Group Project CVEN Mixing and Transport in the Environment. A River Dye Study

Basic Description Each team will choose a narrow topic from the course to research in more detail Three articles from the research literature will be used as primary sources, together with other articles Each team will prepare a report in the required format Each team will make a 20 minute presentation on May 10 th, 2005

Topics Teams may pick a topic that satisfies the following requirements:  Articles must be available in the research literature  Three related articles must be identified  The topic must be relatable to engineering practice  Teams must be able to suggest similar problems where the results could be applied.

Topics, continued Case studies or fundamental problems are acceptable Appendix A of handout gives suggestions for topics Choose from a list of possible primary papers (see instructor) Find a topic that interests you and your team

Literature Review To find a topic, it is best to go to the library stack and browse journals in an area of research that interests you Once you have a primary article, use that article’s literature review and reference section to find two more closely related articles Also, use the Web of Science to find related articles (must be behind the TAMU firewall for access)Web of Science

Required Format Download the MS-Word Template files from the course web site for the project report Must contain (within maximum of 6 pages):  Title, authors, address  Abstract  Introduction  Methods  Results  Discussion  Summary and Conclusions  References

Citations You MUST give a citation whenever significant ideas, concepts, or items of intellectual merit not considered common knowledge are presented In the text, citation format is  Jones and Williams (2004) found that…  …is important to respiration (Cox et al. 1993)  …reduces turbulent transport (Jones et al. 1988, 1992; Cox et al. 1993; Jones and Williams 2004)  Harvey et al. (2005) acknowledge that…

Citation Examples Common knowledge that may not need a citation:  Water containing salt has a higher density than pure water.  CO2 is considered to be an important Green House Gas. Statements that need citation:  Ideas that are unique to something you read or not generally known by an informed public Turbulent transport in shallow wakes is dominated by the presence of large coherent structures (Socolofsky and Jirka 2004).

Citation Examples, continued When in doubt, put a citation Omitting required citations is considered plagiarism, a severe form of academic dishonesty Plagiarism will result in a grade of zero Citations do not detract from the merit of your paper, they ADD to it You do not have to cite ideas you came up with

Direct Quotations The citation examples above are for paraphrases. If a direct quotation is made, it must be in quotes “” if it is five or fewer lines long in the text If a longer quotation is made, it must be indented All forms of quotation require a citation

References All articles cited in the text must be listed in the References section. Follow a format similar to the articles you are researching. Required information are:  All authors names  Date  Article Title  Journal Title  Volume, Number  Year  Pages Socolofsky, S. A. and Jirka, G. H. (2004) Large-scale flow structures and stability in shallow flows, J. Environ. Eng. Sci., 3: 451—462.

Abstract Your paper reduced to 150 words or less It should summarize the important points, listing significant results and conclusions Purpose is to let the reader know if they should bother to read your paper; therefore, put all the important points of the paper in the abstract

Introduction Paragraph 1: Attention getting statement, narrowing statements, topic statement Middle paragraphs: Highlight context of this report in broader knowledge base Final paragraph: Road-map for the rest of the report

Methods For this report, use the methods to  Describe the primary articles you consulted  Explain how you found them  Detail if you believe your search to be exhaustive or not and why This is a short section that lets the reader know if you “did your homework”

Results Summarize the important results from the papers You will have to chose the results that interest you You will not have space to explain everything in your papers

Discussion Here is where YOUR ideas should be presented You need to relate the results section to HOW those results might be applied in engineering practice This is the section where you show that you understood the Results and their Significance

Summary and Conclusions Paragraph 1: short summary of the key parts of the report Paragraph 2: short summary of the important conclusions. No new information should be presented, but conclusions may be drawn. Paragraph 3 (optional): recommendations for future research in the area

Oral Presentation Use MS-PowerPoint Give description of the topic and how it relates to the course Give any needed background for your classmates to understand the results Summarize the Results section  You may include scanned figures or tables with citation Explain how the results can be applied in Engineering Practice Highlight the significant conclusions

Oral Presentations, continued Limit of 20 minutes per team Each team member should present some of the material Estimate 1 minute (minimum) per slide Organize as follows  Title (1 slide)  Outline (1 slide)  Content slides (up to 17 slides)  Conclusions (1 slide)

Progress Reports 30 March 2005  Description of the Research Topic  Summary of how the topic may be related to Engineering Practice  Strategy for finding articles (e.g. list of relevant journals or journal databases) 6 April 2005  Selection of mandatory three articles  Copy of first page (including abstract) of each article  Citation format you expect to use

Progress Reports, continued 13 April 2005  Completion of literature review  Draft of Introduction and Methods sections 20 April 2005  Draft of Results and Discussion 27 April 2005  Draft of the full report and start on oral presentation 10 May 2005  Hand in final report and give oral presentation