Enzyme Kinetics Lab Report Submission Instructions

These instructions are specific to the lab report for the enzyme kinetics labs, and are meant to augment the
instructions on pages 5-8 of the lab manual for the important comprehensive general guidelines for lab reports.

This lab report is an individual exercise. Even though you collected data as a group, you will be writing your own
individual report and generating your own figures. You will write your report on the varying substrate concentration,
varying substrate concentration with inhibitor present, and either effects of pH OR temperature (depending on the
exercise you completed).

Submission and formatting.

All lab reports should be submitted via VeriCite as a single document (see the link and instructions on Canvas) and
must be your original creative work. Your TA may request printed hard copies or email copies in addition. To avoid
last minute uploading issues, try uploading your report to VeriCite a day or two before it is due. The following
submission requirements are mandatory: The report should be prepared with a word processor (i.e. Microsoft
Word). The final product should have a maximum of 9 pages as follows: 6 pages of text followed by 3 pages of
figures. Reports that do not conform to these instructions will not be graded.
Text. The report should have 6 pages of text (not more!). The text should be single spaced with one inch margins,
and in 11p font for Arial or similar fonts or 12p for Times. Sections should be separated by a line break and
headings. The first page (title page) should have the title and author (your name), followed by the abstract and
then the abbreviations. The abstract should be between 80 and 100 words (not more!). For the remaining 5 pages of
the text (the main text) you should have the following approximate lengths for each section. Introduction: about ½
to 1 page, Materials and Methods: about 1 to 1.5 pages, Results: about 1.5-2.5 pages, Discussion: about ½ to 1
page. Literature cited: You must include 3 references, one of which is the lab manual, two of which must be found
by yourself and must be a peer-reviewed journal article. Citations give credit and are verifiable sources for
statements made in the text. They allow the reader to see where ideas, methods, or concepts were described before in
the scientific literature. The balance of these 5 sections of main text should be close to 5 pages (but not more!).
Some of the enzyme kinetics data might lend itself to presentation in table form (for instance the K M and Vmax values
for different conditions). Such simple tables may be embedded in the text in the results section.

Figures. You should add three figures with data which are described in the results section. The figures should be
each on a separate page with a clear title, and the legend (caption) under the figure. The legend explains what we see
in the figure. One figure may have multiple panels. For instance, you might want to present Michaelis-Menten plots
for several conditions that you have tested. If the data become too crowded in one plot you can choose to separate
the data into two or more plots presented next to each other or above each other as two panels (e.g. panel A and
panel B). Which data you choose to present in the figures is up to you. Choose wisely.

Grading criteria and guidelines.

Your report will be graded based on the following evaluation criterion: To what extent does the report allow a
reader to understand and reproduce what was done, and to what extent does it allow a reader to understand and
evaluate how conclusions were reached (all within the given space constraints). Careful analysis and interpretation
of the data presented in the figures and results is of paramount importance. Sloppy presentation or errors in style and
grammar distract and make a report less readable, therefore points may be deducted for work that lacks editing. 40
points can be earned. The figures with legends are worth 15 points (5 each). The text is worth 25 points (5 for the
abstract and 20 for the rest).