Explaining Procedures
A number of conventional patterns are available to the writer to "front" certain information elements in the sentence. This allows the writer not only to maintain the topical flow of information but also to satisfy the light-before-heavy requirements when structuring the text.
The methods section primarily consists of three basic information elements: action, means, and purpose.
Quantitative Determinations
[VARIABLE] [ACTION] [MEANS] The electrical properties of the capacitors was measured using a Hewlett-Packard impedance analyzer.
[MEANS] [ACTION] [PURPOSE] A Hewlett-Packard impedance analyzer was used to measure the electrical properties of the capacitors. [PURPOSE] [ACTION] [MEANS] To measure the electrical properties of the capacitors, we used a Hewlett-Packard impedance analyzer
[GOAL] [ACTION] [MEANS] Measurements were performed on a Hewlett-Packard impedance analyzer. "Production" Pattern
Another important pattern is the "Production Pattern." This pattern introduces new characters as an outcome or end-product. It is often found at the beginning before the description of a process and is usually used to describe how an end-product was derived:
[PRODUCT] [ACTION] [MEANS] The oligonucleotide primers were synthesised by phosphoramidite chemistry on a DNA synthesis device. [SOURCE] The plasmid phGH-M13gIII was constructed from the hGH producing plasmid, pBO473 [8]..
[MEANS] [ACTION] [PRODUCT] Phosphoramidite chemistry was used to synthesize the oligonucleotide primers Of course, the two information elements [PRODUCT] and [SOURCE] can also be combined and even inverted to give the opposite orderings:
[PRODUCT] [ACTION] [MEANS] [SOURCE] Plasmid phGH-M13gIII was created by gel purifying the lac fragment.
[SOURCE] [ACTION] [PURPOSE] [PRODUCT] The lac fragment was gel purified to create the plasmid phGH-M13gIII.
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