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Database Tips Archives

July 9, 2007

Green Industry topics on the Inspec database

In the “Inspec Matters” bulletin, Winter 2006, the indexed content managers and subject specialists have noted “hot” environmental topics (pun intended): product lifecycle management, recycling and disposal, corporate social responsibility towards environmentally aware practices and policies, global trade and outsourcing, important legislation on waste and recycling in the EU and US. “Other environmental factors of importance in the literature include car emissions, pollution, and green energy. Inspec is THE major (subscription) bibliographic database concentrating on physics, electrical and electronic engineering, information technology, computer and control systems, and manufacturing, production engineering, and information technology. It contains references back to 1896.

September 7, 2007

Environmental Chemistry Information System (ECIS)

Trial subscriptions to Environmental Chemistry Information System are free during the month of September. Check http://www.nisc.com for details. These databases are nearly all separate flles on government websites. There are over 8 million records for nearly 700,000 chemicals.

Should we suscribe?

The ECIS News (Newsletter Archive)

A wealth of information about chemicals in the environment.

  1. Chemical/Physical properties OBSERVATIONS, SANSS
  2. Biodegradation/Bioremediation BIODEG, BIOLOG
  3. Site Assessment BRS, CERCLIS, FINDS, ICIS (DOCKET),RCRIS, TRI (1987-2005)
  4. Toxicity & Carcinogenicity AQUIRE, CCRIS, CRISP, EMIC, GIABS, GENE-TOX, IRIS, MEDLINE Subset, NIOSHTIC
    Subset, RTECS, TERRETOX, TSCATS
  5. Regulations TSCAINV, TSCAPP
  6. HAZMAT CHRIS, HSDB, MALLIN, New Jersey Hazardous Substance Factsheets, OHMTADS

Continue reading "Environmental Chemistry Information System (ECIS)" »

September 17, 2007

INIS-- International Nuclear Information System -- new database

INIS Online Database from 1970 to date. This new resource was added to our Princeton University Library’s “Articles and Databases” page this summer, and contains ~2.8 million records on peaceful uses of nuclear science and technology. >850,000 papers are full-text. Sponsored by the IAEA, the International Atomic Energy Agency, there is world-wide coverage. Approximately 1/2 of the records come from journals, the rest are technical reports, conference proceedings, patents, theses, and preprints, known as “grey” or “non-conventional” literature. Almost 2200 journals are scanned for inclusion, but 580 are key.

The portions especially applicable to environmental sciences are:

8% economic, environmental, legal and safeguards

7% fuel cycle waste and radiochemistry

13% nuclear power and safety

September 28, 2007

Science Reference Center -- new database

The Science Reference Center is a new database among several that Princeton is now offering, thanks to the State of New Jersey. It is perhaps in a league with AccessScience, the online version of the McGraw-Hill Encyclopedia of Science and Technology, but it offers reviews and articles from key, authoritative journals, and there are sections aimed at a much younger audience.

From EBSCO’s description: Science Reference Center is a comprehensive research database that provides easy access to a multitude of full text science-oriented content. Designed to meet every student’s science research needs, Science Reference Center contains full text for nearly 640 science encyclopedias, reference books, periodicals, etc. Topics covered include: biology, chemistry, earth & space science, environmental science, health & medicine, history of science, life science, physics, science & society, science as inquiry, scientists, technology and wildlife. Science Reference Center also satisfies the demand for standards-based content by providing teachers and librarians with articles correlated to state and national curriculum standards.

October 17, 2007

Energy Economics databases -- two new resources

The Library has subscriptions to Global Insights and EIU ( Economist Intelligence Unit). These services cover economic issues worldwide, by region, or country. There is data, economic and financial analysis, forecasting and marketing intelligence for various sectors of the economy. Energy is now a segment in each. These databases can be found listed under the “Articles and Databases. Global Insight is a monolithic heading, whereas EIU, lists various sectors separately. The EIU market sector databases are brand new and are currently listed under “New & Featured Databases”. “The Economist” (London), the highly respected and popular periodical, is also published by EIU. Similar to Global Insight, EIU contains news of critical issues, reports and briefings, and data and market analyses.

October 31, 2007

Environmental Impact Statements records added to transportation database

Northwestern University has added ~19,000 bibliographic records for environmental impact statements and drafts, to the TRIS database. “The Transportation Research Information Services (TRIS) Database is the world’s largest and most comprehensive bibliographic resource on transportation information. TRIS is produced and maintained by the Transportation Research Board at the National Academy of Sciences.” This is a free web-based database.

The Library has recently subscribed to the Environmental Impact Statements database from CSA: Environmental Impact Statements: Full-Text & Digests

The collections do not appear to overlap, so there must be at least some unique EISs in each. Both these databases are listed in the “Articles and Databases” groupings.

December 5, 2007

Improvements to the Princeton University Library catalog

There has been further developments — improvements — in the utility of our Main Catalog: Finding the location of a specific book, and finding related material. Look up a title in the catalog, and you will note, toward the bottom of the record: 1a. Item details: Where to find this item This link gives you a picture of the library building and a map to help you locate the site on campus. 1b. Location details: More information about this location This link gives you specifics of the whereabouts of the particular copy you are seeking. For Firestone books, a picture of Firestone shows while the floor plan loads. Then, from the central elevators & stairs, “anttracks” may take you to the approximate location of the book. In addition, locations may be highlighted and annotated. 2. Notice that there is an additional button just at the top of the record reading: more like this . This terminology may be more familiar from other database searching, but here it mainly condenses the key links from the long view.

January 14, 2008

TOXNET has CARCINOGENIC POTENCY Database

More details are reported here, in the NLM Technical Bulletin, No. 360, dated January/February 2008. This information was also disseminated via NLM-Tox-Enviro-Health-L…with an invitation to subscribe.

Among the entries under Articles and Databases from the Library’s homepage you will find TOXLINE which is specific, bibliographic database in the TOXNET group of databases. ToxSeek is also listed which is a “meta” & clustering search engine for many governmental resources on environmental health and toxicology .

February 1, 2008

Knovel additions in Geosciences

K-News Winter 2008 - Knovel Adds 173 New Engineering Titles

“Our new Earth Sciences subject area enables subscribers in infrastructure construction, oil and gas, civil engineering and many other fields to rely on Knovel as a single place for finding reliable answers quickly. The Earth Sciences collection currently contains 53 titles covering the following topics:

Geochemistry, Geology, Geophysics, Geodesy & Seismology, Geotechnical Engineering, Hydrology, Oceanography & Glaciology, Paleontology & Stratigraphy”

Continue reading "Knovel additions in Geosciences" »

April 2, 2008

GreenFILE, a new database from EBSCO

The new database, GreenFILE, produced by EBSCO, concentrates on human interactions with the environment. It is a small database, which indexes many different types of documents, from scholarly journal articles to recipes from popular journals. About 6% of the articles have links to full text. The searching is transparent and flexible, including limiting by scholarly titles. For research in depth, you mustn’t neglect the larger, more comprehensive databases in environmental sciences/studies and the subject database(s) most related to your topic. For more information from the announcement in Knowledgespeak Newsletter of April 2, 2008, read on…

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April 28, 2008

LexisNexis Academic -- more transparent, enhanced

LexisNexis Academic the daily-updated, major news and legal resource now has a friendlier design. The layout and tabs are redesigned for easier navigation, and some terminology is clarified. One may eliminate sources in a “Source Selection tray”.

All of the searching techniques and parameters remain the same — Boolean logic, truncation, wild cards, proximity, or connecting, operators, etc. Under the “Power search”, button, searching hints are readily available; more, of course are explained under “Help”, and there are several tutorials.