In English, we are often taught to “sugarcoat” our writing. We add too much that has no relevance to thew paper. This just adds “fluff”, and this fluff takes away from the main point your essay hoes to convey. English 110 has allowed me to perfect my writing abilities depending on the assignment . In Biology, essays must be precise with none of the added descriptions and useless information. everything is direct and to the point. During English 110, we worked on writing to accurately convey our thoughts without being vague or by adding too much. “why Academics Stink at Writing” by Steven Pinker makes this same argument. Too many of our academics today are filled with more words than necessary. Pinker also writes about humor in writing. In academics (specifically Biology), a humorous flare is looked down upon. There is no need to make a write-up on protists humorous. Professors only want to see that you understood the topic, not that your writing is extremely creative and engaging. The essay needs to be organized and concise. English 110 has given me the opportunity to focus on both of these. In organization, we worked on the TRIAC paragraph as well as reviewing and making multiple drafts. The TRIAC paragraph allowed us to organize a paragraph based on what we were talking about. A topic is introduced ans then elaborated on. We also worked with multiple drafts of a work. We had the opportunity to review other peers writing to focus on how to make each other’s writing more organized. Paper’s need to follow a logical sequence. This also ties into how essays need to be concise. When we review our drafts, we can look over how concise we wrote about something. If someone is ever lost or confused on where we are headed in a paper or what we are talking about, it needs to be re-written. English 110 has given me the opportunity to perfect my academic writing and make it now “stink.”
Effect of environmental factors on phagocytosis in Tetrahymena
METHODS
For the control group, 3 microcentrifuge tubes were labeled C3, C6, and C9 accordingly and each was filled with 100 µl of iodine. A wax pencil was used to label 3 glass slides C3, C6, and C9. A separate microcentrifuge tube was labeled Control. 450 µl of Tetrahymena culture and 450 µl of carbon solution were added to the Control microcentrifuge and a timer was started. At 3 minutes, 100 µl of solution from the control centrifuge was transferred to the tube labeled C3. At 6 minutes 100 µl of solution from the control centrifuge was transferred to the tube labeled C6. At 9 minutes 100 µl of solution from the control centrifuge was transferred to the tube label C9. Independent wet mounts (50 µl) were made on the C3, C6, and C9 slides using their respective microcentrifuge tubes. The number of food vacuoles in the first 10 Tetrahymena cells were counted and recorded for each slide.
For the experimental group, a microcentrifuge tube was labeled X. 200 µl of the stock chemical and 200 µl of the carbon source were added to the tube. 200 µl of Tetrahymena was added to the tube and the timer was started. While the timer was running, 100 µl of iodine was added to 3 microcentrifuge tubes and they were label 3X,6X, and 9X respectively. After 3 minutes 100 µl of solution from the X tube was added to the 3X tube. This was repeated with each respective tube at 6 and 9 minutes. These steps were then repeated using 2 µl of the stock chemical instead of 200 µl. The experiment was conducted at room temperature at the University of New England’s Alfond Center for Health Sciences room 241.
RESULTS
The mean number of food vacuoles present in the Tetrahymena at each time were measured as the following: Control group (no chemical) = 3 minutes/2.2 mean, 6/3.2, 9/3.6. Stock Chemical (200 µl) = 3/2.4, 6/3.7, 9/4.0. Stock Chemical (2 µl) = 3/2.8, 6/5.0, 9/5.5.
Fig. 1: The mean number of food vacuoles present in each study (no chemical, 200 µl of stock chemical, and 2 µl of stock chemical) was calculated and recorded in the graph above.
