A Student Handbook for Writing in Biology

Karen Knisely’s indispensible handbook provides practical advice to students who are learning to write according to the conventions in biology, covering everything from reading technical literature and writing scientific papers, to preparing lab reports and making oral presentations of scientific findings. Since scientific communication requires unique competencies on the computer (for example, producing Greek letters and mathematical symbols), almost half of the handbook is devoted familiarizing students with helpful features in Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint—features that are essential to professional quality scientific communication.

Karin Knisely is Lab Director of Core Course Biology at Bucknell University. She earned a B.S. in Biology from Bucknell, (where she was a three-sport athlete and is now enshrined in the Athletics Hall of Fame) and an M.S. in Zoology from the University of New Hampshire. She then completed a Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst (DAAD) fellowship at the University of Konstanz (the German equivalent of a Fulbright fellowship). Bilingual in German and English, she sometimes works, outside of the academic year, as a freelance translator.

Preface
1. The Scientific Method
2. Developing a Literature Search Strategy
3. Reading and Writing Scientific Papers
4. Step-by-Step Instructions for Preparing a Laboratory Report or Scientific Paper
5. Revision
6. A “Good” Sample Student Laboratory Report
7. Poster Presentations
8. Oral Presentations
Appendix 1. Word Processing in Microsoft Word 2010
Appendix 2. Making Graphs in Microsoft Excel 2010 and Excel for Mac 2011
Appendix 3. Preparing Oral Presentations with Microsoft PowerPoint 2010
Bibliography
Index