Note: This paper will statisfy the IUS research writting requirement
but you have to tell the instructor you wish to satisfy the requirement
at
the begining of the semester. The
IUS Writing Lab is a good place to get help.
Time table:
Discuss possible topics with instructor (look at Scientific American,
American Scientist, Physics Today, American Journal of Physics, Astronomy etc.
for ideas). The topic should be something currently in the science news
related to physics (new or recent discoveries or progress in a field which
is not yet found in a book).
After making sure you can find enough information about your topic (see
number 3), turn in a sentence or two describing what you are going to write
about. Topic due September 23rd.
Collect library resources (a minimum of 6 references). These should be
technical or trade articles or information on the internet (from legitimate
sources- I can show you how to reference this material). Go to the original
papers (i.e. primary sources) in Physical Review, Science etc,
as much as possible, even if you cannot understand everything in these
article. Use Scientific American articles or other sources (the instructor
for example) to help you understand the original articles. You should not
use books (except to reference background material) or popular magazines
(i.e. secondary sources such as Popular Mechanics, Omni etc.) as references.
You can get an idea for a topic from Popular Mechanics but
you should track down the original sources and use them as references or
resources, not Popular Mechanics. Note: the library can get
many things through inter-library loan but it takes about two weeks so
give yourself plenty of time. You will also want to check the library's
Infotrack system which indexes current newspapaers and magazines. List
of references due October 7.
Imagine you are a reporter for a fairly sophisticated magazine (or possibly
the New York Times) and you are going to write a somewhat lengthy news
report on the current status of your topic. You can assume your readers
are intelligent but not particularly well informed about the subject (suppose
they have had at least high school level physics but not much more). You
will want to give enough background information to bring the reader up
to speed, including definitions of technical terms and concepts. You may
also wish to include diagrams (draw your own) or pictures for clarification.
If an equation or two is needed for clarity then include them but try to
avoid mathmatical expresions. Since this will be a topic which is currently
developing you will want to put the discovery in historical perspective;
why is it significant? If there is disagreement among the principle scientists
working on the topic you should discuss both sides of the argument. The
paper should be written in a style something like a Scientific
American article (so take a look at Scientific American-
the long articles not the short news items) but perhaps with more references.
The paper (including early draft versions) should be about 10 pages typed,
double spaced (not including pictures or diagrams). Quotes and other referenced
material should be numbered with references at the end.
Make an outline of the paper (give the sections into which the paper is
divided and a few sentence fragments under each section indicating what
will be in that section). Outline due October 9.
Turn in the first draft. Frist draft due November 4
I will return the draft by November 11 with a tentative grade. You may
then make improvements (based on my comments) and turn in the paper as
many times as you like for a chance at a better grade (I'll keep the highest
grade) until the last day of class.