Questions about the research paper.

<li><p>How long should the research paper be?
Just 2 pages is fine?</p></li>
<li><p>Would it be a good paper if I cannot find a perfect explanation to the experiment that i carried, although I made some attempts to find it? </p></li>
<li><p>Can anyone give me an example of a proper research paper please? I don’t know about the format.</p></li>
</ol>

<p>TWO PAGES!</p>

<p>I think you are misguided on what a "research paper" means, maybe. You need to write the explanation of your experiment in your own words, this is not a cookie-cutter lab report. If you want an example of a research paper, look in scientific journals. I am pretty sure two pages could never cut it for a full research paper, just because it's impossible to explain everything you need to with good research in two pages...... But an abstract could be very short...</p>

<p><a href="http://www.dgp.toronto.edu/people/stam/reality/Research/pdf/GDC03.pdf%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.dgp.toronto.edu/people/stam/reality/Research/pdf/GDC03.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>Random example</p>

<p>but this is not the best example of formatting... my advice would be to check journals in the area you did research in, and follow their formatting requirements</p>

<p>Good research papers can indeed be short, with an appendix which is longer explaining analytical details. Different fields have very different styles. In modern math, you'd almost never see anything in a major journal shorter than 10 pages (though sometimes notes can be as short as a page), whereas in physics 3-4 pages is the norm but exposition tends to be more telegraphic. Here is an example of a good, short paper which is about standard for physics.</p>

<p><a href="http://arxiv.org/PS_cache/cond-mat/pdf/0107/0107420v2.pdf%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://arxiv.org/PS_cache/cond-mat/pdf/0107/0107420v2.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>Ah, lol, I only really read math papers, so that's why I was so surprised at the length... apparently physics papers can be shorter :-)</p>

<p>are we supposed to double space it? when I did for my summer program, we turned in double spaced, but my dad said for caltech, it should just be single spaced</p>

<p>also, I did my paper in a university lab...caltech acutally, so on top do I put just mine name, or also my professor and graduate studnts' names?</p>

<p>well, that's something you should talk to your research mentor about. the norms differ widely across disciplines. your prof/grad student mentor/etc. should be able to give you pretty good advice.</p>

<p>Was that an example of a paper submitted to Caltech, or you were you just trying to give him an example of just any research paper?</p>

<p>The one I offered as an example was a paper written by professional physicists, so no. I don't know about the one given by lalaloo6. But one should aim high.</p>

<p>My research abstract comes to only around a page..... :( I wasnt sure about the format etc ... I didnt know that it has to be submitted that way...</p>

<p>1 page for an abstract is fine; there's a big difference between an abstract and an entire research paper...</p>

<p>My research abstract consisted of the reason I chose that particular project, what I actually did and what the results really mean and its future impact on the society.... Is that fine?</p>

<p>Should be ok. Aim to sound like the abstract from the paper I linked above or any abstract you see in a scientific journal.</p>

<p>so how many of you guys are sending in the acutal full paper?</p>

<p>how can a research paper be 2 pages...</p>

<p><a href="http://proxy.ulib.csuohio.edu:2293/cgi/reprint/85/7/2029%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://proxy.ulib.csuohio.edu:2293/cgi/reprint/85/7/2029&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>Something tells me that the link wont work cuz i had to log into my account to view this, but hopefully it works. If not, trust me, it's 2 pages :).</p>

<p>I think the shortest published paper was half a page long. It was the factorization of the 5th (or something) Fermat prime.</p>

<p>Hey I have another question regarding research papers. Can we send our work after the deadline ( December 31st). My research is complete but i'll have to translate it and convert it into a .pdf file. Would it be ok if we sent our research papers like during the first or second week of January ?</p>

<p>baphomet, I am not sure if you have this, but when i go to "print" I can just select Adobe and it "print's the microsoft document into a pdf. it only took 2 sec</p>

<p>You can only do that if you have adobe acrobat pro installed.</p>