[O] how do scientists use org mode?

[GMX Christoph 13]

Hi
this is my first post here and although I am evaluating org mode with great 
interest, I am also asking myself in which way other scientists are making use 
of org mode. It will take a while to get my head around how to accomplish 
certain things in org mode but for the moment I am intrigued by *why* one would 
want to approach the problem of organizing one's research with org mode and in 
which way. 
Are you putting exclusively your todos in, well, your todo file and perhaps 
keep project-related things, such as data and progress, notes, ideas etc. 
somewhere else? Or do you embed your notes and todos within their original 
context, i.e. is org mode your one-stop solution for data management? Do you 
maintain a separate file for every major project you are responsible for or 
involved in or throw everything into one or few humungous  files and 
differentiate using hierarchies and tags? 
In the past I have hit some road blocks not so much with other softwares but 
rather concepts such as GTD, which I think is tailored to the needs of people 
outside science, so I would deeply appreciate your views and experience.

If this list is geared towards the proximate aspects of development and less 
towards philosophy of usage, I apologize

Christoph