Science Writing

Writing in the sciences may be different from what you're used to. Make sure to read through all of your assignment guidelines or the journal submission guidelines if you are submitting an article for publication. 

A few general best practices, although these can also change depending on the publication:

• You will typically write in the active voice. For example, "I did this", "We hypothesized that", "We observed that". This is different from writing in the passive voice, which would be "The experiment was performed" or "Results were observed".
• Use past tense since you are writing about things that have already happened: "I hypothesized", "I conducted", etc. This is different from writing in present tense ("I hypothesize"), or future tense ("I will observe"). 
• When incorporating information from other sources, you will want to paraphrase rather than provide a direct quotation. Make sure to read through the resources linked from this page on how to properly paraphrase.