Chemistry Grad Students: Intro to Chemistry Resources
Fall 2004
Goal: To give an overview of the availability of electronic
resources in Chemistry made available by Lehigh's library services.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
SciFinder Scholar 2004
Web of Science
Other Science Databases
Obtaining Copies of Papers
Contact Information For Further Assistance
SCIFINDER SCHOLAR 2004
WHAT IT IS
SciFinder Scholar allows you to access a number of databases, including Chemical Abstracts, reaction information, substance information, and MedLine.
ACCESS
See here for information about accessing SciFinder Scholar 2004.
If you want to learn more about SciFinder Scholar, see CAS webpage about SciFinder Scholar. There are tutorials/ eseminars available there if you want to review fine points of searching.
TIPS
Details about bringing up full text of articles, from out of SciFinder Scholar after bringing up search results, are available here.
When you are new to a field, it helps to begin by finding "review" papers that give you an overview of a field. By virtue of being "reviews", these papers can lead you to other papers. To find review articles, go to "research topic" and do a search. (See help documentation for pointers about entering searches and/or contact the science librarian for help.) At the bottom of the resulting search set, click on "analyze/refine".Select "refine", then "document type". Select "review". Alternatively, after putting in a search in the research topic search box, click on additional options. Select limit by document type, then select review.
You can find citing and cited articles. After you click on a "microscope" icon to bring up a full record, you'll see a button labelled "Get related..." at the bottom of the screen. Clicking on this brings you to place where you can find citing and cited articles. You can also bring up cited/citing references by going to the "Get Related" button at the bottom of a set of search results.
WEB OF SCIENCE
WHAT IT IS
A library database that lets you:
1. search for literature about a given subject, 1993-forward (journal articles,
some monographic series coverage)
2. start with a known paper (can be pre-1993) and find papers 1993 and later
that cite it.
ACCESS
Web of Science (hereafter, WOS) is available off the library listing of databases;
see information
and link here. Use this tutorial: http://www.isinet.com/tutorials/wos7/
. Select on-campus or off-campus depending on where you are. If you are off-campus,
you will be prompted for your Lehigh login and ID.
To search WOS, click on general search. Enter your search term string. Set
search limits near the bottom of the page if you want. (Again, when you are
new to a field, it helps to begin by finding "review" papers that
give you an overview of a field. By virtue of being "reviews", these
papers can lead you to other papers.)
Now click on "search". A list of titles comes up. Scroll through
these to find one that of interest to you. Click on ones that interest you
to see their full WOS record.
What you see is *not* the full text of an article; it provides information
*about* an article, including an abstract. How do you get to the full text
of the article?
Click on "Lehigh SFX Links". This will bring up the SFX interface,
which will, let you access the full text of an article if it is available.
If you find, using SFX, that the item is not available electronically, then
off the SFX screen you can access ASA, Lehigh's online catalog, to see if
it is available in print at Lehigh. Or, if if we still don't have it, you
can click on the ILLIAD (that is, interlibrary loan) option. The data
is automatically put in; all you have to do is submit the request. ILLIAD
requires a one-time ILLIAD 'registration' before using. (For
further information about obtaining articles, see below).
Finally, supposing you already know that an author is an important one for
the field you are searching, you can type in the author's name in the author
search area of the general search screen.
OR, if you already know a good paper (including ones that you found using another database), you can use the cited reference search capabilities of WOS. Click on the Cited Ref Search button near the top of the page.
OTHER SCIENCE DATABASES
SciFinder Scholar and Science Citation Index are only two of the databases
that Lehigh's libraries make available. See here for an alphabetical and subject
breakdown of databases. Some databases on this list worth considering for
chemistry research:
* Applied
Science and Technology Abstracts
* Chemical
Abstracts Student Edition
* McGraw-Hill
Encyclopedia of Science and Technology
* INSPEC
Includes coverage of Physical Chemistry topics. Examples are: chemical kinetics,
reaction mechanisms, polymer reactions, photochemistry, electrochemistry,
radiation chemistry, chemical thermodynamics, and surface chemistry. NOTE:
WHEN YOU USE INSPEC, MAKE SURE IT IS SELECTED IN THE DATABASE DRAG-DOWN OPTIONS.
In addition to INSPEC, you can also select Engineering
Index/Compendex off the same search interface.
OBTAINING COPIES OF PAPERS (Electronically or
in Print)
If you have used bibliographic databases to find references and abstracts
for items that look interesting, how do you actually locate the paper(s) that
are of interest to you?
(1.) First, check ASA to see if Lehigh has the item, either in paper or electronic
format.
OR, check to see if there is a full text "SFX"
link from the bibliographic database you search. See information above.
(2.) If not, you may want to see if one of the regional
libraries has the journal or check WorldCat.
Also, for obtaining books, check out PALCI.
(3.) An additional way to find papers: browse the tables of contents of recent
issues or archived (bound) copies in the library, or look for relevant electronic
journals browsable here
by title or linked on ASA.
(4.) Contact the science librarian if you need additional assistance in locating
an item.
CONTACT INFORMATION FOR FURTHER ASSISTANCE
At any point in your research, email Brian
Simboli (brs4) if you have any questions. You may also call me at x5003
or drop by my office at Room 633 in Fairchild-Martindale Library.
Brian Simboli 9/21/04