The National Biological Information Infrastructure (NBII), provided by the US Geological Survey Biological Informatics Office, is a broad, collaborative program to provide increased access to data and information on the nation’s biological resources. The NBII links diverse, high-quality biological databases, information products, and analytical tools maintained by NBII partners and other contributors in government agencies, academic institutions, non-government organizations, and private industry. NBII partners and collaborators also work on new standards, tools, and technologies that make it easier to find, integrate, and apply biological resources information. Resource managers, scientists, educators, and the general public use the NBII to answer a wide range of questions related to the management, use, or conservation of this nation’s biological resources.

OSU Libraries has set up a trial of Cambridge Histories Online, produced by Cambridge University Press. This trial will run through June 17, 2010.

Cambridge Histories Online is the online version of the Cambridge Histories reference series, dating back to the 1960s.

Key Features:

  • Contains over 260 volumes published since 1960, equating to around 196,000 pages of unrivalled scholarship
  • Unique & dynamic content
  • Covers over 15 different academic subjects
  • Search and browse content (basic & advanced search and a content specific browse)
  • Personalisation including, saved & most recent searches, workspaces and bookmarks
  • Citation export functionality
  • Comprehensive librarian support resources including, COUNTER compliant usage statistics, library branding, MARC records and title lists
  • User display control features including, switchable hit term highlighting, pagination of results and the ability to control the number of hits per page
  • Extensive bibliographic reference functionality; fully referenced content with all references displayed, OpenURL compliant and linked online through CrossRef

Comments on this database trial can be submitted using the Electronic Resource Evaluation Form.

OSU Libraries has acquired the JSTOR Arts & Sciences II collection. JSTOR offers a high-quality, interdisciplinary archive to support scholarship and teaching. It includes archives of leading academic journals across the humanities, social sciences, and sciences, as well as select monographs and other materials valuable for academic work. The entire corpus is full-text searchable, offers search term highlighting, includes high-quality images, and is interlinked by millions of citations and references.

Arts & Sciences II adds to the library’s current JSTOR holdings (Arts & Sciences I, Ecology & Botany, and Health & General Science) and is home to 127 titles. This collection adds depth to many disciplines introduced in JSTOR Arts & Sciences I, such as economics, history, and Asian studies. Arts & Sciences II also offers core journals in several new disciplines, such as archaeology, classics, and African, Latin American, Middle Eastern, and Slavic studies.

The full list of titles and dates of coverage for Arts & Sciences II is available here.

OSU Libraries now has access to the Opposing Viewpoints Resource Center as part of the statewide database licensing contract with Gale.

Opposing Viewpoints Resource Center pulls together background information and pro & con viewpoints about current social issues. The database includes:

  • Nearly 7,000 viewpoint articles
  • 41 complete titles from the Information Plus reference program
  • More than 275 primary documents
  • 300 biographies of social activists and reformers
  • Nearly 5,000 statistical tables, charts and graphs
  • Nearly 4,600 topic overviews that provide context for the issues
  • More than 775 court-case overviews
  • 334 profiles of federal agencies and special interest groups
  • 2,000 links to reviewed and subject-indexed Web sites
  • More than 1,300 images, all hand-selected to support the topics covered
  • More than 135 full-text periodicals and newspapers
  • Podcasts from the Weekly Presidential Radio Address

JSTOR Plant Science is an online environment that brings together global plants content, tools, and people interested in plant science. It provides access to foundational content vital to plant science – plant type specimens, taxonomic structures, scientific literature, and related materials. They are offering JSTOR Plant Science to all participating institutions worldwide at no cost.

JSTOR Plant Science offers access to botanical and other resources from around the world including:

  • The world’s largest database of plant type specimens representing the botanical diversity of the planet. More than 600,000 specimens are available today. When complete, there will be an estimated 2.2 million.
  • Over 175,000 scientific research articles and other content dating back hundreds of years from leading academic journals including Kew Bulletin, Mycologia, International Journal of Plant Sciences, Science, PNAS, and others.
  • Foundational reference works and books such as The Useful Plants of West Tropical Africa, Flowering Plants of South Africa, and illustrations from Curtis’s Botanical Magazine.
  • A significant set of correspondence, including Kew’s Directors’ Correspondence which included hand-written letters and memorandum from the senior staff of Kew from 1841 to 1928.
  • More than 20,000 paintings, photographs, drawings, and other images.

OSU Libraries has a trial of the Reaxys Database, published by Elsevier. Reaxys combines the content of CrossFire Beilstein, CrossFire Gmelin and the Patent Chemistry Database. This trial will run through June 4, 2010.

Reaxys has extensive coverage of authoritative information in organic, organometallic and inorganic chemistry including:

  • Single and multi-step reaction data
  • Information on catalysts
  • Experimental substance property data

Comments on this database trial can be submitted using the Electronic Resource Evaluation Form