There are several key databases that are useful for searching the biomedical and life sciences literature. Click on the title link to open the database:
Offers access to the Elsevier digital library, covering over 1,800 publications. Most are available in full text after 1995. The collection is updated daily.
Scopus is the largest ever bibliographic database and indexes over 20,000 titles from science, technology, medicine and the social sciences. This abstract only database is updated daily so it is excellent for identifying the emerging research. Use Article Linker (AL - link to full text) to check for full text online sources.
Full text of more than 1250 journals published by Springer-Verlag. Access includes most of the Springer Journal Archives up to 1996, and many current titles but, please note, more than 600 titles are excluded from our Springer journals package - these are indicated by a padlock symbol. Springer Link also provides access to Lecture Notes in Computer Science, and Lecture Notes in Mathematics; and Springer Protocols (up to 2012 only, see description below) but not to any other e-book series (although we do hold some Springer books in the Library and some e-books on Ebook Central - these may be found on the Library catalogue).
Contains full text articles from over 5,800 journals, covering many subjects, including anthropology, politics, political science, psychology, psychiatry, sociology and social work. Coverage includes 450 magazines for news, current awareness and examples of professional practice.
Indexes sources in medical research including biomedical and physical sciences, North American bias, from 1946 to date. The database is updated weekly.
Provides access to 13 Nature branded journals and Oncogene, covering subjects across the life, physical and applied sciences and, most recently, clinical medicine. Content encompasses daily news, expert opinion, practical methodology, and high impact research and reviews.
Collection of e-Books available for free via the National Center for Biotechnology Information. No ID is required for access.
This archive includes content published between 1980 until 2012 ONLY.
Springer Protocols contains more than 28,000 protocols, derived from primary content from 6 book series: mostly from Methods in Molecular Biology (907 volumes), and also from Methods in Biotechnology (24 volumes), Methods in Molecular Medicine (140 volumes), Methods in Pharmacology and Toxicology (11 volumes), Neuromethods (70 volumes), 8 Springer Protocols Handbooks titles and 21 additional books not in a series.
Used primarily in the life sciences, these protocols provide written procedural methods in the design and implementation of experiments including aspects such as safety, bias, procedures, equipment, statistical methods, reporting, and troubleshooting standards. Each protocol is templated into four sections—Introduction, Materials, Methods, Notes.
This collection is also available on the new Springer Nature Experiments platform.
Pre-prints are versions of scientific papers that the author uploads to a public server like a digital archive. Pre-prints can be early drafts, but often they are the almost final versions of the paper that will be published in a journal, before the publishers' typesetting is applied. Many journal publishers allow this form of publication, although several will only accept a paper if it has not been made visible elsewhere beforehand.
Pre-prints are often used to elicit comment from peers at early stages, or as a quick means to make visible a research paper in an openly accessible manner. Searching on a relevant discipline pre-print server can be a good way to locate current literature or open access materials, and to understand emerging areas in your research field, but bear in mind that you might not be viewing the final paper and the work within it might not have been peer-reviewed.
Split your topic into keywords: To find better and fewer results, think about your keywords. Make sure they accurately describe what you are looking for, and add more keywords to make your search more specific.
Think of alternative keywords: For example, 'cancer' could also be referred to as 'neoplasm'.
Search for phrases in "double quotation marks": For example, "DNA replication". This will search for the phrase as a whole, instead of the individual words.
Select a data range: For example, you may only want literature published since 2010. Most databases have the option to select dates.
For more help see our Finding resources guide, or contact your Librarian.