This week’s spotlight is on Bacteriology Abstracts available on the Cambridge Scientific Abstracts platform. This database indexes 404 publications in the areas of bacteriology and microbiology from 1982 to the present. It is the online equivalent of the print resource Microbiology Abstracts, Section B (Bacteriology). The database is searchable through CSA’s easy to use platform, allowing for up to 9 simultaneous keywords in a large variety of fields, as well as limits by date range and English only.

The results are organized into several categories, including all results, journals, peer-reviewed only, conference proceedings, websites, dissertations, and patents. It is also compatable with the LinkSource program — a simple button included in each record will search all our online vendors to see if the library has electronic access to the article.

The lists of new subscriptions and databases added and journals canceled by the LSU Libraries is now available on the library web site at http://www.lib.lsu.edu/journals/newsubscriptionsandcancellations.html. A link to the lists has also been posted on the Libraries home page.

Most database additions are now available as are a number of the journal subscriptions. The dates of availability of the remaining new subcriptions are listed with the titles. Journal cancellations will take effect in January 2006. Articles from these titles may be obtained via subsidized document delivery or interlibrary Borrowing. You may request articles from canceled journals at http://illiad.louis.lsu.edu/illiad/luu/logon.html.

Criteria for selection of the new additions are listed on the library site. The library will retain the faculty recommendations for the remaining journal subscription requests that could not be added this year in the event that additional funding becomes available. The remaining journal list totals more than $200,000.

Circulation and electronic access statistics, cost per use, and faculty in-put were the basis of cancellation decisions. The University is being receptive to our requests for added funding but a substantial permanent increase to the materials budget is required to prevent further cancellations in the future. In the interim, journal titles will continue to be reviewed for cancellation. More information about the Libraries journal assessment project and the materials budget is available at http://www.lib.lsu.edu/journals/.

This week’s resource is the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ). Just as the title suggests, the DOAJ serves as a one-stop shop for open-access scholarly journals on the web. From the main page you can search for a journal, browse by journal title, or browse by subject area. You can also search for articles among the DOAJ’s journals. The journals indexed by DOAJ are peer-reviews, so quality is assured. The subject area browse splits the collection into 17 broad categories, which are further split into more specific categories. Links for each journal take you to that journal’s homepage, with fulltext available in either HTML or PDF formats (sometimes both).

This week’s resource is Science Citation Index, one of the Web of Knowledge databases. SCI indexes more than 5900 scientific journals in a variety of disciplines and is an excellent resource for multidisciplinary topics.

The general search allows searching by topic, author, journal title, and others, multiple terms combinable using AND, OR, or NOT. The advanced search uses field tags, and allows more flexibility. Searches may be restricted to specific language sources, or by document type, and multiple searches may be combined in the Search History section. There is also a browseable author index.

One of the most unique features of the Web of Knowledge databases is the ability to do a cited reference search — enter an author or an article/book title and SCI will retrieve papers that list that author/work in their works cited lists. This is a very useful tool for tracking the progression of a line of research, or discovering related works and topics.

Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press is offering replacements free of charge to scientists and researchers who have lost books or journals published by CSHL Press due to Hurricane Katrina. Post requests to the CSHL Message Board.

Animal Sciences
Edited by Allan B. Cobb
New York: MacMillan Reference USA, 2002
4-volume set
Call# SF61 .A56 2002

From Gale:

“Animal Sciences brings together a wide range of scientific, historical and cultural information about the animal world. In addition to covering biological concepts, the history of zoology, biographies of scientists in the field, and ethical issues, such as the practice of animal experimentation, it also covers careers in the animal sciences. Each fully illustrated volume includes sidebars, charts and a glossary, as well as bibliographies, filmographies and a list of the addresses of institutions devoted to the protection and study of wild and domesticated animals around the world.”

Elsevier is making it’s MD Consult and FIRST Consult medical resources open to all those affected by Hurricane Katrina. The username is KATRINA (all caps) and the password is katrina (all lower case).

MD Consult is a searchable database with 100 full text medical books, over 70 full text journals, access to MEDLINE, Practice Guidelines, Patient Handouts, a Drug Database, and more, MD Consult can best be described as full text access to medical reference books and journals.

FIRST Consult is an evidence-based tool for differential diagnosis, evaluation and management of medical conditions, patient education and procedure skills review. FIRST Consult also works on a PDA, FIRST Consult can best be described as a clinical decision support tool to be used at the point of care.

In addition, School of Library and Information Science professor Cavan McCarthy has put together a comprehensive webliography of Katrina-related resources here.

I apologize that this post is a day late due to the server issues we had yesterday.

This week’s resource is Animal Behavior Abstracts (just hit “connect” from the link). Animal Behavior Abstracts indexes 225 serials in the area of animal behavior, including neurophysiology, genetics, behavioral ecology, and others.

Animal Behavior Abstracts is provided as part of Cambridge Scientific Abstracts on the CSA platform. The advanced search page allows up to nine search terms combinable by AND, OR, or NOT in up to three fields, including the basics of author, title, and keyword, as well as ISSN, publisher, publication year, conference, author affiliation, and others. You can also specify a date range, and limit to english only.

LSU has created a web page with shelter information, emergency agencies, blood centers, information about donations and volunteers, and other information pertinent to the recovery effort for Hurricane Katrina. In addition, the reference desk at Middleton Library has collected some print sources on those topics as well.