Four person group assignment: Group Leader, Editor, Statistician and Researcher.

Individual Grading on Group Assignment, 100 points (25 for presentation, 25 for individual assignments and 50 for final draft and disk copy. Group evaluation for 10 additional points.

Third person, not First person. Use third person to lend credibility to your data and statistical findings.

No less than five pages plus literature review, double spaced, Times New Roman, 12 point font (including main text, graphs and tables).

Title (20 font, bold), followed by student names (12 font), followed by the following five sections (Abstract: in 11 point font, section titles in 14 bold font, no colon) in the following order:

• Abstract (11 point font, TNR, single line spacing, bold the word Abstract: only - including the colon): 4-6 sentences,limited to 80 words, Should summarily describe purpose, methods and results. Single line box around abstract.
• Introduction: Approximately two pages, include background information, purpose of study and hypotheses
• Methods and Materials: Approximately one page, explain project setup, levels tested, statistical design, state hypotheses and type of statistical analysis system to be used.
• Results and Discussion: Approximately two pages, explain what happened, which hypotheses was true, Use graphs & charts, statistical proofs, finish with a paragraph of conclusions and plausible explanations
• A Bibliography titled, Literature Cited: No less than five (ten if two researchers) literature citations in alphabetical order by author's last name.

Paper must contain an embedded table (single spaced) of replicate and treatment means, with mean separations and a graph of treatment means. The graph should be black and white, no gray background or box around the figure. Make sure you change the font to Times New Roman.

References must be from published (refereed) articles, scientific publications or text books (go to SCIENCE library). Internet sources or references are NOT legal, unless they contain a reproduction of the original scientific publication and are from a government, educational or scientific society web site. Magazines and Newspapers are NOT legal reference sources. A government document or reference such as a Material Safety Data Sheet or product labeling information can be footnoted, but not cited in the bibliography. The agroecology lab manual and Carolina Biological manuals on Fast Plant Biology may be used as reference sources in the Materials and Methods section. All references listed in the Bibliography must be cited in the body of the document.

Citation Format

• After citation in text (author's last name, year published)
  - Examples: (Jones, 1998), (Jones and Smith, 1998) or (Jones, et.al., 1998)
• In Bibliography - author(s), initials, year. title. journal/publisher, location, volume/chapter, page(s)
  - Example: Jones, L.C., 1998. Fast Plant Research Techniques. Journal of Plant Research; New York, NY. v12: pp112-119
  - Example: Jones, L.C., Smith, T.R., 1998. Wisconsin Fast Plants. Plant Physiology, Prentiss-Paul, New York, NY. Chapter III; page 73
  - Example: Jones, L.C., Smith, T.R., Brown, S.S., 1998. Brassicas. Symposium Proceedings, Society of Plant Science, New York, NY; v6; pp11-13

Scientific Names: Complete name on first appearance, underlined. Can be abbreviated through remainder of paper, unless a sentence starts with the scientific name, in which case it must be the complete genus and species.

• Examples: Brassica rapa, B. rapa

Scientific name may be italicized in title.

• Example: The Effects of Salt on Brassica rapa Plant Growth.

NO OTHER FORMATS ARE ACCEPTABLE - Common errors include no space between the underlined genus and species name, capitalizing both genus and species name or not underlining the genus and species name.

Hypotheses: You must have a null (Ho) and an alternate hypothesis (Ha). The null is always that there were NO EFFECTS and the alternate is that there were effects.

• Example -
  • Ho: Salt had no effect on the growth of Brassica rapa plants.
  • Ha: Salt affected the growth of Brassica rapa plants.

The hypotheses are not predictions (prediction implies bias, and good science is not biased). With hypotheses you are simply covering ALL possibilities, and therefore you cannot be wrong, because at least one of the hypotheses will be correct. Statistics will determine which hypothesis is true and you will simply report which hypothesis your research proved to be correct.

Statistical Designs & Analysis: All projects will use either a Completely Randomized Design (CRD) or a Randomized Block Design (RBD). Statistical Analysis should be done with the Statistical Analysis System (SAS) at the University of Wyoming, available through the University ASUWLINK server

Example Paper - Please note this paper was modified for HTML format codes and does not conform to the above guidelines due to HTML restrictions. Please follow the above guidelines.

1. It is not double spaced
2. There are no paragraph indents
3. Paragraphs are spaced
4. Font sizes are approximations
5. This paper is copyrighted, DO NOT COPY or Plagiarize.
6. VIEW PAPER