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Final Year Projects
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07-07-2018 2:03pm#1well,
I'm starting the final year of a biological sciences degree in September, and haven't a solid idea of the process/troubleshooting problems of a final year project, hoping to make the most of it, really only plan on doing final year once so might as well do it properly i.e. plan ahead
Could anyone give a rough idea of how to even basically plan one that would ideally be part of a 1.1 degree? Looking for sourcing literature, allocating time to specific sections, thinking critically about the thesis portion etc as well as any other common hitches that could come up
GRMA and tanx0
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I'm not sure of how the FYP works in UCC in terms of the thesis write up, but I did a Masters in UCC and got a 1.1 (both in thesis and overall). The best place for sourcing literature is PubMed (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/), and I cannot stress enough REFERENCE AS YOU GO. You can get add-ons for your browser that will reference an article for you if you input in the link to the article.
1. Once you find out what your FYP is going to be about, start to read lots of papers, and begin to write down important points. For example, my thesis was looking at specific proteins, so I would write down the main points of each one. This is the start of your lit review/introduction. Make sure you read any papers your supervisor has written on the topic, and ask them for good papers to read.
2. Keep a lab copy either physically or electronically (I used research space in conjunction with my supervisor, so he could see what I was doing.) Within my lab copy there was the name of the experiment, date, method, my results (for me these were data set points and Western blots), and a conclusion drawn from the results.
3. Don't try and change your data to suit your preconceptions. Accept your results as is.
4. I kept a folder of my methods written out. This was really helpful so when I was doing a technique I had done months previously I was able to refer back to this document. It's also really helpful when you're starting out and watching your supervisor/doing it the first few times by yourself. You don't want to have to bug your supervisor about the next step you do, for something they showed you 20 minutes beforehand.
5. Saying that, if you do have questions, ASK YOUR SUPERVISOR.
6. As you get your results, start to interpret them and add them into the results section of your write-up. Start making any graphs/scans into actual figures, it will save you so much time. GraphPad Prism is the tool that's used in papers to make the graphs. You can get a free trial of this (or your supervisor may have a cracked copy).
7. Once you're sure you've a section of your results completed, begin the discussion on it. This is where the conclusions from your lab copy come into play. It's much easier to take information you wrote down weeks ago than to try and remember it. Make sure you tie your discussion back to the results and to your original hypothesis.
8. Don't be afraid to ask your supervisor to review your thesis. I was terrified to send mine to my supervisor for feedback, which in hindsight is silly because they'll be at least one of the people marking it, so their input is hugely important.
From my experience doing my FYP in UL while completing course work, I found the biggest thing was dedicating time to writing the thesis. It's easy enough to do the lab work, but making yourself write is different. Set aside at least 3-4 hours a week to read and write. Reading papers is actually a really important skill that is overlooked by students. It will take time (it used to take me ~4 hours to fully read a paper critically), but it gets so much easier. Its a skill that will help you out in other modules too.
Make sure you utilise your experiences learned in the lab and through your research to help you out in other modules. So much of biology ties together, so don't focus on your research as a standalone.
That's all I can think of for the minute but if you have any questions or would like to see my thesis just let me know!0 -
I'm not sure of how the FYP works in UCC in terms of the thesis write up, but I did a Masters in UCC and got a 1.1 (both in thesis and overall). The best place for sourcing literature is PubMed (, and I cannot stress enough REFERENCE AS YOU GO. You can get add-ons for your browser that will reference an article for you if you input in the link to the article.
1. Once you find out what your FYP is going to be about, start to read lots of papers, and begin to write down important points. For example, my thesis was looking at specific proteins, so I would write down the main points of each one. This is the start of your lit review/introduction. Make sure you read any papers your supervisor has written on the topic, and ask them for good papers to read.
2. Keep a lab copy either physically or electronically (I used research space in conjunction with my supervisor, so he could see what I was doing.) Within my lab copy there was the name of the experiment, date, method, my results (for me these were data set points and Western blots), and a conclusion drawn from the results.
3. Don't try and change your data to suit your preconceptions. Accept your results as is.
4. I kept a folder of my methods written out. This was really helpful so when I was doing a technique I had done months previously I was able to refer back to this document. It's also really helpful when you're starting out and watching your supervisor/doing it the first few times by yourself. You don't want to have to bug your supervisor about the next step you do, for something they showed you 20 minutes beforehand.
5. Saying that, if you do have questions, ASK YOUR SUPERVISOR.
6. As you get your results, start to interpret them and add them into the results section of your write-up. Start making any graphs/scans into actual figures, it will save you so much time. GraphPad Prism is the tool that's used in papers to make the graphs. You can get a free trial of this (or your supervisor may have a cracked copy).
7. Once you're sure you've a section of your results completed, begin the discussion on it. This is where the conclusions from your lab copy come into play. It's much easier to take information you wrote down weeks ago than to try and remember it. Make sure you tie your discussion back to the results and to your original hypothesis.
8. Don't be afraid to ask your supervisor to review your thesis. I was terrified to send mine to my supervisor for feedback, which in hindsight is silly because they'll be at least one of the people marking it, so their input is hugely important.
From my experience doing my FYP in UL while completing course work, I found the biggest thing was dedicating time to writing the thesis. It's easy enough to do the lab work, but making yourself write is different. Set aside at least 3-4 hours a week to read and write. Reading papers is actually a really important skill that is overlooked by students. It will take time (it used to take me ~4 hours to fully read a paper critically), but it gets so much easier. Its a skill that will help you out in other modules too.
Make sure you utilise your experiences learned in the lab and through your research to help you out in other modules. So much of biology ties together, so don't focus on your research as a standalone.
That's all I can think of for the minute but if you have any questions or would like to see my thesis just let me know!
Thanks for such a step-by-step answer! I always fall down on finding the best websites/citing sites to use, just like any other software that's used for data interpretation. The balance between normal module revision and 8-10 weeks in the lab on something 15-credits worth is what I really hope I can deal with.
Would really like to see your thesis closer to the start of September, I'll shoot you a message when I can! Thanks again0
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