DLR 5: Locomotion – Abstract
Instructions
We Are All Responsible for Maintaining Academic Integrity
Read the Academic Integrity section of this Pressbook, including the resources we have provided.
While you are responsible for ensuring you do not commit academic dishonesty (e.g. plagiarism, inappropriate collaboration) according to any of the relevant offenses and explanations listed in McMaster’s Academic Integrity Policy (e.g. section 18 and Appendix 3), we have provided additional details regarding expectations for the LIFESCI 2L03 assessments. You are responsible for reading our expectations in regards to appropriate academic behavior (e.g. for group vs. individual work) and how to reference sources of information for individual assignments.
In order for your assignment to be graded, you must acknowledge on the assessment cover page that you have read the Academic Integrity section of this Pressbook and our expectations (see the links above). The cover page template provided to you contains this acknowledgement.
Refer to the ‘Abstract‘ section of the lab report writing guide for details on on how to prepare this section
- This LRWG section, in addition to this assignment overview page, acts as the SPECIFICATIONS for what we are expecting for a submission to be graded with a pass
- Recall that DLRs are graded as pass/fail
- If you do not submit this assessment, it will be noted as 0 in the Avenue to Learn gradebook)
- A submission that does not meet the specifications will receive a fail (noted as a 1 in the Avenue to Learn gradebook)
- A submission that meets the specifications will receive a pass (noted as a 2 in the Avenue to Learn gradebook)
- A submission that exceeds the specifications will receive a pass (noted as a 3 in the Avenue to Learn gradebook)
- These numerical notations are not percentages, scores, or anything that can be used to mathematically calculate a new value. In fact, a 2 and a 3 are identical when we record your final letter grade at the end of the semester.
- You should refer back to the GradeGrid if you want a refresher of how DLR completion is used to determine your final letter grade in the course at the end of the semester
An Abstract is a brief, 200-300 word summary of the findings of a study and their impact on the research field. This is the first section of a research paper someone will read, and it should summarize your entire research study well enough to help the reader to conclude whether reading the entire article will help them in their own research/literature searching, or if it is not relevant to their field of study. The Abstract contains 4 main sections:
- The motivation/problem statement
- Methods/procedure/approach
- Major results of the experiment
- Main conclusions arrived at from the data and their implications
You will compose an Abstract regarding the nematode locomotion lab. Remember that an Abstract will not contain any figures or references, but it does share the major results and conclusions, as well as the purpose of doing the research and how the research was conducted. Abstracts are meant to be concise, and they can be a tricky part of a lab report to write. When writing a full lab report in other courses you may take in the future, we would recommend writing your Abstract LAST, even though it’s the beginning of the report. You cannot write an effective abstract until all of the other sections of the lab report are complete (or in your case, before you have completed the lab activities and analyzed your results in the ELN).
You do not need to include any citations or references for the abstract.
Your abstract must be 300 words or less. Anything written after the word limit will not be considered when assessing your answer.
- NOTE: Your DLR assignments MUST include the course cover page in order to be graded. Failure to include the cover page will result in a failed assignment. We require the cover page because it serves as an agreement that you comply with the course academic integrity policy.