Databases

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Databases

• Indexes Abstracts

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Indexes Abstracts Serials

• When most librarians think about science and
  technology
• they think about serials and the
• importance of journals
• expense of some of these journals
• multitudinous number of these journals
• extensive conference literature
• number of tools to choose from
• Before we get too deeply into this topic, let's
  talk briefly about
• serials from a sci/tech librarian's point of
  view.

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Serials a publication, produced under one name,
in successive parts, indefinitely

• Generally broken down into
• series
• periodicals
• journals
• newspapers
• yearbooks, almanacs, etc.
• Just a quick reminder--the term series is used
  for those publications where each volume is a
  unique monograph book, but all titles are held
  together by a series title, e.g. Monographs in
  Clinical Neuroscience.

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Periodicals

• periodical and journal are used interchangeably
  by librarians
• scientists usually refer to them as journal
  because they regularly see citations to things
  titled Journal of XYZ, but almost never
  Periodical of ABC.
• common mistake by users is to add word journal to
  the front of a title
• Example
• Journal of Materials Engineering--correct title
• Materials Science and Engineering--correct title
• Materials Science and Engineering is a
  journal--but that's not part of its name.

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Journals

• Historical means of scientific communication
• Record of past research
• Each discipline, field, sub-field has its own
• Expensive publishers charge what market will
  bear

• Markets for journals
• libraries
• research lab, companies
• individuals

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Publishers

• Societies
• ASCE, American Society of Civil Engineers
• ACS, American Chemical Society
• AMA, American Medical Association
• Commercial, for-profit
• Elsevier
• Springer-Verlag
• John Wiley
• Companies
• Governmental agencies
• Universities

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Refereed/Peer-reviewed

• Yet, another way to look at journals is by
  whether the articles are
• refereed
• not refereed
• When a journal is refereed it means that before
  an article can be published it is sent to another
  person who is known as a referee. The referee
  reads the article, suggests improvements, and
  recommends publication or non publication. Some
  journals referee only selected articles, some
  referee all articles published and some don't
  referee any. The only way to know for sure is to
  check with the publication.

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Another perspective

• Scholarly authored refereed
• Trade publications geared to industry, rarely
  refereed
• News industry news journals newsletters,
  brief articles, not refereed
• Often undergraduate students as part of a writing
  assignment are told that they must have 2-3
  articles from scholarly journals and 1-2 from
  trade journals in their reference list. This
  confuses the daylights out of them.

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Conference Literature

• Purpose
• Share preliminary results
• Network, look for job
• See equipment
• Publications
• No papers, nothing no record
• Abstracts only, no papers published
• Full papers, not refereed
• Full papers, refereed
• Frequency
• ?Once ?Occasional ?Regular

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Expensive!

• Many journals published for library market
• Differential pricing, libraries vs individuals
• Examples
• Tetrahedron Letters 26,000/yr
• Brain Research 20,000/yr
• Thin Solid Films 15,000/yr
• Nuclear Physics B 14,000/yr
• JGR Journal of Geophysical Research 10,000/yr
• JGR Brain Research are multiple parts

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Databases/Abstracts/Indexes

• Tools for access to journals
• One for every conceivable topic
• Database/Abstract/Index all the same
• Chemical Abstracts SciFinder Scholar
• GeoRef Bibliography Index
• Engineering Index COMPENDEX
• Zoological Record Zoological Record
• Index Medicus MEDLINE PubMED

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Databases

• Use the right tool, regardless of name
• Divide by how they work
• Knowing your tools what they cover

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Know your database

• Subjects
• Journals
• Dates of coverage
• Types of material
• Searching

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Subjects

• Database subject scope statement
• Search across databases compare
• Number of journals as indicator

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Journals

• List of journals covered
• Number of journals
• INSPEC 3,500
• MEDLINE 4,300
• Chemical Abstracts 8,400
• BIOSIS 6,000
• GeoRef 3,500
• Engineering Index 4,500
• Completeness of coverage
• Cover-to-cover vs selective (how selective?)

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Nature 2000-2001

• INSPEC 830 articles
• MEDLINE 5040 articles
• BIOSIS 1103 articles
• Engineering Index 48 (less) articles
• Web of Science 5891 articles

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Dates of coverage

• Typically late 1960s to present
• Notable exceptions
• Local service vs whats available

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Materials indexed

• Journal articles
• Books
• Book chapters
• Conference proceedings
• Maps
• Theses/dissertations

• Technical reports
• Government reports
• Book reviews
• Patents
• U.S.
• Foreign

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Included materials

• Articles
• Letters
• Editorials, correspondence
• Corrections
• Links related articles?
• Obituaries
• Etc.

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Searching

• Keyword
• Codes
• Controlled vocabulary
• Special descriptors
• Registry Number
• Enzyme Commission

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Searching cont

• Common Sense
• Review full record
• Review available fields
• Help database guides

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Other

• Frequency of update
• International coverage
• Database consistency over time
• E.g. BIOSIS, changed author format
• Specialized databases, e.g.
• ASFA
• Pollution Abstracts
• Water Resources
• International Pharmaceutical Abstracts
• Correspondence to available collections

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Keyword databases

• Examples of databases where keyword is most
  useful approach
• International Pharmaceutical Abstracts
• Engineering Index
• INSPEC
• Next Week codes, trees, weird special features