Announcements 2012

Back To 2012 Mainpage

Feb 20: The Reader

I think many questions about the lab report writing/presentation could be answered by imagining your intended reader. The intended reader is one of your classmates who knows nothing about the experiment and needs to understand and believe your result. This includes

1) the background theory,

2) the setup and execution of the experiment (including the values of any relevant parameters -- currents, frequencies, delay times etc -- used in the experimental setup),

3) the model and analysis

4) a discussion that brings all this together (may be complicated or not depending on how the experiment went).

The intended reader is not the instructor, who can read between the lines and see what you did and didn't do -- you must provide these details in an organized narrative with with useful diagrams and plots.

Feb 19: First Lab Report Due Tonight @ Midnight

Just a reminder that your first final report is due tonight at midnight -- don't waste your "one free late report" by turning it in at 12:05!

Remember the naming convention:

To help us organize, the subject of the email should be "Advanced Lab: [last name]" where [last name] is your last name. Also the PDF should be titled [lab number]_[lab initials]_[last name].pdf. For instance if it's your first lab and you are doing Franck Hertz, and your last name is Smith, then you would title your report "01_FH_Smith.pdf".

Finally, also don't forget tomorrow that tomorrow in the lab you should show go over with your instructor a rough draft of the first couple sections of your next report. (Worth 5 participation points.)

Feb 16: Lab Report Example

Lab report not attached to wiki, but contact professor for report if you did not receive it in email.

As you prepare your first reports, I think it will be useful to have a good example (attached) from last year. Noting is perfect, but this gives you an idea of how an "A" report looks. Note how a discussion of the theory is given out in the intro, then the experiment is described, and then a model is fit with error analysis. Note how the derived physical parameters, as derived in the analysis section and given in the abstract are reported with errors. Also note how the graphs are well labelled -- the labels are a good big font size and all labels have units. Data are plotted with error bars. Also note how there are nice descriptive captions to go along with the figures -- don't just leave a caption as a one or two word caption.

Going beyond the call of duty, Justin included several appendices (labeled as addenda). The hall effect (which this example covers) is a bit on the fritz (we have replacement parts ordered), so there is an appendix on diagnosing the issues. And the larger amounts of data were put in the second Appendix.

Good luck and send questions etc. Reminder: tomorrow 2-4 pm in the PUC lab, I'll be around to answer questions about your first reports/analysis.

Feb 15: Graphing and Analysis; Friday Hours

I wanted to send a note on the role of "graphing" in these experiments. Many analysis sections that I've read begin, "We graphed the data." The problem with this is that, while a great way to visualize data, graphing is not analysis, and doesn't really warrant mentioning aside from in a sentence like "In Figure 3, a graph of the data is plotted with the model fit." The critical things are 1) your model 2) how you fit your model 3) chi-sq of the fit 4) the result of the fit, including errors on model parameters. You'll want a graph with your model, data, and maybe your residual (data minus model), but this is more part of the presentation than the analysis.

On another front, I'd like to set aside 2 hours -- from 2pm-4pm in the PUC lab -- on Friday after noon as a time that you can come and ask final questions about the lab reports b/f they are due on Sunday. Don't forget that you need to prepare for the new lab on Monday, so don't wait till Sunday to try to finish your report. Work on it during this week.

Feb 12: Clarification on Grading for Drafts for Tomorrow

Just to clarify about the report drafts due tomorrow -- these are examined and discussed as part of your participation grade -- there are points associated with them. Specifically there are 10 points associated with this second draft, which should include a first-pass analysis (a total of 15 points of participation are associated with each lab -- 20% of the total score). Generally if you make a thoughtful try at the analysis, you get full participation points. Beyond participation points, it's important to have a first pass at the data analysis on the second monday of the lab because you maximize the feedback from the instructors to produce the best possible final report, which is worth 60 pts.

This is the first lab, so don't stress -- just give it a try and we'll discuss how to bring this work to a successful conclusion.

Feb 12: LaTeX Tutorials Tomorrow; Next lab drafts

Just a reminder that the latex tutorials, led by your TAs, will be happening tomorrow at 10 am and 1:30 pm. Please attend these, especially if you are having any difficulties with latex.

Besides this, you need to submit a draft of your data reduction to your instructors for review and comment. You need to set up a time to discuss the data reduction with your instructor. As usual, I'll be around for both sessions tomorrow,

Feb 10: More Analysis Tutorials

I've added many more tutorials on analysis that should give you all the tools you need to model your data.

https://wiki.pha.jhu.edu/advlab_wiki/index.php/2012#Tutorials

They include worked examples as well as derivations. Please have a look at them and bring questions to the monday lab session.

Also, don't forget there is the python workshop tomorrow.

Feb 08: Analysis 1

A first tutorial on analysis, defining/deriving basic concepts, is up on the wiki at

https://wiki.pha.jhu.edu/advlab_wiki/index.php/Analysis_1

More to follow soon.

Feb 08: Python Workshop

From: Paul O'Neil Sent: Wednesday, February 08, 2012 4:28 PM To: announce@acm.jhu.edu Subject: Python Workshop

On this Saturday, February 11, at 2 pm there will be a workshop on Python. We will keep going until 4 or until people decide to leave. It's going to be in the PUC lab in Bloomberg (room 478). You can get there by going up the stairs near the cafe in Bloomberg to the fourth floor. Exit the stairway to the left (into a larger area with waterfountains / bathrooms) and go straight through the doors. There will be signs.

If you don't know Python or NumPy or SciPy, you should come and learn how they work. If you do know these things, you should come so you can teach others how they work. At the beginning, we'll get everyone set up installing & running Python, cover basics of the language, then work on small programs in pairs / triples.

If you are comfortable with Python and would like to help teach others, please email me at poneil1@jhu.edu or otherwise let me know you'll be there. Also, take a look at the NumPy documentation so that you know your way around it.

Please bring you own computer if you can. If you cannot, then let me know beforehand and we can find one for you.

Hope to see you there! Paul O'Neil

Feb 08: Schematic Example

Here is an example/tutorial illustrating good and bad practice for your experiment schematics.

https://wiki.pha.jhu.edu/advlab_wiki/index.php/Experiment_Schematics

Send questions More to come on data analysis soon.

Feb 07: Lab Prep/Write-up Instructions

We had a pretty good first day in the lab. Working out the kinks. I wanted to make a couple comments on the lab reports

1) Pre-write ups: Generally these were good, but we'll be looking for more in the future -- in particular we'll want both an introduction and an experiment section.

2) Collaboration and experiment section: while you're expected to make your own figures etc (and this applies to schematics of the instrument), I realized yesterday that there are a few labs (e.g., Zeeman or Brownian Motion) where a picture of the data (line splitting, dots in a fluid) is useful -- since this comes from the same data taken by the group, it's okay to have these figures duplicated between reports in the group.

3) Schematics of the instrument: most the time it's better to keep this simple and to draw your own schematic with clear labels. The schematics from the manuals tend to be over complicated, showing every little component (because it's a user manual!). You're trying to give the essence of the lab. So you should use the schematic to distill the essential parts to the procedure etc. You should also label the schematics and you should include important effects. For instance, if there is an important magnetic field, or current etc, draw it and it's direction into the schematic. Label the field/current/etc with a letter that you will then use in your model in the analysis section. (and that you might have already used in the intro when describing the theory. I'm planning to put some examples up on the wiki later today of what to do/what not to do.

Feb 05: Lab Locations

In case you forgot since the lab tour, here is a page showing where all the labs are located. Note the PE lab has moved to the SL lab since those are coupled.

https://wiki.pha.jhu.edu/advlab_wiki/index.php/Locations_2012

And here is the skinny:

Rm 478E: BM, ZE, RS

Main Room: HE, NMR, ML, FH

478B: MOD

478G: PE/SL

If, after trying out the lab, you feel that a lab would be better if moved to a separate room or even out into the main hall, let us know.

Feb 02: SPS / ACM Python Workshop

Good news! Paul O'Neil and colleagues are organizing a Python workshop that should help with the analysis part of the course (as well as plotting figures etc). Paul can provide more info. The tentative date for your calendars is Feb 11 in the afternoon -- just in time for analyzing your own data -- and I've suggested the PUC Lab as we a laptop farm there. I'll also post some python analysis examples next week to the wiki (sorry for the slow tutorial feed this week -- mainly making sure everything looks good with experiments b/f you start taking data).

As usually please send any questions that you have.

Feb 01: PUC Accounts and LaTeX

1) PUC Lab accounts. During the first lecture I said that these would be optional -- this was incorrect. You need a PUC lab account to log into many of the computers associated with the labs. If you do not have an account, email Steve Wonnell <wonnell@pha.jhu.edu>.

2) LaTeX. I've posted an initial take on a basic latex tutorial that should get you started on the required intro/experiment write-up for Monday. This will probably evolve a bit, but it's there if you want to start now.

Remember there will be tutorials offered in LaTeX from your TAs on the third week of the course.

Jan 31: Groups and Labs

Most of you now have lab groups and a sequence of labs chosen, with some variation, based on the your preferences.

The labs have also been divided among the instructors as follows:

Tobias Marriage: PE/SL, HE, ZE, NMR
Christopher Brust: BM, RS, NS
Sean Cantrell: MOD, ML, FH

If your first lab is run by a TA, please contact them to schedule a time to meet during class times on Monday. I'll be around the whole time.

Finally, after further consideration, I've decided that it will be more straightforward to have reports submitted/returned by email instead of dropbox. The wiki has been updated to reflect this change (see text at end of email).