ProQuest Upgraded

We’ve recently improved and upgraded our subscriptions to academic databases on the ProQuest platform. Look out for both new databases and expanded full-text coverage amongst Natural Sciences and Social Sciences collections. 

The new ProQuest Natural Sciences Collection includes access to seven themed database collections: Agricultural Science; Aquatic Science; Atmospheric Science; Biological Science; Earth Science; Environmental Science and ProQuest Illustrata: Natural Sciences. 

And the new ProQuest Premium Social Sciences Collection expands on the content available before with new collections in subjects such as: Criminology & Criminal Justice; Education; Political Science and Sociology.

All Keele staff and students can access the databases from both on and off-campus at: http://search.proquest.com. For more information or help accessing ProQuest please contact the Library InfoPoint or your Liaison Librarian.

Keele Campus Library: reminder about forthcoming training sessions ...

Just a reminder of our forthcoming training sessions at the Keele Campus Library:

The 'Basic RefWorks' session will be delivered twice more, as follows:

• Monday 18th November, 12:00 – 13.30 

• Monday 2nd December, 12:00 – 13.30

'Effective Dissertation Research' will be delivered on: 

Wednesday 27th November, 12:00 – 14.00

Click here to find out more & book a place

Further information:

Based at the Hospital Campus?  You can book on sessions delivered at the Health Library:

click here for more details

No time to attend training sessions?  Try one or more of the following:

• Online guides and videos to help you use a range of resources
• Health Library e-tutorials and videos on searching 

Springer Protocols

A new resource to Keele Unviersity library users, to access go to http://www.springerprotocols.com/index.vm


Used primarily in the life sciences, protocols provide individual sets of instructions to allow scientists to recreate experiments in their own laboratories.  These documents provide written procedural methods in the design and implementation of experiments that describe the safety, bias, procedures, equipment, statistical methods, reporting, and troubleshooting standards to be used in order to successfully conduct the experiment.

SpringerProtocols combines the world’s largest collection of protocols with advanced search functionality.  Each protocol is in four sections—Introduction, Materials, Methods, Notes—so that information will always be exactly where you expect to find it.

SpringerProtocols contains more than 28,000 protocols, most of which come from the classic book series Methods in Molecular Biology.  Each protocol is a chapter of a book, and each book is a collection of protocols on a given research topic.

Looking for information?

Looking for information and don't know where to start? Why not try our new discovery service Encore?

This combines searching the library catalogue with some of our major journal databases at the same time, saving you time and complication.

Give it a try here, and let us know what you think.

New search system under test

http://encore.keele.ac.uk

Locating information for an essay or indeed any kind of research isn't always as quick or easy a process as it ideally should be. Having to repeat your search in multiple information resources such as the Library catalogue and journal databases can be inconvenient
and time-consuming. To meet this need, the Library has set up a new system called Encore which allows searches on the library catalogue and most of our major ejournal databases at the same time. The default search combines books and articles, showing the top 3 or 4 most relevant articles and giving direct access to the full text of journal articles. However if you click on the 'Articles' tab you can choose to focus your search on the most subject-relevant resources. Of course, due to database licensing, the full-text is available only to Keele staff and students, so you must login using either your IT username and password or your library barcode.

Please let us know what you think of the system. Although we've tested it thoroughly we'd be particularly grateful if you notice anything which doesn't appear to work as it should.

Web of Knowledge 3.5 due to be available soon!

A new version of Web of Knowledge (known as "version 5.3") is due to become available from 17 July 2011; the updated version is the one you should see when you access the database from this date.

The existing version (known as "version 4.10") is to be made available until the end of 2011.  From 17 July 2011 you should be able to access it via a link on the right-hand side of the updated Web of Knowledge screen.

Look out for more news/information from the Library about this ...