msalvucci's blog

The METHODS project intrigued me because I haven’t done anything similar to a project like this in college. I knew this project would be a good challenge for me to write methods in a concise and effective manner. I used to think that my writing was very wordy so going into this project I knew I needed to write many drafts for these methods until I found a description that explained my process of finding a spider web in the best way. Throughout my process of writing my methods, I found that my writing ended up clearer than I thought. This showed when my peer  replicated my methods; the replicate was very close to the original! As for the actual report, I was confused as to how to write my findings in an efficient way. It was interesting to determine the distinction between observations and inferences. The practice in writing about these observations was helpful in explaining the findings about the replicate photo without being repetitive or confusing. This project was also helpful in showing how paragraphs should be split up. I never realized how big of an affect splitting up paragraphs has on the flow of a scientific paper. I learned that it is important to keep alike topics in one paragraph, rather than scattering it throughout multiple paragraphs. I will keep this in mind when writing in the future. Overall, I think my classmates also enjoyed this project because it was interesting and fun to see how all of the other replicate figures turned out.

Writing perfect paragraphs each week helped me finalize a piece of writing for my peers to review. I was nervous at first to post my writing for others to see and comment on, but I slowly became more comfortable with it after seeing how helpful the comments were. As the semester went on, I got better at writing helpful comments rather than just complimenting everyone’s paragraphs. I noticed that most of the class had trouble with making the perfect paragraphs flow nicely with transition statements. It was interesting to see that there were some common factors that we all could have improved on. I liked the perfect paragraphs because I could see what I needed to improve on before turning in the assignments for some classes. I was able to use the revised paragraphs to hand in; I basically had free peer editing for my papers which was valuable. Revising my paragraphs also helped me understand and solidify my knowledge on a particular topic as some of the paragraphs were taken from notes in my classes. This was a very useful study technique throughout the semester. In the future, I will write out the material that I struggle with as if it is telling a story because I learned that this tactic was very useful for studying and understanding complicated concepts.

    The METHODS project intrigued me because I haven’t done anything similar to a project like this in college. I knew this project would be a good challenge for me to write methods in a concise and effective manner. I used to think that my writing was very wordy so going into this project I knew I needed to write many drafts for these methods until I found a description that explained my process of finding a spider web in the best way. Throughout my process of writing my methods, I found that my writing ended up clearer than I thought. This showed when my peer student replicated my methods and the replicate was very close to the original. As for the actual report, I was confused as to how to write my findings in an efficient way. It was interesting to determine the distinction between observations and inferences. The practice in writing about these observations was helpful in expressing the findings about the replicate photo without being repetitive or confusing. This project was also helpful in showing how paragraphs should be split up. I never realized how big of an affect splitting up paragraphs has on the flow of scientific paper. I learned that it is important to keep alike topics in one paragraph, rather than scattering it throughout multiple paragraphs.

The aim of this experiment was to test the effects of temperature on spider web production for the species Pholcus phalangioides. We had hypothesized that the warmer the temperature a spider occupied, the denser the web it would create. During this experiment, spiders were placed in 3 environments set at different temperatures. The control enclosure was kept at 19℃, the warm enclosure was kept at 26℃, and a cool enclosure was kept at 11℃. For the control and cool conditions, the spiders were placed in a plastic cup which was enclosed in a Styrofoam box; the cool condition had a layer of ice underneath the plastic cup with a cardboard barrier to achieve the cool temperature. The spiders in the heated condition were kept in plastic cups that were placed under a heat lamp. Two spiders for each condition were observed for four days; the spider web enclosures were weighed on the final day in order to measure spider web production. Following the data collection and analysis, the results indicated denser web production in the warm enclosure compared to cool and control conditions.

For the control and cool conditions, the spiders were placed in a plastic cup which was enclosed in a Styrofoam box; the cool condition had a layer of ice underneath the plastic cup with a cardboard barrier to achieve the cool temperature. The spiders in the heated condition were kept in plastic cups that were placed under a heat lamp. Each condition was monitored over a four-day period to ensure the temperatures were constant. Following the four days, the spider contraptions were weighed to get final measurements of the spider web densities.

The aim of this experiment was to test the effects of temperature on spider web production for the species Pholcus phalangioides. We had hypothesized that the warmer the temperature a spider occupied, the denser the web it would create. During this experiment, spiders were placed in 3 environments set at different temperatures. The control enclosure was kept at 19℃, the warm enclosure was kept at 26℃, and a cool enclosure was kept at 11℃. Two spiders for each condition were observed for four days; the spider web enclosures were weighed on the final day in order to measure spider web production. Following the data collection and analysis, the results indicated denser web production in the warm enclosure compared to cool and control conditions.

Overall, I found this research project highly conclusive regarding the function of the V1 nerve in reed warblers. I admire the team’s strong efforts in keeping this experiment controlled. For example, the scientists did not know which bird population they were analyzing in order to keep the results unbiased. The team also used a sham-surgery in order to prevent the possibility of there being any skewed data due to surgical setbacks in one group of birds. I find this tactic reasonable and necessary to control the variables in this project, but also a bit unethical as the excess surgeries may have been prevented. This article creates a strong foundation for research regarding how exactly birds utilize map information transmitted through the V1 nerve.

For the warm environment, the spiders were placed in plastic cup enclosures that rested 18 inches below a heat lamp. Prior to starting data collection, the spiders and plastic cup apparatuses for each condition were weighed so that a difference in weight could be detected after four days. The spiders were then left in each condition for four days, and their condition was checked every 12 hours. To avoid from overheating the conditions, the heat lamp was alternated on and off every 12 hours. Following the four days, the plastic cup enclosures were weighed to get a final weight of the spider web in each enclosure.

For this experiment, two spiders were observed in the warm, cool and control environments. A thermometer was used in each environment to track the temperature in each environment with the goal of keeping it constant. The spiders for both the cool and control environments were kept in plastic cup enclosures inside a Styrofoam box. The cool environment had a layer of ice enclosed underneath the plastic cups that could be replenished in order to keep a constant temperature. The control environment consisted of the plastic cups enclosures with no ice or heat to keep the environment at room temperature.

I am happy with my exam grade, but there are some things that I could improve on. When I was studying for the exam, I redid the homework problems and textbook problems. I also went through the class slides and went over any class activities that we did because these were helpful application problems. While studying, I also went through all of the objectives and wrote down all of the information I knew off the top of my head for each topic; I then studied more and added to the objectives as I studied new information. For the next exam, I am going to go over more problems that incorporate new concepts into the material. These questions will most likely come from the textbook. I will try to work with a study partner so we can come up with new ways of thinking about the concepts. It also helps to talk about the information because studies show that people who are able to teach a subject have a better understanding of it. Lastly, I will write out the “hows” and “whys” for the pathways and concepts. This way I will understand how and why the pathways happen in real life rather than memorizing the information. It is helpful to apply these concepts to real life and make the pathways sound like a story so that they are easier to understand.