Piecing it all Together
Although I started early on the research paper assignment and planned out what I was going to work on each day, I still ended up finishing the assignment the day it was due. This was primarily because I struggled too much on the Results section, which was at the very beginning of my writing process. In fact, when I first sat down to write the paper, I did not know where to begin. I wanted to begin with the introduction or abstract because I like doing things in the order that they appear in. However, I couldn't do that because I didn't really know what the big take-away of my results are.
I have analyzed the results from each experiment. There were the p21 expression data, the heatmaps, the tables of the GO terms and the comparison with public data. But how do they all relate to each other? How can I assemble the data so that they come together to create a coherent story? Then I remembered the presentation from the BE Communication Lab on how to write a research paper. I quickly pulled up the Powerpoint slide and was thankful to find the slide that said, "We recommend the following order for writing your research paper: 1. Figures 2. Methods...". Following the guidelines and examples on the presentation slides, I finally made some progress on my paper. Referring to the comments that I received on my homework assignments - even ones from the Mod1 homework assignments - I had no trouble completing the Figures and Methods section. But then I came upon the results. Although I had an outline of how the figures should go together, I still wasn't sure how the conclusion from one figure connects with that of another figure. I spent hours repetitively writing and deleting the Results section because the subsections just didn't seem like they belonged to one coherent story. At times, I would even spent hours staring blankly at my laptop screen, not knowing how to piece together all these data.
At the end, I got through the Results section by looking through all my data and not just the ones that I used to create my figures. I created a list of all the conclusions that can be drawn from the data and picked out conclusions that could go together to tell a story. Thus, I ended up making new figures and changing the order in which they appear in. At the end, I spent around 90% of my time working on the Results section. Of that 90% of the time, 50% was wasted trying to figure things out all by myself, instead of reaching out for help. Therefore, for this assignment, I regretted most for not meeting with someone from the Communications Lab. If I had talked to them about my results, I would have understood them much better, which then would make it much easier for me to write my paper. Nevertheless, I still enjoyed this assignment because it taught me the process of writing a research paper.
I have analyzed the results from each experiment. There were the p21 expression data, the heatmaps, the tables of the GO terms and the comparison with public data. But how do they all relate to each other? How can I assemble the data so that they come together to create a coherent story? Then I remembered the presentation from the BE Communication Lab on how to write a research paper. I quickly pulled up the Powerpoint slide and was thankful to find the slide that said, "We recommend the following order for writing your research paper: 1. Figures 2. Methods...". Following the guidelines and examples on the presentation slides, I finally made some progress on my paper. Referring to the comments that I received on my homework assignments - even ones from the Mod1 homework assignments - I had no trouble completing the Figures and Methods section. But then I came upon the results. Although I had an outline of how the figures should go together, I still wasn't sure how the conclusion from one figure connects with that of another figure. I spent hours repetitively writing and deleting the Results section because the subsections just didn't seem like they belonged to one coherent story. At times, I would even spent hours staring blankly at my laptop screen, not knowing how to piece together all these data.
At the end, I got through the Results section by looking through all my data and not just the ones that I used to create my figures. I created a list of all the conclusions that can be drawn from the data and picked out conclusions that could go together to tell a story. Thus, I ended up making new figures and changing the order in which they appear in. At the end, I spent around 90% of my time working on the Results section. Of that 90% of the time, 50% was wasted trying to figure things out all by myself, instead of reaching out for help. Therefore, for this assignment, I regretted most for not meeting with someone from the Communications Lab. If I had talked to them about my results, I would have understood them much better, which then would make it much easier for me to write my paper. Nevertheless, I still enjoyed this assignment because it taught me the process of writing a research paper.
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