Lab reports are written to attract the attention of readers and draw them into the researcher’s findings. There are seven essential elements that make up a lab report, including an abstract, introduction, materials and methods, results, discussion, conclusion, and references. In this analysis, we will examine, compare, and contrast the organization and presentation of content in three lab reports. Lab report 1, “Soil structural stability following decades of straw incorporation and use of ryegrass cover crops” and lab report 2 “Improved soil structural stability under no-tillage is related to increased soil carbon in rice paddies” are written by Jian-Ying Qi et al. from Department of Agroecology, Aarhus University (Denmark), Hunan Soil and Fertilizer Institute, College of Agronomy and Biotechnology, China Agricultural University, Key Laboratory of Forming System, Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs of China, while the lab report 3 titled by “Strength, Flexural Rigidity and Aerodynamic Stability of Fiberglass Spans in Pedestrian Suspension Bridge” is written by Sergey Salenko et al. from Novosibirsk State Technical University and Siberian Transport University in Russia. Although all lab reports have their own strengths and weaknesses, upon careful analysis of each one, it is evident that Lab Report 1 and Lab Report 2 are more effective and clearer in their presentation.

      Moving on to the abstract and introduction sections of lab reports, lab report 1 and lab report 2 follow the traditional organizational method in that their abstracts and introductions are separated. The abstracts for the lab report 1 and lab report 2 have clearly stated the purpose of experiments, which are respectively maintaining good soil structural stability (SSS) and improving soil structural stability (SSS) and soil organic carbon (SOC). Moreover, they have provided briefly, the methodology followed through the experiment. Like the lab report 1 and the lab report 2, the lab report 3 follows also the traditional organizational method by separating the abstract and the introduction. Contrariwise, it didn’t state clearly the purpose of the experiment, Sergey Salenko et al. start their abstract by invoking the importance of crossing the pedestrians and the transport paths at different levels. They also assume that many studies have been carried out confirming the feasibility of one of their methods used through their experiment. Unlike lab report 1 and lab report 2, lab report 3 didn’t provide clearly the methodology followed through the experiment, its abstract is really vague and not explicit. Nevertheless, while the abstracts of these three lab reports mention the outcome of their experiments, none of them didn’t provide any explanation of what those data ultimately mean.

      The lab report 1 starts its introduction by reminding that several processes which are closely related to soil function are impacted by soil structure, including soil microbial diversity and activity, air permeability, soil carbon and nitrogen dynamics, and soil erosion, to announce how it is important to maintain a good soil structural stability. In addition, Jian-Ying Qi et al. hypothesize in their introduction that including straw incorporation and cover crops will affect SSS differently at different spatial scales and that increased straw incorporation rates will be related to increased associations between clay and organic matter, while cover crops will promote stabilization at a larger scale. Lab report 2 uses the same approach Like lab report 1 in its introduction, by explaining the purpose of the experiment and citing some researches done before their experiment, and provides some hypotheses which are no-tillage can improve SSS, positively correlate with SOC, and alter SOC distribution and decomposition in aggregates. Unlike the introduction of the first two lab reports, the lab report 3 introduction didn’t provide any hypothesis. It only cited some studies done before about their topic. While discussing in great detail, about their topic, citing some studies done in those area by other researchers, none of the three lab reports did provide any insight into what other researchers might have to say about their topics. 

      With the analysis of the introduction of the Lab Reports concluded, this segment will be dedicated to the analysis of the Methods and Materials used. The “Materials and Methods” sections of lab Report 1 and lab report 2 accurately explain the tools used and the methods followed throughout their experiments in a detailed, yet easily comprehensible, way. In both lab reports Jian-Ying Qi et al.  utilize schematics of the apparatus used as well as their actual pictures to assist readers with understanding the details of the procedure. They are divided into different sections based on the various tools they are trying to evaluate, and each of those sections include separate explanations of the experimental equipment, procedures, and results. In addition, these segments include the difficulties and discrepancies in calculating that were faced during the experiments. On the other hand, lab Report 3 has a different organizational method. It is not divided into sections like the first two lab reports. Its section didn’t provide enough information about the methods and materials used in the experimental equipment and procedures. However, the way it explains this section is brief and insufficient.

      Coming next in the review of the lab reports is the analysis of the result sections in each lab report. The result segments are separated into many categories depending on various techniques in lab reports 1 and 2. The first thing that stands out is how crucially important the tables, graphs, and illustrations that are included in these segments are in summarizing and underlining the findings and their interpretations. In addition, the experiments were demonstrated to be valuable for maintaining a good soil structural stability and soil organic carbon by the results, which confirm the hypotheses they provided in their both introductions. In a similar method, lab Report 3 uses tables and schematics and graphs to explain the results. Gathering the data for each section, it does a great job at summarizing them and putting them in a way that display the purpose of the experiment. However, it didn’t provide any hypothesis in its introduction that’s why it’s not possible to say that the results confirm the hypotheses.

      The discussion sections of all three lab reports seem trustworthy and equally effective in integrating the findings with the research objectives. While lab report 1 and lab report 2 provided a long discussion section with several parts, lab report 3 had a short discussion section, which made it inadequate as it did not clearly discuss all the results. The discussion sections in lab report 1 and lab report 2 are convincing and well supported by the results that align with the hypotheses and research objectives. In contrast, lab report 3 lacked a thorough discussion of the results. Lab report 1 and lab report 2 also have a comprehensive analysis and comparison of data from different parts of the experiments, leading to answering the questions raised in the introduction.

      The three lab reports’ conclusion sections, similar to those in most lab reports, are devoted to restating the goals of the studies as well as summarizing the methodology and results. While lab report 1 and lab report 2 include a more thorough conclusion that paraphrases the methodology and the results to help the readers better understand the arguments in the discussion section, lab report 3 offers a brief but effective conclusion that contains just the right information about the experiment and its results.

     In terms of addressing the essential questions that a lab report should answer, all three reports made an effort to cover as much as possible and presented their content in a way that would engage the readers. However, upon closer examination of the three reports, it is evident that lab report 3, despite its advanced formatting and good flow of content, did not offer a hypothesis, discussion, analysis, and interpretation of data as strongly as lab report 1 and lab report 2 did. Therefore, lab report 1 and lab report 2 are considered to be more academically productive and effective.








                                                                           References
Jian-Ying Qi, Johannes L. Jensen, Bent T. Christensen, Lars J. Munkholm. (2022, January 15). Soil
          structural stability following decades of straw incorporation and use of ryegrass cover 
          crops.
          https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0016706121005437
Jian-Ying Qi, Shou-Wei Han, Bai-Jian Lin, Xiao-Ping Xiao, Johannes L. Jensen, Lars J. Munkholm,
          Hai-Lin Zhang. (2022, May). Improved soil structural stability under no-tillage is related to
          increased soil carbon in rice paddies: Evidence from literature review and field 
          experiment.
          https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352186421008130
Sergey Salenko, Alexander Obukhovskiy, Yuri Gosteev, Andrey Yashnov, Alexander Lebedev. 
          (2020). Strength, Flexural Rigidity and Aerodynamic Stability of Fiberglass Spans in 
          Pedestrian Suspension Bridge.
          https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352146521003069