living with depression and related mental health conditions. Through its medical solutions, Braxia aims to reduce the illness burden of brain-based disorders, such as major depressive disorder among others. Braxia is primarily focused on (i) owning and operating multidisciplinary clinics, providing treatments in-person and virtually for mental health disorders, and (ii) research activities related to discovering and commercializing novel drugs and delivery methods. Braxia seeks to develop ketamine and derivatives and other psychedelic products from its IP development platform. Through its wholly owned subsidiary, Braxia Health (formerly the Canadian Rapid Treatment Center of Excellence Inc.), operates multidisciplinary community-based clinics offering rapid-acting treatments for depression located in Mississauga, Toronto, Kitchener-Waterloo, Ottawa, and Montreal.
ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD
"Dr. Roger S. McIntyre" Dr. Roger S. McIntyre
Chairman & CEO
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION PLEASE CONTACT:
Braxia Scientific Corp. Tel : 416-762-2138 Email : [email protected] Website : www.braxiascientific.com
The CSE has not reviewed and does not accept responsibility for the accuracy or adequacy of this release.
Forward-looking Information Cautionary Statement
This news release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of applicable securities laws. All statements that are not historical facts, future estimates, plans, programs, forecasts, projections, objectives, assumptions, expectations, or beliefs of future performance are "forward-looking statements."
Forward-looking statements include statements about the intended promise of ketamine-based treatments for depression, the potential for ketamine or other psychedelics to treat other mental health conditions, the ability of telemedicine and the Proposed Transaction to address the unmet need for mental health disorders or expand or accelerate the growth of Braxia or Irwin, the potential business or strategic advantages to either Irwin or Braxia in connection with the Proposed Transaction, the negotiation and execution of a definitive Arrangement Agreement, the completion and proposed terms of the Proposed Transaction and the acquisition of all of the issued and outstanding Braxia Shares, required conditions precedent to the Proposed Transaction, including regulatory, court, and securityholder approvals for the Proposed Transaction, and the anticipated benefits of the Proposed Transaction. Such forward- looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual results, events, or developments to be materially different from any future results, events or developments expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Such risks and uncertainties include, among others, the failure of ketamine, psilocybin and other psychedelics to provide the expected health benefits and unanticipated side effects, dependence on obtaining and maintaining regulatory approvals, including acquiring and renewing federal, provincial, municipal, local or other licenses and engaging in activities that could be later determined to be illegal under domestic or international laws. Ketamine and psilocybin are currently Schedule I and Schedule III controlled substances, respectively, under the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act, S.C. 1996, c. 19 (the "CDSA") and it is a criminal offence to possess such substances under the CDSA without a prescription or a legal exemption. Health Canada has not approved psilocybin as a drug for any indication, however ketamine is a legally permissible medication for the treatment of certain psychological conditions. It is illegal to possess such substances in Canada without a prescription.
These factors should be considered carefully, and readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on such forward-looking statements.
Although the Company has attempted to identify important risk factors that could cause actual actions, events or results to differ materially from those described in forward-looking statements, there may be other risk factors that cause actions, events or results to differ from those anticipated, estimated or intended. Additional information identifying risks and uncertainties that could affect financial results is contained in the Company's filings with Canadian securities regulators, including the Amended and Restated Listing Statement dated April 15, 2021 and its most recent MD&A, which are available at www.sedar.com . There can be no assurance that forward-looking statements will prove to be accurate, as actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in forward-looking statements.
To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/156882
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March 3, 2023
Three ways to prevent school shootings, based on research
by Beverly Kingston and Sarah Goodrum, The Conversation
1. Teach students and adults to report warning signs
- threats to the target or others, and an intent to attack, including on social media
- intense or escalating anger
- interest in weapons
- sadness, depression or isolation
- changes in behavior or appearance
- suicide or self-harm
- interest in weapons or violence
- complaints of being bullied
- worries over grades or attendance
- harassing others
2. Develop and publicize around-the-clock anonymous tip lines
3. conduct behavioral threat assessment and management.
Provided by The Conversation
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Dimensions Research Integrity
Data-driven insights to help identify the quality and research integrity of scientific publications.
Putting trust in research
Dimension Research Integrity uses the methodology and algorithms developed by Digital Science company Ripeta to examine published papers and identify the hallmarks of responsible science – called ‘Trust Markers’ In doing so, Dimensions has created the world’s largest research integrity dataset by applying the processes to over 33 million publications since 2011, resulting in over 200 million trust marker data points. This huge resource allows researchers to look at the development over time of the portfolios of research organisations, publishers and funders.
Why use Dimensions Research Integrity and its Trust Markers?
Research integrity is one of the biggest issues facing scholarly communications this decade – ensuring research is validated is a bigger priority now than ever.
Being able to identify and remove illegitimate or tainted sources will not only benefit individual researchers using Dimensions Research Integrity, but help clean up the research ecosystem.
Evidence that research has been checked is also important to enhance research reputation and ensure legitimacy to third parties.
You can see further benefits and examples of the power of Dimensions Research Integrity in this report .
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The world’s largest research integrity dataset
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Dimensions Research Integrity Dataset on Google BigQuery
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Dimensions Research Integrity in action
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North America OTT TV and Video Market Report 2023: A $107 Billion Market by 2028 - Market to Witness a Notable Slowdown from 2023 Mainly Due to Netflix's Hybrid AVOD-SVOD Tier Lowering its ARPUs
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Mar 03, 2023, 18:00 ET
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DUBLIN , March 3, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- The "North America OTT TV and Video Forecasts to 2028" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.
North American OTT TV episode and movie revenues will reach $107 billion in 2028; up from $74 billion in 2022. The US will contribute $30 billion from the $33 billion additional revenues, with Canada supplying the rest.
Most of the region's growth will come from AVOD. North American AVOD revenues will increase by $27 billion to $43 billion .
Simon Murray , Principal Analyst, said: "North American SVOD revenues will increase by only $6 billion between 2022 and 2028 to $58 billion . There will be a notable slowdown from 2023 mainly due to Netflix's hybrid AVOD-SVOD tier lowering its ARPUs."
The report comes in two parts:
- Insight: Detailed country-by-country analysis in a 30-page PDF document.
- Excel workbook covering each year from 2015 to 2028 by household penetration, by SVOD subscribers and by OTT revenues for movies and TV episodes. As well as summary tables by country and by platform.
NEW FOR 2023: Filter worksheet - every row on one spreadsheet, allowing for easy comparisons.
Companies Mentioned
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For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/tguo79
About ResearchAndMarkets.com ResearchAndMarkets.com is the world's leading source for international market research reports and market data. We provide you with the latest data on international and regional markets, key industries, the top companies, new products and the latest trends.
Media Contact:
Research and Markets Laura Wood , Senior Manager [email protected]
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The Chinese balloon saga could be part of a new space race closer to Earth
A fighter jet flies near a large balloon drifting above the Atlantic Ocean, just off the coast of South Carolina near Myrtle Beach, Feb. 4. Minutes later, the balloon was struck by a missile from an F-22 fighter jet, ending its weeklong traverse over the United States. China said the balloon was a weather research vessel blown off course, a claim rejected by U.S. officials. Chad Fish/AP hide caption
A fighter jet flies near a large balloon drifting above the Atlantic Ocean, just off the coast of South Carolina near Myrtle Beach, Feb. 4. Minutes later, the balloon was struck by a missile from an F-22 fighter jet, ending its weeklong traverse over the United States. China said the balloon was a weather research vessel blown off course, a claim rejected by U.S. officials.
TAIPEI, Taiwan — Back in March 2018, Chinese officials and key state scientists gathered in Beijing to celebrate the start of a new front in research: near space.
That's a part of airspace 60,000 to 330,000 feet from the ground, just before the beginning of outer space — and historically overlooked by militaries, until recently.
"Strengthening the exploration and understanding of near space, seizing the strategic commanding heights of near space and cultivating emerging high-tech industries have become the focus of competition among countries around the world," declared Xiang Libin, a vice president of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Xiang, an engineer who specializes in microsatellites and space technology, also serves as chief commander of the Beidou satellite system, China's competitor to the U.S.-run GPS.
The research initiative would be dubbed the Honghu Program and focused on producing near-space technology that can "identify clearly, stay in place and be useful," Xiang said. He vowed to build "my country's first near-space science experiment system."
Earlier in February, American defense officials revealed they had been tracking a Chinese balloon they alleged had been set aloft for intelligence-gathering purposes that had drifted over continental United States. The U.S. soon shot down the balloon, setting off further diplomatic tensions between the two countries.
While it is unclear whether Honghu's research was incorporated in the object shot down by the U.S., the program's existence reflects the renewed importance Chinese military officials attach to airships. These airships, officials and researchers say, are not just tools for surveillance or gathering weather and meteorological data, but they also provide help with advanced weapons China is building, including hypersonic missiles, and are a new and important area of competition with the U.S.
In this Nov. 7, 2018, file photo, a model of the Chinese BeiDou Navigation Satellite System is displayed during an aerospace exhibition in Zhuhai city, south China's Guangdong province. The system is China's version of the U.S. GPS. Kin Cheung/AP hide caption
In this Nov. 7, 2018, file photo, a model of the Chinese BeiDou Navigation Satellite System is displayed during an aerospace exhibition in Zhuhai city, south China's Guangdong province. The system is China's version of the U.S. GPS.
Near space is an emerging battleground
U.S. defense officials say they believe the downed balloon was part of a fleet of surveillance airships Beijing has been building and deployed over 40 countries around the world. Suspected Chinese balloons have been spotted in Japan, Taiwan , India, Latin America and Hawaii in the past three years.
The sightings could reflect years of Chinese state and private investments into balloon capacity, making use of a centuries-old technology that could drift at low enough speeds that radar systems might not immediately tag them as foreign objects.
China's efforts to develop aerial surveillance capacities were partly prompted by competition with advancements in near-space technology in other countries, including from the U.S.
"Near space has become a new battleground in modern warfare," said the Liberation Army Daily , a state-run newspaper affiliated with the Chinese military.
The balloons float along a band of the atmosphere up to 164,000 feet high, just before outer space begins — the peripheral area called near space. That altitude, straddling outer space and commercial airspace, makes the balloons useful for fine-tuning and targeting hypersonic weapons, which China is developing.
Military vehicles, carrying DF-17, roll down as members of a Chinese military honor guard march during the parade to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the founding of Communist China in Beijing, Oct. 1, 2019. China's military showed off a new hypersonic ballistic nuclear missile in the parade. Ng Han Guan/AP hide caption
Military vehicles, carrying DF-17, roll down as members of a Chinese military honor guard march during the parade to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the founding of Communist China in Beijing, Oct. 1, 2019. China's military showed off a new hypersonic ballistic nuclear missile in the parade.
"When you're launching a ballistic missile, the meteorological information about where you launch is probably the most important meteorological data that you can cover. But hypersonic weapons fly low, on the edge of the stratosphere at altitudes of 100,000 to 120,000 feet. The balloon is giving you that data," says Carl Schuster, a retired U.S. Navy captain and former director of operations at then-U.S. Pacific Command's Joint Intelligence Center.
Their hypersonic application has turned slow-moving balloons, previously considered a low-tech option, into a surveillance and navigational tool seen as increasingly crucial by Chinese military officials.
"Near-space vehicles have increasingly become the new darling of long-range and rapid strike weapons, and the pace of future wars will therefore be significantly accelerated," declared an editorial last year in Chinese state media.
Even weather research can have military applications
The Honghu Program — named after the Chinese for "swan" — is one key way China has tried to advance its high-altitude technology.
Run through the state-run Laboratory of Quantitative Remote Sensing Information Technology in Beijing, the Honghu Program's researchers focused their efforts on developing materials light yet strong enough to prevent gas leakage at such high altitudes and to improve the limited steering abilities of the blimps.
"There is no air convection effect in the adjacent space, so the aircraft is difficult to control," Chinese military commentators have noted .
Over the next two years, scientists affiliated with the project would conduct six experiments launching balloons from northwestern Qinghai province, off the elevated Tibetan plateau that extends into the province. The experiments were designed to collect atmospheric and wind data as well as ground data from the balloons, according to state media.
Much of that research appears purely scientific, based on papers and patents published by near-space researchers, in line with Beijing's claim that the airship shot down over the U.S. was a civilian research balloon. Yet even simple meteorological data can have military applications, say analysts, collected at a fraction of the cost of operating a satellite.
"Balloons are one possible way to do what the U.S. military calls a kill chain. It's kind of all the steps you would need in terms of finding the target, getting that information to the hypersonic missiles, then giving updates to the missile," says William Kim, a consultant for Washington-based think tank the Marathon Initiative.
That importance has led the Chinese government to bring in private players as well. Less than a week after the U.S. shot the Chinese balloon out of the sky, the U.S. Commerce Department slapped sanctions on six Chinese entities "for their support to China's military modernization efforts, specifically the People's Liberation Army's (PLA) aerospace programs including airships and balloons and related materials and components."
Four of the six companies are private enterprises founded or run by just two men: Wu Zhe, an aerospace engineer and professor, and Wang Dong, a technology investor.
"Beijing's own program of civil military fusion certainly seeks to bring in more private companies, largely because I think the Chinese government views them as more innovative and providing better capabilities than what their state-owned enterprises have been able to do in the past," says Matthew Turpin, who served as a top White House China expert in the Trump administration.
An online biography for Wu showed a career first built within the public sector, teaching at Beihang University, a state aeronautics institute now sanctioned by the U.S. government for its military ties. He then became a member of the Chinese army's General Armaments Department.
In 2015, Wu struck out on his own, founding an aerospace company dedicated to developing what it called "near-space vehicles," including balloons. In 2019, one of his companies said it successfully circumnavigated the globe with a silvery, high-altitude blimp.
Such private innovation seems motivated in part by geopolitical rivalry with the United States. Published papers from Chinese government-affiliated research bodies closely monitored U.S. private companies and technology, including SpaceX, and measured domestic progress in near-space research with these companies.
"First of all, near-space airships are different from satellites and airplanes in that they can track a certain position on the ground in one place for a long time," according to a military editorial in Xinhua , China's state news agency. "Secondly, the near-space aerostat is very close to the Earth, so whether for surveillance or for filming, the image will be very clear."
The relatively close distance near-space balloons have to the Earth's surface and their ability to stay fixed to one spot, depending on the winds, let them fill a surveillance niche missed by satellites.
China accuses U.S. of flying spy balloons into Chinese airspace more than 10 times
Blinken has a lot on his plate including tensions with China and the war in Ukraine
"You can know who key individuals are who work in certain areas," says Turpin, who is a visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution, a Washington think tank. That means Beijing can use high-resolution imagery amassed over time to map out the routines and locations of important personnel who work at military sites.
The suspicion that foreign countries are gathering intelligence from the air runs both ways. Earlier this month, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson accused the U.S. of flying its own surveillance vehicles "more than 10 times" into Chinese airspace above Xinjiang and Tibet — which the U.S. has denied.
"We do not send spy balloons over China — period," Secretary of State Antony Blinken told NPR in an interview.
- China balloon
- Chinese balloon
- Chinese surveillance
- China surveillance
- meteorology
There’s Something Odd About the Dogs Living at Chernobyl
Pets left behind when people fled the disaster in 1986 seem to have seeded a unique population.
In the spring of 1986, in their rush to flee the radioactive plume and booming fire that burned after the Chernobyl power plant exploded, many people left behind their dogs. Most of those former pets died as radiation ripped through the region and emergency workers culled the animals they feared would ferry toxic atoms about. Some, though, survived. Those dogs trekked into the camps of liquidators to beg for scraps; they nosed into empty buildings and found safe places to sleep. In the 1,600-square-mile exclusion zone around the power plant, they encountered each other, and began to reproduce. “Dogs were there immediately after the disaster,” says Gabriella Spatola, a geneticist at the National Institutes of Health and the University of South Carolina. And they have been there ever since.
Spatola and her colleagues are now puzzling through the genomes of those survivors’ modern descendants . In identifying the genetic scars that today’s animals may have inherited, the researchers hope to understand how, and how well , Chernobyl’s canine populations have thrived. The findings could both reveal the lasting tolls of radiation and hint at traits that have helped certain dogs avoid the disaster’s worst health effects. The fates of dogs—bred and adapted to work, play, and lounge at our side—are tied to ours. And the canines we leave behind when crises strike could show us what it takes to survive the fallout of our gravest mistakes.
One of the key canine groups the team is focusing on is based at what’s left of the power plant itself, and has likely weathered the highest levels of radiation of any dog population in the exclusion zone. The researchers are working to compare the genomes of those dogs with those of others living farther out, in Chernobyl City, a quasi-residential region about nine miles away that was evacuated after the blast, and in Slavutych, a less contaminated city roughly 30 miles out, where many power-plant workers settled after leaving their post.
The spatial differences are essential to the study’s success. The region’s landscape is “a patchwork of different radioactivity levels,” says Timothy Mousseau, a biologist at the University of South Carolina who’s been studying Chernobyl’s wildlife for more than 20 years, and is co-advising Spatola’s work. Which means that geographically distinct packs of dogs could, in theory, have distinct exposure histories, and distinct genetic legacies to show for it. The team’s work is just beginning. But in the hundreds of blood samples that Spatola and her colleagues have analyzed from dogs in all three groups, they’ve already found evidence that the reactor-adjacent canines are different in at least some ways.
The animals that the team sampled in Chernobyl City and Slavutych, the researchers found, look a lot like dogs you’d find elsewhere. They’ve been born of mixtures of modern breeds: mastiffs, pinschers, schnauzers, boxers, terriers. But the power-plant population seems more stuck in the past. The dogs there are far more inbred, and still skew heavily German shepherd—a breed that has a long history in the region, a hint that the animals have largely kept to their ancestral roots, says Elaine Ostrander, a geneticist at the National Institutes of Health and another of Spatola’s co-advisers. This pack might represent something like “a time capsule” from the disaster’s worst days, says Elinor Karlsson, a genomics expert at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard. Perhaps this lineage of dogs has been stewing in the plant’s radiation for a dozen generations or more. Some may even have inherited mutations caused by the explosion itself.
The long-ranging consequences of their exposures, though, aren’t yet clear. Repeated, heavy doses of radiation—which can mutate DNA, seed cancers, and irreparably damage the structural integrity of cells—can be, without question, “extremely detrimental to life,” says Isain Zapata, a biomedical researcher at Rocky Vista University. And over the decades, a wealth of studies has revealed serious health effects among some local animals : Birds have been found with tumors and unusually small brains ; bank voles have battled cataracts and produced wonky, underperforming sperm . Even bees seem to struggle to reproduce . Still, not all creatures are equally susceptible to radiation; many have also avoided the region’s most saturated zones. And in some parts of the exclusion zone, some of them appear to be flourishing on terrain now largely devoid of humans and their polluting, disruptive ways. In this landscape of possibilities, it’s hard to say where the dogs of Chernobyl might fall: Domestic canines depend heavily on us, and may suffer more than other animals when we leave. But that dependence also means that dogs are also less likely to chow down on wild, radiation-contaminated food, and may be well positioned to take advantage of the ruins we leave behind—and to mooch more when we start to creep back.
Read: The creatures that remember Chernobyl
What the team finds next will be telling. Scientists have already spent decades scrutinizing canine genomes; a reference book for what’s “typical” already exists, which makes detecting “when something’s unusual” much easier, Karlsson told me. The researchers might uncover mutations and sickness in the power-plant pack—a sign that the dogs’ genomes have been walloped by years of radiation, as those of some other animals apparently have. But Karlsson also thinks the team could find the opposite: hints of genetic traits that have kept the dogs alive under harsh conditions, such as a higher resistance to cancer. That, in turn, could bode well for us. Canine and human genomes are quite similar, and “domestic dogs have been a model for human cancer for a very long time,” says Shane Campbell-Staton, an evolutionary biologist at Princeton who studies Chernobyl’s wolves . Perhaps these dogs did not bend under pressure, but instead thrived.
One of the trickiest parts of the project will be figuring out which differences among the studied dog groups are attributable to radiation, rather than the ways in which the Chernobyl disaster completely remodeled the region and its ecosystems . Populations of plants, insects, birds, and mammals ebbed and flowed, affecting the availability of resources and the presence of predators. Humans came and left, sometimes bringing food, medical care, or more dogs. Generations of animals replaced each other, and populations mingled and mixed. Olena Burdo, a radioecologist at the Kiev Institute for Nuclear Research, has worked for years to try to parse these many variables in her work with bank voles . In the wild, it’s usually easy to tell that differences between populations exist, she told me. It’s just not always possible to pinpoint why .
Without perfect record-keeping of individual canines, the team can’t prove that the modern dogs they’re sampling are directly descended from 1980s dogs, either. Burdo told me she suspects that at least some of the power-plant dogs may be more transient than the researchers think. If the three dog populations under study are loose, amorphous, and constantly turning over, the researchers will have a tough time determining the effects of higher- or lower-dose radiation exposure through generations. The power-plant dogs—the purported high-radiation cohort—may not really be a lineage born of the facility’s buildings after all.
But Ostrander is fairly convinced that the power-plant population has largely kept to itself. Life among the abandoned buildings is actually quite plush. Workers toss the dogs leftovers; tourists cheerfully sneak them snacks. And in recent years, veterinarians have banded together to provide the dogs medical care, vaccinations, and spay-and-neuter services. Beyond that, the canines may not need much. The pack seems to have grown more aloof and self-sufficient over the years, Spatola told me, and may even be behaviorally reverting to some of its wilder, wolfish roots. Left to fend for themselves when the reactor blew, this population of dogs—which started out as pets—has been transformed, perhaps by radiation, perhaps by human fallibility, into something less familiar, more strange, and entirely its own.
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Horizon: Scientists warn Sunak on EU research programme
Reports said sunak was holding back on re-joining the €95bn programme..
Prof Sir Adrian Smith told BBC News that reneging on government promises would be damaging to UK science.
His comments follow reports that Rishi Sunak was holding back on re-joining the €95bn programme, known as Horizon.
PM Rishi Sunak should not go back on his pledge to re-join the EU's science research programme, the President of The Royal Society has warned.
BBC News understands that he is considering renegotiating a cut-down version of the Horizon programme.
The Royal Society represents Britain's leading scientists. Prof Smith told BBC News that ministers had consistently said that they were fully supportive of full association with the Horizon programme once the EU gave the green light.
"There is a great deal of concern and anxiety at the rumours that there is now a desire to renegotiate our association of the Horizon programme.
"It will mean that the continuing uncertainty will drift on and we will have more of the problems we are already seeing, such as a brain drain and the exclusion of leadership from major programmes," he said.
The assumption was that if differences over the Northern Ireland Protocol could be resolved, the UK would fully re-join the Horizon programme under terms similar to those it had before Brexit.
But BBC News understands that Mr Sunak is keen on an alternative research programme put together by ministers, known as "Plan B". This would be a UK-led programme involving collaboration with non-EU as well as European nations. It was developed in case a research agreement could not be reached with the EU.
Sources say that while some aspects of the Horizon programme are appealing to the Prime Minister, such as grants to individual scientists, he believes that larger institutional grants favour France and Germany and may not represent good value for money.
While no decision has yet been taken, one option under consideration is for a complete renegotiation of the terms of the Horizon agreement currently in place with the EU. This would allow the UK government to sign up to those parts of the programme that appealed, then use the remainder of the money that would otherwise have been spent on Horizon on its Plan B.
Prof Smith told BBC News that he didn't believe that such a plan would work.
"There is an assumption that we are in charge of the renegotiation and that we can have the good bits and get out of the not so good bits. All history shows that this kind of cherry-picking and negotiation Is not up for grabs.
''The whole thing is a package and the point is that the entire programme has in the past been good for the UK," he said.
Prof Sarah Main of the Campaign for Science and Engineering said that the UK's previous fruitful membership of the EU programme had attracted investment from the hi-tech companies her organisation represents and that her members want nothing short of the full association that is currently on the table.
"We want to see this with all speed. If the Prime Minister has not been close to the discussion, we need to make clear that that is the message from the research community and in the UK's economic interest to secure this deal as quickly as possible," she said.
Prof James Wilsdon, a specialist in research policy at University College London, said the failure to commit to the current arrangement on offer from the EU showed that the government was not listening to the science community.
"To keep the whole UK research system hanging on in limbo for two years while we ostensibly seek association; then to walk away when we finally have it in our grasp would, I think, be for many UK scientists, the final straw," he said.
Horizon Europe is a collaborative research programme involving Europe's leading research institutes and hi-tech companies. EU member nations each contribute funds which are then allocated to individuals or organisations by expert scientists based on the merit of research proposals.
The government negotiated associate membership of the programme in the withdrawal agreement following Brexit, because it felt it was important for the UK to be involved. But the EU went back on its part of the deal after disputes emerged over the Northern Ireland Protocol and British involvement in the prestigious programme has been left in limbo ever since.
The agreement of the Windsor Framework last week paved the way for the UK to re-join.
When the European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and the Mr Sunak were asked about re-entry to the Horizon programme at a joint press conference, Ms von der Leyen enthusiastically remarked that it was "good news for scientists and researchers, in the European Union and in the UK," but Mr Sunak did not comment.
He also failed to make a commitment to the programme when asked at Prime Minister's Questions this week and the FT has reported that he was holding back on committing to the programme.
Downing Street has been approached for comment but has not responded.
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nature scientific reports research articles Research articles Article Type Year Analysis of contact pressure in a 3D model of dual-mobility hip joint prosthesis under a gait cycle Mohammad...
Scientific Reports has a 2-year impact factor: 4.996 (2021), and is the 5th most-cited journal in the world, with more than 696,000 citations in 2021*. *2022 Journal Citation Reports® Science...
The scientific method, you'll probably recall, involves developing a hypothesis, testing it, and deciding whether your findings support the hypothesis. In essence, the format for a research report in the sciences mirrors the scientific method but fleshes out the process a little.
The main purpose of a lab report is to demonstrate your understanding of the scientific method by performing and evaluating a hands-on lab experiment. This type of assignment is usually shorter than a research paper. Lab reports are commonly used in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields.
Scientific reports allow their readers to understand the experiment without doing it themselves. In addition, scientific reports give others the opportunity to check the methodology of the experiment to ensure the validity of the results. A scientific report is written in several stages.
A scientific research report is a document that contains all the information about experimental investigations. It describes the processes and progress of scientific research, including its results and the state of the research problem.
A formal scientific research report is a piece of professional writing addressed to other professionals who are interested in the investigation you conducted. They will want to know why you did the investigation, how you did it, what you found out, and whether your findings were significant and useful.
A research report refers to a journal that reflects on a particular research venture's conclusions or otherwise science studies on or about a particular topic. The functional utility of the research study is heavily dependent upon how it is portrayed to those who are expected to behave on the grounds of research results. Table of Content
Although most scientific reports use the IMRAD format, there are some exceptions. This format is usually not used in reports describing other kinds of research, such as field or case studies, in which headings are more likely to differ according to discipline.
A scientific report consists of details regarding scientists reporting what their research entailed and reporting the results and conclusions drawn from the study. Researchers should write scientific psychology reports per the APA format to ensure the scientists report enough information.
Begin by describing the problem or situation that motivates the research. Move to discussing the current state of research in the field; then reveal a "gap" or problem in the field. Finally, explain how the present research is a solution to that problem or gap. If the study has hypotheses, they are presented at the end of the introduction.
A science research report is a clear and comprehensive document which is composed of collected, analyzed, and interpreted data performed by research scientists as it clearly communicates key messages about why certain scientific findings are valuable.
5 Steps to create the Science Research Report The research report is the total representation of the actual theories and the numbers in a more detailed, descriptive manner. The researcher work hard on the numbers and the facts that are going to be presented through the use of the report.
Intelligence reports supporting the lab-leak theory for COVID are not based in science. By Cheryl Rofer on March 3, 2023. This aerial view shows the P4 laboratory (top C) on the campus of the ...
Introduction Sections in Scientific Research Reports (IMRaD) Download this guide as a PDF; Return to all guides; The goal of the introduction in an IMRaD* report is to give the reader an overview of the literature in the field, show the motivation for your study, and share what unique perspective your research adds. To introduce readers to your ...
The purpose of a scientific report is to talk the reader through an experiment or piece of research you've done where you've generated some data, the decisions you made, what you found and what it means. Lab or experimental reports in the Sciences have a very specific structure, which is often known as IMRAD: I ntroduction M ethods R esults and
The report thus stresses the need for a considerable increase of national investment in basic research to allow Israel to maintain a leading and competitive position in world science and even ...
Begin with a clear statement of the principal findings. This will reinforce the main take-away for the reader and set up the rest of the discussion. Explain why the outcomes of your study are important to the reader. Discuss the implications of your findings realistically based on previous literature, highlighting both the strengths and ...
"The scientific literature contains essentially nothing but original research articles that support a natural origin of this virus pandemic," said Michael Worobey, an evolutionary biologist at ...
Iwasaki, Scientific Reports, Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41598-023-29692-9. Patterns and drivers of anaerobic sediment nitrogen transformations across thermokarst lakes ... The previous edition of Skeptical Science New Research may be found here. 0 0. Printable Version | Link to this page. Comments. There have been no comments posted yet.
Toronto, Ontario--(Newsfile Corp. - March 1, 2023) - Braxia Scientific Corp. (CSE: BRAX) (OTC Pink: BRAXF) (FSE: 4960), ("Braxia Scientific", or the "Company"), a medical research and telemedicine ...
Here are three evidence-based steps that schools and communities can take to prevent violence. 1. Teach students and adults to report warning signs. Most school shooters exhibited concerning ...
Dimension Research Integrity uses the methodology and algorithms developed by Digital Science company Ripeta to examine published papers and identify the hallmarks of responsible science - called 'Trust Markers'. In doing so, Dimensions has created the world's largest research integrity dataset by applying the processes to over 33 ...
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The CT scanning of osteological remains was supported by a grant of the Romanian Ministry of Education and Research, CNCS-UEFISCDI, project number PN-III-P1-1.2-PCCDI-2017-0686, within PCCDI, contract no. 52PCCDI. P.W. and S.A. wishes to mention a grant from the National Science Centre (Kraków, Poland) "From steppes to the Balkans.
China said the balloon was a weather research vessel blown off course, a claim rejected by U.S. officials. TAIPEI, Taiwan — Back in March 2018, Chinese officials and key state scientists ...
March 3, 2023, 2 PM ET. In the spring of 1986, in their rush to flee the radioactive plume and booming fire that burned after the Chernobyl power plant exploded, many people left behind their dogs ...
In Summary. Prof Sir Adrian Smith told BBC News that reneging on government promises would be damaging to UK science. His comments follow reports that Rishi Sunak was holding back on re-joining ...