Where to find (and dig up) the Scientist’s research notes in Fortnite Chapter 3, season 4

Time to dig a little deeper.

A screengrab from Fortnite showing metal trees near Sanctuary
Screengrab via Epic Games

One of the latest quests in Fortnite Chapter Three, season four tasks players with finding and digging up the Scientist’s stolen research notes. You’re going to need those notes if you want to help Jones and AMIE figure out just what’s going on around the island this season.

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The stolen research notes are in a pretty specific location on the map, and if you don’t know exactly where you should be looking at first, it can be easy to spend a long time wandering around the map just trying to figure out where you’re supposed to be heading. Luckily, the notes themselves aren’t very difficult to spot once you know where to look.

If you’re struggling to figure out where the Scientist’s notes are for you to dig up and complete your quest, check out the guide below for a full rundown of where to go.

Where are the Scientist’s research notes in Fortnite?

When you look at your map, you’ll notice the islands on the eastern edge of the map. To the north of those islands, and due east of Lustrous Lagoon, there’s an island with a small, modern-looking mansion on it. Make your way over there.

Screengrab via Epic Games | Remix by Adam Snavely

To reach the island, you can always land directly there from the Battle Bus. If you can’t quite reach it, you’ll have to swim, or you can reach the island by using a hot air balloon at the top of Lustrous Lagoon and you can fly all the way there.

Once you’ve reached the island, you’ll notice some conspicuous piles of dirt that are noticeably darker than the rest of the dirt and sand around the house. You can walk up to those piles of dirt and hit them with your harvesting tool to search. The Scientist’s notes are in one of these dirt piles around the house. They might not be in one specific dirt pile, so if you’ve already hit one and found no notes there, keep looking around for more dirt piles. 

You’ll know you’ve found them when you see some papers with a light shining out of them appear on the ground and the game gives you the option to “Collect Notes.” Once you’ve collected the notes, you should get a message from AMIE, signaling that you’ve officially completed the task.

Author
Image of Adam Snavely
Adam Snavely
Associate Editor and Apex Legends Lead. From getting into fights over Madden and FIFA with his brothers to interviewing some of the best esports figures in the world, Adam has always been drawn to games with a competitive nature. You'll usually find him on Apex Legends (World's Edge is the best map, no he's not arguing with you about it), but he also dabbles in VALORANT, Super Smash Bros. Melee, CS:GO, Pokemon, and more. Ping an R-301.