Essay on the Laboratory Notebook
John L. Hubisz, Ph.D., Hubisz@unity.ncsu.edu

All science students, no matter how young, should learn how to maintain a laboratory notebook.

When I first went to work in a microwave development laboratory, I was sent to a man in a cage who handled all supplies and records. One of the items that he gave me as a newcomer was a laboratory notebook. Embossed on the cover was a code (I think that it was "A0362") with a place for me to letter and sign my name on the cover. The book had sewn-in pages with each page embossed with its page number. It was similar to the required book for my college laboratories, but definitely more expensive. I was told that everything that I did for the company was to be written in that book with black or dark blue ink and that nothing was ever to be erased. Today I would add that whiteout should never be used. One line drawn through material not to be considered was to be sufficient. If I were ever to write on napkins or envelopes, as some engineers were wont to do in the lunchroom, that material was to be immediately copied to the book and the loose papers destroyed. After suggesting that the first couple of pages be left for a table of contents, he had me sign a big ledger next to "A0362." When I left the company, I had to return every notebook still in my possession.

In my reading of history later, I learned that Alexander Graham Bell and Thomas Edison often fought battles in court over priority of inventions and the laboratory notebooks were the deciding factors in many of those cases. Two excellent examples of laboratory notebooks for all of us are those of Michael Faraday and Thomas Edison. You may wish to look through them in your library.

You can approximate such an expensive laboratory notebook with a $1.00 Composition Book from the Dollar Store. Look for a fairly stiff front and back cover with sewn-in pages. Sewn-in pages make it easy to see if pages have been ripped out, something that should never be done! Number the pages and use the first two for a table of contents. Also, get a piece of stiff material and tape it on three sides to make a pocket on the inside back cover. Here you can place odd items such as computer printout, graphs, and so on. Loose-leaf binders, spiral notebooks, and loose papers are never acceptable as a laboratory notebook.

This laboratory book is a record of the raw data that you collect from demonstrations, films, your laboratory work, and any daily activity whether at home or in your laboratory. It is almost like a diary of activity to prove that you have done your work.

Each collection of data must start on a new page prefaced with a few remarks on just what it is you wish to investigate. It may help if you simply ask yourself what you would like to do today that would help you to learn some physics. For example, you may wish to put on record the theory or idea that you wish to investigate and are attempting to disprove along with the minimum evidence you will accept for rejecting the theory. The date, your name, your partner's name (if applicable), and other data (barometric pressure, temperature, and so on) pertinent to your work should appear somewhere. Note that in physics you do experiments to disprove theories. Your theory, no matter how crude, should be stated at the outset of all experimental work, perhaps as the first sentence of the laboratory report for the day. (Every experiment is a search for an answer to a question born in a body of ideas.) At the same time, evidence that would be considered acceptable toward validating or disproving a particular theory should also be recorded. Some days you might just have a few notes on a bright idea or two that you thought of while traveling.

The laboratory book may be used by itself only to meet the objective of maintaining a laboratory book. Other assignments may depend heavily on the material you collect in your laboratory book so you should be able to locate notes on work accomplished quickly, and those notes should be reasonably neat and orderly. You should have someone inspect your laboratory book occasionally to see that you have been doing a good job. Do not expect that you will get extra marks because the laboratory book is especially neat! Ideas and observations are the important points to record. Do not write notes on separate paper and then transfer them to the laboratory notebook!

It is important that you keep a record of dates and times because you may have to prove that you have spent a certain minimum number of hours on your project. Then, again, the date that you did something might turn out to be very important. If you are required to turn in a report on a particular project, do NOT turn in the laboratory book and expect this to meet your requirement. Any report should be made up from your notes and handed in as a separate assignment following your instructor's format. You will be responsible for following up all instructor questions and comments made on your laboratory work either orally or by written work.