Nabeel Butt
Professor Rodwell
Writing For Engineering
3/8/19
Civil Engineering is branch of engineering which has many subcategories. For example, a civil engineer could be a construction engineer, an environmental engineer and a structural engineer. Although these aren’t the only subcategories of civil engineering, they are highly important and revolve around the aspects of buildings, materials, as well as the impact of the environment on these things. Engineers in modern society are always looking to improve on the foundations of the knowledge they already know. To accomplish these tasks lab reports are conducted as a way of testing new ideas in a safe environment. A proper lab report must have six components which consist of an abstract, introduction, procedure, findings from procedure, a discussion of the results and a conclusion. This format is done in order to ensure that the experiment can be replicated to prove its effectiveness. An in-depth analysis of a lab report makes the reader understand not only the experiment which took place, but also the purpose of the experiment and how the findings from the experiment can be used. By using three sample civil engineering lab reports, it is possible to prove the importance and effectiveness of lab reports in today’s world.
The first lab report was titled, “Lab-Scale Column Studies for Enhanced Phosphorus Sorption from Synthetic Urban Storm Water Using Modified Bio Retention Media”. This lab study was conducted to test the removal of dissolved organic phosphorus using columns with water treatment residual and alum on bio retention soil media. Basically, the study was conducted to see if removing a substance known as dissolved organic phosphorus and adding a substance named alum on columns would have any effect of the bio retention of soil media. The experiment itself used many different combinations to see which was most efficient on the bio retention on soil media. For example, one group simply saw the normal effect of absorption in columns of bio retention of soil media, the next group tested the effect of adding 10% of alum to the column, the third group tested the effect of adding 10% water treatment residual to the column, and the final group tested the effects of adding 10% water treatment residual and alum to the column. The final results of the experiment proved that adding 10% water treatment residual and alum to the column would decrease the amount of time it would take for the bio retention of soil media.
The second lab report was titled, “Performance of Asphalt Mixtures with High Recycled Contents Using Rejuvenators and Warm-Mix Additive”. This lab study was conducted to test if asphalt mixtures would have a higher tolerance to cracking when using recycled asphalt pavement. The study consisted of using three mixtures each with a different level of recycled asphalt pavement in the mixture itself. The results of the lab showed that the asphalt mixture using the highest amount of recycling agent will provide a lower resistance to cracking of the asphalt mixture.
The third lab report was titled, “Biodegradation of Sulfamethazine by Activated Sludge: Lab-Scale Study”. This lab study was conducted to test the degradation of sulfamethazine. A sludge sewage treatment plant was used to break down sulfamethazine under controlled conditions. The results from the study show that adding oxygen to the process was quickest for the removal of sulfamethazine.
All three of these lab reports were similar and different in many ways. For example, all three lab reports were related to the field of civil engineering. The first lab report was an environmental engineer lab report. The second lab report was a materials engineering report. Finally, the third lab report was another environmental engineering. All of these sub-categories belonged to the main branch of civil engineering. As for the format of these reports, the main aspects of these reports were all included. Each report included an abstract, an introduction, materials used, procedure, data from procedure, a discussion of the results and a conclusion. Additionally, all three lab reports followed a similar format of listing the tests that would be used to conduct the experiment. Many tests were used in a single report which could make it confusing to understand which tests were conducted and how they were conducted. Each lab report had a section dedicated to summarizing each of the individual tests that would be used to prove the hypotheses. The content was different, but the inclusion of a summary of each test was present throughout all reports. Furthermore, in each report the author would introduce a word, then use an abbreviation for the word if it was too long in the abstract. Throughout the report the abbreviation would be used. This was done to ensure the reader knew the information that was being discussed because they would not know what the abbreviations meant unless they read the abstract. Also, each lab report had a list of references which was used in order to give credit to the people involved in the study or those whose research helped towards the study. Finally, all of the reports used both tables and graphs to present the information. This was done to organize the information gained from the experiments in multiple ways which would ensure that the reader would be able to analyze and interpret the information presented.
However, although all of these reports had the vital components which a lab report requires, they were drastically different in presenting the information. For example, in the first and third report the data from each test would be shown after presenting the information for the test. This was different in the second report as the tests that would be conducted were all on one page and that data was on a different page. As for the content, it was drastically different throughout the three reports due to different sub-categories they revolved around. Even though two of the reports were related to environmental engineering, they focused on two completely different topics.
As you can see, analyzing a lab report is a very crucial in modern society. Lab reports are used to test out a situation in a controlled environment before applying it to a real-world situation. The three lab reports that were analyzed in this essay were executed almost to perfection. All of the reports had the required aspects of a lab report. However, a common theme amongst all of the reports was a confusion in data. The data was never easy to interpret and required a lot of flipping back and forth to understand what was happening. I would recommend incorporating a key or a legend on the data page to make it easier to understand. Besides this everything else in the reports was professional and organized. Clearly, lab reports are important in today’s society.
References
- Yan, Qi, et al. “Lab-Scale Column Studies for Enhanced Phosphorus Sorption from Synthetic Urban Stormwater Using Modified Bioretention Media.” Journal of Environmental Engineering, vol. 143, no. 1, 2017, p. 04016073., doi:10.1061/(asce)ee.1943-7870.0001159.
- Xie, Zhaoxing, et al. “Performance of Asphalt Mixtures with High Recycled Contents Using Rejuvenators and Warm-Mix Additive: Field and Lab Experiments.” Journal of Materials in Civil Engineering, vol. 29, no. 10, 2017, p. 04017190., doi:10.1061/(asce)mt.1943-5533.0002037.
- Yin, Xiaowei, et al. “Biodegradation of Sulfamethazine by Activated Sludge: Lab-Scale Study.” Journal of Environmental Engineering, vol. 140, no. 7, 2014, p. 04014024., doi:10.1061/(asce)ee.1943-7870.0000850.
This piece was very challenging to tackle. I have never written a piece which follows such a structured format as this one did. The assignment itself was basically a compare and contrast of three different lab reports. However, the assignment was difficult due to the fact that the lab reports were highly sophisticated and because the topics that were discussed were things which I haven’t learned yet. This made it difficult to fully comprehend the meaning behind each lab report.
The genre of this lab report essay was a compare and contrast. This is easy to see because the assignment asks to identify the differences and similarities between each lab report. Even though the assignment’s description doesn’t state it, by understanding what the assignment is asking, it is easy to identify the genre. The motivation which drove me to write this piece would have to be passion for civil engineering. At first, the assignment seemed to be a complex piece which would take many hours to complete. However, after finding three lab reports which related to civil engineering, I found myself very interested in analyzing each report. The ideas that were presented in the labs were new to me and very interesting to learn about because it gave a brief introduction as to what I would be learning about in the future.
The audience for the essay is the general public as the goal of this assignment was to make it easy to understand what took place in each of the reports. If the assignment wasn’t done properly, then the reader would have no idea what the lab reports were based on and would be confused throughout the paper. From this piece, I feel as if I completed a new course learning outcome. Specifically, I feel as if I mastered the course learning outcome of practicing using various library resources, online databases, and the Internet to locate sources which were relevant to the topic. This was important to me because my first set of lab reports were denied and I was confused as to why. However, I later realized that my sources were weak and didn’t provide me with the results I desired. As a response, I decided to use the CUNY library database which was able to help right away. The database was truly expansive and provided me with multiple resources to aid in completing my task. All in all, this assignment was challenging to take on but very enjoyable to complete as well.
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