Louise M. Darling Biomedical Library Blog

The Encyclopedia of Life Sciences has been called “one of the greatest scientific publications of the 21st century.” UCLA has online access to all 26 volumes of this groundbreaking reference work, which includes articles covering biology, virology, science and society, ecology, genetics, neuroscience, and plant science. The encyclopedia’s 4300 articles are clearly marked as including introductory, intermediate, or advanced content, and include color illustrations and tables. Each article includes a glossary with definitions of technical terms, acronyms, and taxonomical and biochemical information, and hyperlinks provide easy access to related content within the encyclopedia.

MD Consult has one of the largest Patient Education sections of any of the UCLA Library-subscribed health sciences resources.  With close to 10,000 patient education handouts, MD Consult provides educational materials from four major sources: McKesson’s Clinical Reference System, American Academy of Family Physicians, DynoMed.com and A.D.A.M., Inc. Approximately 30% of handouts have Spanish-language translations.  For your convenience, MD Consult has grouped handouts in four major categories: “Conditions and Treatments,” “Medication,” “Specialty,” and “Spanish.”  Handouts are linked off of the top bar in MD Consult and also appear in the search results of a general search in MD Consult.

The California Digital Library has recently licensed the electronic version of Journal Citation Reports (JCR) for all 10 campuses in the UC system. UCLA researchers have had access to these reports since 2001. JCR provides quantifiable, statistical information based on citation data, measures research influence and impact at the journal and category levels, and shows the relationship between citing and cited journals.

JCR is available for the sciences and the social sciences and can be helpful when selecting journals to publish your writing or locating impact factors for peer review documentation or grant applications.

Note that the JCR data only goes through 2007 at this point. JCR’s methods require a full calendar year of data be collected. 2008 data will be analyzed beginning in 2009, and the information on 2008 journals will likely be available in fall 2009.

MitoCarta is a comprehensive online inventory of mammalian mitochondrial genes published by the Broad Institute. Eli and Edythe Broad, together with Harvard University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, founded the Broad Institute in 2003. This molecular genetics database provides a foundation for investigations of mitochondria and mitochondrial dysfunctions which have been associated with a variety of human diseases.

MitoCarta contains three datasets: Mouse MitoCarta (evidence of mitochondrial protein localization and protein distribution across 14 tissues); Human MitoCarta (evidence of mitochondrial protein localization and protein distribution across 14 tissues), and GFP localization (images of 131 protein with mitochondrial localzation assessed by GFP tagging and microscopy). In addition to viewing the above datasets, users may also download the datasets in various formats.

You may already know about LexisNexis Academic and Newsbank’s Access World News, which are both news sources that can be used for community analysis and health services-related research questions and projects. Factiva is another resource you may consider adding to your research toolbox for these specific questions.

Business, company, and industry content all can be found using Factiva, an online resource with more than 14,000 business and general news sources. These sources including U.S. and international newspapers, magazines, wire services, Web sites, photographs, and trade and industry publications. There are well over 500 “health care” industry sources alone, and nearly 200 for “pharmaceuticals.” Just a few of the publications included are Biotech News, Life Science Weekly, and Health & Medicine Week.

How do you get to Factiva? Starting at the Biomedical Library Home page, look for the Search for Online Resources box. Type “Factiva” in the box and change the selection to “All electronic materials.”

Want help in getting to know Factiva or how its content can benefit your research? Schedule a consultation with one of the librarians at the Biomedical Library by completing a request using our online form or emailing us at biomed-ref@library.ucla.edu.