Reporting Results: A Practical Guide for Engineers and Scientists

by David C. van Aken , William F. Hosford

• ISBN13: 9780521723480
• ISBN10: 0521723485
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2008-05-05
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Summary

This brief guide is ideal for science and engineering students and professionals to help them communicate technical information clearly, accurately, and effectively. The focus is on the most common communication forms, including laboratory reports, research articles, and oral presentations, and on common issues that arise in classroom and professional practice. This book will be especially useful to students in a first chemistry or physics laboratory course. Advanced courses will often use the same formatting as required for submission to technical journals or for technical report writing, which is the focus of this book. Good communication habits are appropriate in all forms of technical communication. This book will help the reader develop effective communication skills. It is also ideal as a reference on stylistic and grammar issues throughout a technical career. Unlike most texts, which concentrate on writing style, this book also treats oral presentations, graphing, and analysis of data.

Author Biography

David C. Van Aken is a Professor of Materials Science and Engineering at the Missouri University of Science and Technology. Dr. Van Aken is a licensed Professional Engineer in the states of Missouri and Illinois. He is the author of more than 70 technical articles. He joined the Missouri University of Science and Technology faculty in 1993 after having taught at the University of Michigan for seven years. Dr. Van Aken has been the recipient of 12 awards for teaching excellence, 4 Missouri ST faculty excellence awards, and a Missouri ST Alumni Association outstanding advising award. In 2006 he was designated a Dean's Teaching Scholar. Dr. Van Aken began his engineering career in 1978 at Caterpillar, Inc., as a materials engineer and returned in 1982 to the University of Illinois for his Ph.D. studies. Dr. Van Aken is the recipient of the NSP Presidential Young Investigator Award and the Office of Naval Research Young Investigator Award. His research interests include the physical metallurgy of ferrous alloys, experimental and theoretical aspects of phase transformations, and the mechanical behavior of structural materials. William F. Hosford is a Professor Emeritus of Materials Science and Engineering at the University of Michigan. He is the author of more than 80 technical articles and a number of books, including the leading-selling Metal Farming: Mechanics and Metallurgy, third edition (with R. M. Caddell) (Cambridge 2007); Materials Science: An Intermediate Text (Cambridge 2006); Mechanical Behavior of Materials (Cambridge 2005); Mechanics of Crystals and Textured Polycrystals (1993); Mechanical Metallurgy (2005); and the forthcoming Materials for Engineers, an undergraduate textbook. Professor Hosford's research interests include explorations into the quantitative relationship between anisotropic yielding behavior and crystallographic texture, sheet metal forming and the dependence of sheet formability on plastic anisotropy, and the formation of deformation textures in body-centered cubic metals, as well as the spheroidization of medium carbon steels.

Table of Contents

Preface	p. vii
Elements of Technical Writing	p. 1
Technical Papers	p. 13
Technical Letters	p. 26
Oral Presentations	p. 41
Presentation of Technical Data	p. 53
Statistical Analysis of Experimental Data	p. 82
Resumé Writing	p. 111
Common Errors in Writing	p. 121
Punctuation	p. 123
Common Word Errors	p. 133
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