Research Experience for Undergraduates: Library Resources

Project Topics: Environmental & Transportation Engineering | Chemical Engineering | Biomedical Engineering

Beyond reading what your professor assigns gather background and research on your topic from a variety of sources. Starting of course with...

the free web: search engines and other free sites such as Scirus for scientific information
general and specialized encyclopedias: Encyclopedia of Biomaterials & Biomedical Engineering.

Scholarly Research Articles

Use library databases by subject to find articles by topic: biomedical, chemical engineering or civil engineering databases to find academic research articles.

Types of Articles You'll Come Across

Review Article: Drinking water treatment processes for removal of Cryptosporidium and Giardia in Veterinary Parasitology
Research Article: Inactivation of cryptosporidium parvum oocysts using medium- and low-pressure ultraviolet radiation in Water Research
Conference Paper/Proceeding: Providing safe drinking water to 1.2 billion unserved people in Proceedings of 96th Annual AWMA conference, San Diego, CA June 22-26, 2003

Use Various Types of Resources & Evaluate Everything

Evaluating Web Resources Checklist (PDF)

According to a study at Stanford, nearly half of all web site evaluators (46.1%) used visual cues, to assess a site's credibility. Move beyond what a site looks like...

EPA Ground Water and Drinking Water | Water Quality and Health Council

Authority
Scope
Currency
Accuracy

Books - search Library Catalog for items @ WPI or WorldCat to search beyond our library

PRINT: Handbook of water and wastewater microbiology
ELECTRONIC: Water Quality and Treatment [e-book]

Government Sources: GPO Access Catalog of U.S. Government Publications : search federal information from agencies such as the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) or use Google Advanced search (limit search to domain .gov)

Experts: track down trade associations, scholars/researchers. Check the Encyclopedia of Associations Reference Collection HS17 G334, or search the web: drinking water (association or associations)

Research Assignment: In Class

JumpStart: Worksheet

All listed are WPI subscriptions except PubMed, which is a free government funded source. Off campus? Use Proxy to connect. Search Google Scholar, a web search of scholarly sources.

Start with these, but try also Databases by Subject: Biomedical Engineering, chemical engineering, or Civil Engineering

Engineering Village - CompendexWeb: Abstracts to engineering journals, reports, and conferences for professional engineers and scientists. Choose FullTextFinder to track down full text, if available.
PubMed: The U.S. National Library of Medicine database of articles and abstracts of biomedical journals for medical and health professionals.
Go thru the Tutorial to become a MEDLINE search pro! Notice this web link has wpilib at the end, use this so that LinkOut/FullTextFinder connects you to WPI's journal holdings.

Filter and Follow Up...

Scan results: use subject headings/descriptors, keywords, phrases found to expand search

Scrutinize article titles, number of pages, and journal title

Browse promising abstract and conclusion sections of long studies

Bibliographies can clue you in on the value of the article as well

Find an interesting author? Search for more articles or for his/her web site

Notice an agency, association or expert mentioned in an article? Follow up!

Web of Science: Search abstracts of major scientific literature, most academic sources, choose FullTextFinder to track down full articles and citing references.
ScienceDirect: Full text access to academic science journals published by Elsevier.
SciFinder Scholar: Abstracts to chemistry and other journals, reports, conferences and patents. On library ;& lab computers (not a web site).

Only Finding a Citation? Getting the Full Text

Within most databases, click on the FullTextFinder link to get options for obtaining the full text of the article.

Is the journal online or here in the library? Search our Journals, Magazines, & Newspapers list
Visit another library: Search WorldCat to find one
Request delivery from another library: Interlibrary Loan.

Citing Your Sources

Try RefWorks or EndNote bibliographic database & citation management tools. Create a database of your references then output them into many formats. More ...

Wednesday June 6 @ 10am: Anderson Lab A: PubMed/Endnote Overview

Also, check out our workshops to learn how to save time.

Unsure What Format to Use?

This often depends on where the article will be published, journals have their own styles. Your faculty advisor will be able to help you chose the proper style for your project. Often Civil Engineers use American Society of Civil Engineers Manuscript Requirements and biomedical engineers sometimes use IEEE style.

Questions?

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Last modified: Mar 12, 2008, 09:39 EDT