Aero 972 Seminar Info Sheet
Library and Information Resources
Dorothy Byers, Head Engineering Library, x64211
Important basics to know:
Defining a topic:
- Look at theses at UC, in OhioLINK (keyword search and limit material type to thesis)
- Look at books, reviews, encyclopedias and handbooks to get background information
- Check out faculty or researchers whose names you know and see what they are doing in databases and web sites
- Use the funnel approach
- name a broad area
name a subarea name a specific topic within the subarea
- what aspect to look at: theory, application, design, material, construction process, function, use data
- what are your independent variables? your dependent variables.
Search tips:
- For author searching, beware varying forms of name.
- In Science Citation Index, only initials are used, e.g. Walker, BK
. Try their new Author Finder!
- Browse author name index if not sure, or to pull up variants of same author's name and even misspellings!
- Verify person by topic of research and location
- For subject searching, start with keyword
- Know how to use truncation, wild cards, and proximity operators
- Combine synonyms (OR words together) to create a set of terms for a concept
- Combine sets with AND to limit search to the intersection
- Use search history to combine search statements
- Examine search result record to see what subjects have been assigned (if any) to the record. These subjects may be used to expand to all records on the same subject.
- Expand to related articles, if opportunity exists (usually based on common references)
- Use citing features, if any
- To narrow your results
- use advanced searching capability
- use " " or ( ) to identify a phrase unless database automatically does it
- use limit features such as date, material type (journals only, conferences only, patents only, theses only, online only), or treatment (theoretical, applied, historical, scholarly, review, etc)
- search your topic in title only (this works great in internet searches)
Web searching:
- Engines
- Tips
- Remember to use advanced searching to control words, where it searches, domains
- Limit to title to reduce results
What's cool:
Presenting your work:
dfb
10/3/08