Research Guide for Science

Information Resources	Guides for Science Courses
Finding Articles	Anatomy & Physiology
Finding Books, Videos, DVDs, & CDs	Environmental Issues
Online Books
Finding Authoritative Web Sites

FINDING ARTICLES

EBSCO Multiple Topics & Disciplines

Academic Search ™ Premier contains full text coverage in a broad array of subjects including biology, chemistry, physics, education, health, psychology, religion & theology, and social work. Academic Search ™ Premier contains indexing for 8,200 publications, with full text for more than 4,650 of those titles.

Science Related Databases

Health

EBSCO's Health databases searches CINAHL ®, PreCINAHL ™, Health Source ®: Nursing/Academic Edition, Clinical Pharmacology, SPORTDiscus, and the multidisciplinary Academic Search ™ Premier. The citations in these databases link to the full text of the article when available. You can search individual databases by going to EBSCO Database Selection . Additional search features are provided when you limit your search to a single data.

EBSCO Education

EBSCO's Education searches three databases, Professional Development Collection ™, ERIC ®, and the multidisciplinary Academic Search ™ Premier. Most of the citations in these databases link to the full text of the article when available.

ProQuest Education Journals

ProQuest® Education Journals gives users access to over 700 top educational publications, including nearly 600 of the titles in full text. Image articles include all the charts, tables, diagrams, and other graphical elements often used to enhance the editorial value of articles that focus on education topics. ProQuest Education Journals covers not only the literature on primary, secondary, and higher education but also special education, home schooling, adult education, and hundreds of related topics.

National Library of Medicine

The National Library of Medicine Gateway facilitates the simultaneous search of multiple National Library of Medicine information systems, including MEDLINE and PubMed. Userscan access citations - some of which link to full text, video, audio and images.

PubMed

PubMed is a free database that searches millions of article citations from approximately 5000 journals of medicine, nursing, dentistry, veterinary medicine, the health care system, and preclinical sciences. Users can access citations - some of which link to full text, video, audio and images.

JSTOR

JSTOR is a non-profit organization that archives scanned images of journal issues and pages. Alvernia College has access to the Arts & Sciences I, II and IV Collections. These collections include many of the core research and society published journals in key fields in the humanities and social sciences, and a limited number of journals in the sciences.

LexisNexis Academic

Legal Research
This full text database includes case law, law reviews, legal news, state and federal codes, federal regulations, European Union law and patents.

Medical News 47 Titles
This is a database of full text articles in the fields of life sciences, medicine, & health. (Dates of coverage: varies by title, all titles to present)

Medical Journals 20 Titles
This is an index of full-text journal articles in fields of life sciences, medicine, & health. (Dates of coverage: varies by title, 11 titles to present)

Medical Abstracts
This is an index to the abstracts of journal articles in the National Library of Medicine's Medline (Dates of coverage: 1966-present)

News
This full text database includes U.S. & International news from newspapers, magazines, journals, television and radio news broadcasts.

Psychology

EBSCO's Psychology searches three databases, PsycINFO ®, PsycARTICLES, and the multidisciplinary Academic Search ™ Premier. Searches can be limited to the PsycINFO database by going to EBSCO Database Selection. This will allow you to search using an electronic version of APA's official Thesaurus of Psychological Index Terms ® .

Suggested APA subject terms may be helpful in finding information on the topics listed below:

• Neuroscience
• Nutrition & Dietetics
• Psychopharmacology

Sociology

EBSCO's Sociology databases searches SocINDEX™ with Full Text and the multidisciplinary Academic Search ™ Premier. SocINDEX™ with Full Text encompasses the broad spectrum of sociological study with abstracts for more than 815 "core" coverage journals dating as far back as 1895. The full text for 397 "core" and 150 "priority" coverage journals dating back to 1908, are covered. Books/monographs, conference papers, and other non-periodical content sources are also included.

WestLaw Campus Research

WestLaw Research Campus is an online legal research tool for students interested in law-related areas such as criminal justice, social work, business, education and law. In addition to primary legal information consisting of case law, and state and federal statutes, this resource provides summaries and analysis of court decisions, law reviews, and synopsis of legal issues.

Please note that in order to access this database, WestLaw requires users to check the I agree button at the bottom of the terms of agreement page.   

FINDING AUTHORITATIVE WEB SITES

Franco Library’s Internet Reference Library

The Internet Reference Library has a list of selected Science Web sites. The Internet Reference Library can be accessed from the Resources page of the Library Web site.

Alvernia Library Research Page

The Research Guides page, listed under Research Help on the Alvernia Library Research page, links to sources for finding and evaluating Web sites.

Brodart DartClix

The Brodart DartClix consists of 16,000 professionally selected Web sites.

FINDING BOOKS, VIDEOS, DVDS, & CDS

WorldCat 100 million records

This Online Union Catalog lists holdings from libraries across the world. Searches can be conducted across all libraries or limited to the Alvernia Library collection. Searches can also be limited to specific types of documents such as books, visual materials and Internet resources. (dates of coverage: 2100 B.C. – present)

Requesting a book from this collection only takes a minute. Click on the Borrow this item from another library link. Submit the form with your Alvernia ID number and allow two weeks for delivery of the requested book.

Alvernia's Catalog

Alvernia's Catalog is the best tool for finding items in Alvernia Library's collection. You can search for books, audiobooks, books in the Best Seller collection, audio-visual materials (videos, DVD's and CD's), course reserves, and journals in our print collection. Item records indicate if the item is available. Students, faculty and staff with an Alvernia ID card can place a hold on items that are currently in circulation.

The Dewey Decimal System is used to classify books in the Alvernia Library collection. Natural science books are located in the 500 to 599 section.

A good way to start your research is to read brief overviews about your topic. Reference books provided an overview as well as a sense of the scope of a topic, and introduce terms that may be helpful in searching for additional information. Examples of books with background information and reference sources are listed below:

Science Reference Collection

Encyclopedia of Science and Religion R291.17 E56 2003

Environmental Encyclopedia R363.7 E61 2003

Pollution A to Z R363.7303 P977 2004

McGraw-Hill Encyclopedia of Science & Technology R503 M1478

McGraw-Hill Dictionary of Scientific and Technical Terms R503 M147 2003

Sciences Content Knowledge: Study Guide 507.62 S416 2002

Cambridge History of Science R509 C178 2003

International Encyclopedia of Women Scientists R509.22 O11 2002

Encyclopedia of Physics 530.03 R813 2004

Astronomy Encyclopedia R520.3 A859 2002

Encyclopedia of the Solar System R523.2 E56 1999

CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics R541 C517 2008-2009

Encyclopedia of Genetics R576 E56 2004

Dictionary of Genetics R576.5 K54 2002

Encyclopedia of Evolution R576.8 E56 2002

Ecology and the Environment R577.03 F142 2004

Evolutionary Biology R576.803 F142 2004

World of Microbiology and Immunology R579.03 W927 2003

Dictionary of Zoology R590.3 D554 2003

Encyclopedia of Animal Behavior R591.5 E56 2004

Current Protocols in Toxicology R615.9 C976

Illustrated Dictionary of Immunology R616.07 C967 2003

ONLINE BOOKS

Bad Bug Book: Foodborne Pathogenic Microorganisms and Natural Toxins Handbook
http://www.cfsan.fda.gov/~mow/intro.html

Biomedical books
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=Books
The National Center for Biotechnology Information's collection of electronic books can be searched for science topics.

Encyclopedia of Occupational Health and Safety
http://www.ilo.org/encyclopaedia/

Gray's Anatomy
http://www.bartleby.com/107/
The classic illustrated text of human anatomy (20th edition, 1918) is now available online. It is fully searchable by keyword, table of contents, or subject index containing 13,000 entries. From Bartleby.com. (LII)

Gale Encyclopedia of Nursing and Allied Health
http://0-find.galegroup.com.alvin.iii.com/gvrl/infomark.do?type=aboutBook&prodId=GVRL&eisbn=1414410441&version=1.0&userGroupName=pl1855&source=gale
The Encyclopedia covers topics in all major health professions, including nursing, physical therapy, occupational therapy, respiratory therapy, medical lab technology, emergency medical technology, pharmacology and nutrition. In addition, approximately 400 photographs and illustrations are featured.

National Academy Press
http://www.nap.edu/
Full-text of over 3,700 books, searchable and categorized by subject, including:

• Biology & Life Sciences
• Earth Sciences
• Energy & Energy Conservation
• Enviornment & Environmental Studies
• Food & Nutrition

 

Google Books

• biology
• chemistry
• physics

 

NetLibrary eBooks
A collection of over 12,000 eBooks is now accessible from NetLibrary. eBooks are full text electronic versions that can be borrowed and returned over the Internet. To access eBooks from off-campus, you must first Create A Free Account from a computer on the Alvernia College computer network. Examples of science books in this database include: (Note: these links only function from a computer on the the Alvernia College computer network)

• biology
• chemistry
• environment
• genetics

Updated: July 10, 2008

Your comments are welcome.