<p>I’m currently doing research in a crystallography lab testing an origin of life theory. It’s pretty interesting stuff, but all of my experiments’ results have been against the theory. Is it a bad idea to send in the project for a competition if it’s slightly less exciting than if my results had been in support of the theory?</p>
<p>See what conclusions you can make from your data even if they go against common theory and then go ahead and use that as the basis for your own test theory. See if you can fit in more information to prove or disprove your new idea.</p>
<p>Here is an example:</p>
<p>I had a math theorem regarding the sum of digits of square numbers:</p>
<p>Turns out the Theorem Failed but I used it to find a pattern regarding all numbers!</p>
<p>From there I guessed that this pattern would change from the base-counting system…</p>
<p>Turns out I was right and from there I constructed a generic proof</p>
<p>That’s awesome. But unfortunately I’m not a crystallographic genius so I don’t think I have the background to come up with my own theory. I have significant data and a background theory to test that I feel I can write a nice paper, but I just can’t help but wonder whether or not some of the excitement factor is lost…</p>