Editing Lab notebook (section)

{{Short description|Primary record of research}}
[[File:AGBell Notebook.jpg|thumb|Page from a laboratory notebook of [[Alexander Graham Bell]], 1876]]
[[File:Otto Hahn's notebook 1938 - Deutsches Museum - Munich.jpg|thumb|Page from the notebook of [[Otto Hahn]], 1938]]
[[File:Lab notebook for A Test of the Coordinated Expression Hypothesis for the Origin and Maintenance of the GAL Cluster in Yeast.pdf|thumb|Lab notebook with the complete record of the experiments underlying a published [[Scholarly paper|paper]]<ref>{{Cite journal | last1 = Lang | first1 = G. I. | last2 = Botstein | first2 = D. | editor1-last = Rusche | editor1-first = Laura N | doi = 10.1371/journal.pone.0025290 | title = A Test of the Coordinated Expression Hypothesis for the Origin and Maintenance of the GAL Cluster in Yeast | journal = PLOS ONE | volume = 6 | issue = 9 | pages = e25290 | year = 2011 | pmid =  21966486| pmc =3178652 | bibcode = 2011PLoSO...625290L | doi-access = free }}</ref>]]
[[File:Schablone Logarex 25524-S, Chemie II.jpg|thumb|Chemistry stencils that used to be used for drawing equipment in lab notebooks]]

A '''laboratory notebook''' ([[colloquialism|''colloq.'']] '''lab notebook''' or '''lab book''') is a primary record of [[research]].  Researchers use a lab notebook to document their [[hypotheses]], [[experiment]]s and initial analysis or interpretation of these experiments.  The notebook serves as an organizational tool, a memory aid, and can also have a role in protecting any [[intellectual property]] that comes from the research.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Schnell|first=Santiago|date=2015-09-10|title=Ten Simple Rules for a Computational Biologist's Laboratory Notebook|journal=PLOS Computational Biology|volume=11|issue=9|pages=e1004385|doi=10.1371/journal.pcbi.1004385|pmid=26356732|pmc=4565690|bibcode=2015PLSCB..11E4385S|issn=1553-7358 |doi-access=free }}</ref>