Writing for Science and Engineering, Second Edition: Papers, Presentations and Reports

276 Pages·2013·4.447 MB·English

by  Heather Silyn-Roberts

Writing for Science and Engineering
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Writing for Science and
Engineering
Papers, Presentations and Reports
Second Edition
Heather Silyn-Roberts
Department of Mechanical Engineering
Auckland University
Auckland, New Zealand
AMSTERDAM • BOSTON • HEIDELBERG • LONDON • NEW YORK • OXFORD
PARIS • SAN DIEGO • SAN FRANCISCO • SINGAPORE • SYDNEY • TOKYO
Elsevier
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225 Wyman Street, Waltham, MA 02451, USA
First edition 2000
Second edition 2013
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Notices
Knowledge and best practice in this field are constantly changing. As new research and
experience broaden our understanding, changes in research methods, professional practices, or
medical treatment may become necessary.
Practitioners and researchers must always rely on their own experience and knowledge in
evaluating and using any information, methods, compounds, or experiments described herein.
In using such information or methods they should be mindful of their own safety and the
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To the fullest extent of the law, neither the Publisher nor the authors, contributors, or editors,
assume any liability for any injury and/or damage to persons or property as a matter of
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products, instructions, or ideas contained in the material herein.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress
ISBN: 978-0-08-098285-4
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Contents
Introduction: How to Use This Book vii
Section 1: Document Structure. The Requirements for
each Section 1
1 Structuring a Document: Using the Headings Skeleton 3
2 The Core Chapter: Sections and Elements of a Document 17
Section 2: Specific Types of Documents 51
3 An Abstract, a Summary, an Executive Summary 53
4 A Literature Review 63
5 A Research Proposal 75
6 A Journal Paper 83
7 Progress Reports 111
8 Consulting/Management Report and Recommendation Report 117
9 Engineering Design Report 121
10 A Formal Letter (Hardcopy or Online) 125
11 Emails and Faxes 135
12 A Procedure or a Set of Instructions 137
13 Thesis 143
14 A Conference Poster 153
Section 3: Referencing, Editorial Conventions,
Revising, Proofreading 167
15 Referencing: Text Citations and the List of References 169
16 Conventions Used in Scientific and Technical Writing 191
17 Revising 199
Section 4: Writing Style 205
18 Problems of Style: Recognising and Correcting Them 207
Section 5: Presenting Your Work Orally 229
19 A Seminar or Conference Presentation 231
20 A Presentation to a Small Group 251
vi Contents
Appendices 255
Appendix 1 SI Units and Their Abbreviations 257
Appendix 2 The Parts of Speech; Tenses and Forms of the Verb 261
Appendix 3 Recommended Scientific Style Manuals 265
Introduction: How to Use This Book
The goal of this book is to be relentlessly practical. It has been designed with the
specific needs of science and engineering graduate students and junior professionals
in mind. It is the result of working with hundreds of you in Europe and Australasia to
learn how you access information, the type of information you want and the sorts of
books you don’t like. These are the sorts of things that many students have told me:
l You appreciate prescriptions. This book certainly gives prescriptive guidelines. It’s very
user-centred – almost a recipe book. In places, it even gives formulae, e.g. for structuring
material in the various sections of a journal paper. It was this feature of the first edition that
students liked, and I’ve expanded on this concept in the second edition. Science and tech-
nical writing can be guided to a great extent by prescriptions. You may not achieve high
style, but you’ll get professional competency.
l You don’t like dense text. I’ve heard many disparaging comments about books with ‘too
many words’. A great many of you have said that you don’t want to read long passages of
text; most of you prefer concise, listed material to long paragraphs.
l You need to be able to read any chapter in isolation. In this book, you don’t have to
have read the previous parts of the book to understand the later ones.
l Looking things up and cross-referring is second nature to scientists and engineers.
This book has lots of cross-references within it to other parts of the book.
l You appreciate knowing the mistakes to avoid, and that you are not alone in your dif-
ficulties. This book lists the common difficulties and errors.
l Many of you have not had enough guidelines on the requirements of technical writing
and presentation during your undergraduate years. This book assumes no basic knowl-
edge, but it is not simplistic.
Added for the Second Edition
Since the publication of the first edition, I’ve spent 15 years running programmes for
many hundreds of graduate students in German and Swiss graduate schools associ-
ated with major universities and Max Planck Institutes. All of them are doing cut-
ting-edge science in areas ranging from molecular biology, neurobiology, plasma
physics, medicine and microbial genetics to intelligent systems, computational neu-
roscience, biophysical chemistry and more.
The subject areas are wide-ranging, yet the students have the same types of prob-
lems and make similar mistakes. They are also under pressure to publish in high-
impact journals.
viii Writing for Science and Engineering
The twice-yearly experience of intensive small-group teaching has been ideal for
updating and developing the concepts in this second edition. My thanks to all these
students; the education has flowed in both directions. Any mistakes, of course, are all
mine.
The Basic Structure of the Book
Chapter 1 Structuring a Document: How to decide on a structure for a
Using the Headings document
Skeleton
Chapter 2 The Core Chapter: The requirements for all the sections likely
Sections and Elements to be found in a graduate document.
of a Document
Chapters 3–14 Specific types of The requirements for each type of
documents document. Extensively cross-referred to
Chapter 2: The Core Chapter:
Chapter 15 Referencing: text The conventions for referencing within the
citations and the text and for the List of References.
List of References
Chapter 16 Conventions used The conventions for such things as
in scientific and formatting equations, rules for
technical writing capitalisation, etc.
Chapter 17 Revising and The techniques for revising a document
proofreading and proofreading the final version or
editor’s page-proofs.
Chapter 18 Problems of style: Recognising and correcting common
recognising and problems of writing style.
correcting them
Chapter 19 A seminar or conference The techniques for a formal oral
presentation presentation
Chapter 20 A presentation to a The techniques for a presentation to a
small group small panel of people, e.g. PhD oral or a
design presentation.
Appendix 1 SI units
Appendix 2 The parts of speech;
tenses and forms of
the verb
Appendix 3 Recommended Scientific
Style manuals
Introduction: How to Use This Book ix
How to Use This Book
If you need the primary information See Chapter 1: Structuring a Document: Using
about the following: the Headings Skeleton
l The basic skeleton of headings of a
technical document
l How to choose sections for a document
l How to guide a reader through a
document
If you need information about how to See Chapter 2: The Core Chapter: Sections
write a specific section or element of a and Elements of a Document
document
If you need to write a specific type of See Chapters 3–14. Go straight to the chapter
document covering that specific type of document.
It will be extensively cross-referred to the
detail you need in other parts of the book.
If you need to prepare a seminar or See Chapter 19: A Seminar or Conference
conference presentation Presentation
The other chapters give the supporting Chapters 15–17
information on the conventions of
technical documentation: referencing,
editorial conventions and revising.