•• INTRODUCTION (15%): The introduction will only include a description of the
tests performed: the principle (biology) of the test, and how to interpret ALL possible
results for that test. For example, with the gram stain, you would discuss that the gram
stain identifies the differences between two cell wall types, the structures of the two cell
wall types, how each cell wall type is detected/identified in the gram stain, and how the
gram stain is also used for observing cell morphology. Do NOT include any
methodology of the tests in the introduction. You CANNOT state what your
organism is or its importance in the introduction.
•• OBJECTIVE (5%): You will have a single objective (no deviations from this): To
identify the unknown organism.
•• HYPOTHESIS (15%): Your hypothesis will be written AFTER you perform the
Gram staining and fermentation tests. You will use the table provided to narrow down
the possible organisms you have, and you will write IF…. THEN hypotheses for each
possibility. YOU WILL WORK WITH ME IN CLASS to evaluate your results and select
appropriate hypotheses. You will have MORE THAN ONE hypothesis! (The exact
number depends on how many possible candidates you have after
Gram/morphology/fermentation testing.)
•• PROCEDURE (5%): The procedure will be a 1-2-line summary of the chronological
order you performed the tests in and which tests required repeating. If you changed any
parts of the procedure compared to the method(s) in the laboratory manual for any of
the tests, then you MUST give detailed information of how it was changed. If you had to
repeat any tests, then explain what went wrong here.
•• RESULTS (10%): The results section MUST be a table of ALL the results. Use the
table format that is on the unknown record sheet (join the two together to make a single
table) and fill it in. There will be images (pictures) in the results section. IF there is any
trouble uploading due to file size please add the images in a separate file to ensure your
report doesn’t exceed size limits. Upload images as separate files!!
•• DISCUSSION (15%): In the discussion you will discuss your results in the order
performed in class. You will state if your hypothesis was supported or not.
For EACH test (in chronological order) you will have (i) a description and interpretation
of the results, and (ii) a list of all the possible organisms the unknown organism has
been narrowed down to written in full scientific format (genus and species). The more
tests performed, the shorter the list will be, until you have just a single organism left
(any tests performed after identifying your organism are confirmation tests). Discussion
for each new test will start on a new line. At the very end of the discussion you will state
what your unknown organism is.
The discussion is the first place in the report where the unknown organism is identified.
As a note, it is impossible to have just one organism listed after the fermentation results,
as they are not 100% accurate (it is quite possible that 1 of 3 tubes is wrong).
Do not include just the organisms that only match your result perfectly. You must
include all possible organisms that match and are one tube different, otherwise your
discussion will be graded as below average (40%).
You should show how you narrowed down possibilities by listing all the organisms matching each
test. (For your Quiz -Unknown Example 1, it would look like this:
Gram Stain – result purple (Gram+)
Staphylococcus aureus
Staphylococcus epidermidis
Enterococcus faecalis
Enterococcus faecium
Micrococcus luteus
Micrococcus roseus
Streptococcus salivarius
Streptococcus algalactiae
Bacillus cereus
Bacillus megaterium
Bacillus subtilis
Gram Stain – morphology – Rods aka Bacillus
Bacillus cereus
Bacillus megaterium
Bacillus subtilis
Fermentation tests – result Glucose -A Lactose (-) Sucrose- A
Bacillus cereus
Bacillus megaterium
Voges Proskauer test – result POSITIVE
Bacillus cereus
•• REAL WORLD IMPORTANCE (15%): The real-world importance section will be
the medical/clinical, environmental, economic, or industrial importance of the organism
you identified. You can only select one of these options (medical/clinical,
environmental, economic, or industrial), and must give a detailed of these topics to
discuss for the organism in relation to the option you selected. You cannot write about
tests performed and their use, or the purpose/importance of being able to identify an
organism. You can only write about the organism you identified from one of the
categories (medical/clinical, environmental, economic, or industrial importance).
•• SCIENTIFIC PAPER EVALUATION (15%): Failure to include this
reference AND the appropriate section in the unknown report WILL result
in an overall grade of zero for the unknown report. A scientific research paper is
a scientific paper (not a review article) from a peer-reviewed journal. An original
scientific paper is where the authors did some laboratory experiments, presented the
data, and made conclusions about their data (these articles must contain an abstract,
introduction, methods, results, and discussion sections). You can access research papers
using Galileo or going to a library that contains research papers. You can start looking
for articles in PubMed, but you may have to use Galileo to access the full article. This is
more than just finding a research paper and citing at the end of the assignment. The
purpose of this is to teach you how to find accurate information (the internet is not
always correct!), how to read a scientific research paper, and to develop the skills in
assessing the accuracy and conclusions made by others (critical thinking skills). In the
assignment you must add an in-line citation next to the information that you obtained
from the scientific research paper with the words “Scientific research paper” in bold in
front of the citation, example = (Scientific research paper: Hollier, 2007) In this
section you must present your evaluation of the paper by answering the following
questions (type the question on one line, answer it on the line beneath it, and leave a
single line space between the answer and the next question). The answers require
explanations. Simply answering “yes” or “no” is not acceptable. Justify your
answers. Approximately 5 lines of text will be needed for answering each
question.
•1. What two main points did you understand from the abstract?
•2. What methods were used to conduct the research? Why were they appropriate?
•3. What key finding did you see in the results?
•4. Provide a summary of the author’s conclusions.
•5. Were the conclusions accurate for the results presented in the paper?
•• REFERENCES (5%): You should give in-text citations. That means you cite a
source at the end of EVERY sentence where you make a claim! Additional points will be
deducted for missing in-text citations in the paper – references are worth more than just
5% overall because points are deducted from the sections above in addition to this separate
reference section. One reference MUST be a scientific research paper (you may use
Galileo to locate a reference for this requirement). The scientific research paper
requirement MUST be used in the real-world importance section of the
report, that means using the information from the paper in that section.
MY UNKOWN IS PROTEUS MIRABILIS
