Brooks Library Research Guides: Biological Sciences

ICE Biological Inventories of the World's Protected Areas

The Information Center for the Environment (ICE), in cooperation with the United States Man and the Biosphere program (U.S. MAB), the Man and the Biosphere (MAB) program of the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), the National Biological Information Infrastructure, the U.S. National Park Service, and the Biological Resources Discipline of the U.S.G.S., has produced databases containing documented, taxonomically standardized species inventories of plants and animals reported from the world's protected areas.

National Wetlands Inventory (U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service)

The National Wetlands Inventory (NWI) of the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service produces information on the characteristics, extent, and status of the Nation's wetlands and deepwater habitats. Congressional mandates in the Emergency Wetlands Resources Act requires the Service to map wetlands, and to digitize, archive and distribute the maps. With funding from other Federal, State, Tribal, local and private organizations, the Service has produced final maps for much of the nation. About half are digitized and available to the public on the Internet. Private companies provide NWI data in various other media. Hard-copy maps are available through Cooperator-run Distribution Centers.

Nationalatlas.gov

Nationalatlas.gov provides online and printable maps covering all aspects of the United States. There are maps for topics in biology, agriculture, boundaries, climate, the environment, geology, government, history, demographics, transportation, and water, as well as land maps. You can even try making your own map!  Includes statistical information on crime, economics, energy, and health. Aerial photographs are also available, as well as raw data from map layers--see the "Mapping Professionals" tab. Nearly all of the map layers in the National Atlas Map Maker are also available for download using File Transfer Protocol (ftp). There is no charge for this service. Most of the map layers were compiled at a scale of 1:2,000,000 or a ground resolution of one kilometer. Most map layers cover the full geographic extent of the United States of America, although some cover the conterminous United States.

OBIS: Ocean Biogeographic Information System

OBIS is a product of the Census of Marine Life, a global confederation of marine researchers whose mission is to explain the "diversity, distribution, and abundance of marine life in the oceans." A Web-based provider of "global, geo-referenced information on marine species," OBIS claims through its search engine the ability to find 9.8 million records of 68,000 species from 123 databases worldwide on marine animals. The advanced search feature is very sophisticated, allowing users to limit searches to specific databases, geographic region, water depth, classification, and a time range of report dates. Users can also browse by taxonomic group. A completed search returns a map depicting the worldwide location of the marine life in question along with links to available information.

Oxford Reference Online: Maps

This title now includes over 775 maps, with locator, physical and political maps for each country, over 120 island maps, state maps for North America, Canada, and Mexico, and more than 100 city maps.  It is part of a suite of reference materials available through the subscription database Oxford Reference Online.  The database is available in full from the CWU library's homepage under "Research" -- "Databases by Title".

For digital collections of original maps, see also the research guide section "Images Online & in Databases".

Terrestrial Ecoregions of the World

National Geographic interactive map that provides info and images on 867 land-based ecoregions around the world. The regions are not limited to political boundaries, but rather defined by shared features in ecology, climate, plants and animals. 

WildFinder: Mapping the World's Species

WildFinder is a GIS tool for researching Earth's animals. You can search the database in two ways: "Search by Place" to zoom in on an ecoregion and generate a list of species that live there or "Search by Species" shows geographic distribution and is searchable by scientific or common name. "Search by Place" results provide the following data: scientific name of the species, which links to the "Search by Species" results; common name; taxonomic class; threat status; endemic status; and a link that launches a Google Images search. In addition to zooming in on the map, users can search by city name, zip code, country, or other place-names. "Search by Species" is currently limited to amphibians, reptiles, birds, and mammals; at the time of review, the database had records for more than 26,000 species.

Nobelprize.org

Search for nobel prize winners by year or by discipline--physics, chemistry, medicine, literature, economics--as well as Nobel Peace Prize winners.  Info from 1901-current previous year is available.

ScienceWatch.com: Interview & Essays

ScienceWatch.com (part of Thomson Reuters "Scientific", of which Web of Science belongs)  tracks recent research in the sciences, which includes interviews of some of the top scientists in emerging fields of study.  You can also get to ScienceWatch and other online research tools for the sciences from the ISI Web of Knowledge (Web of Science) database from the CWU Library Databases page.

Oxford Reference Online
Oxford Reference Online, with over 2 million entries, many of which are illustrated, is a superb cross-searchable resource to use when you are at the 'looking for a clue' or 'needing verification' stages of your research.  Oxford Reference provides quality, up-to-date reference content from its extensive series of well-respected books - and unlike Wikipedia you can cite Oxford Reference in a paper!

The Quick Reference materials include information on many Subjects, a series of informative Timelines, a wide variety of Quotations, as well as English Dictionaries, and Bilingual Dictionaries.

The Reference Library is divided into Subject Categories, drawn from the 308 volumes of the Oxford Reference Library.  Those categories are:

Archaeology	Media studies
Art & Architecture	Medicine and health
Bilingual dictionaries	Music
Classical studies	Names studies
Encyclopedias	Performing arts
English Dictionaries and Thesauri	Philosophy
History	Quotations
Language reference	Religion
Law	Science and technology
Linguistics	Social Sciences
Literature	Society and culture

Assistance and advice with using the Quick Reference and the Reference Library are available at this link, and by contacting your friendly neighborhood Brooks Library Librarians.

Notes: The Search Box is in the upper right corner of each Oxford Reference page, with additional options on the left-side and in the center of the page before you scroll down.  Most Oxford Reference results pages are scrollable lists of information, and scrolling is worth doing.
          There is also an Advanced Search available.
          To cite an entry click on the individual entry, the Citation Tool is now visible - it is the 'little pencil' to the right and above the entry that you wish to cite.

Oxford Reference Online: Science & Technology

The science and technology section consists of online dictionaries, encyclopedias and handbooks that make up the Oxford Reference Online database.  The Oxford Reference Online database is available from the CWU library's home page, under Databases by Title. 

Summit Online Catalog
Summit is the unified library catalog of 37 universities, colleges, and community colleges in the Pacific Northwest.  Through Summit you have access to over 9.2 million distinct books, CD’s, DVD’s, and more (that the Summit unified collection is over 28.7 million items virtually assures you of access to a copy of what you want or need).  The unified catalog enables you to find with a single search books and other items at any of the 37 member libraries.
(Note: It generally takes between three and five days for a physical item to be sent from one Summit Library to another so please plan ahead.)

In addition to Books, CD’s, DVD’s the Summit Catalog is also one of the many ways that you can locate useful journal articles.  In order to find an article through Summit, type a keyword, a subject, or an article title in the Search Box near the top of the Summit page (an ‘Advanced Search’ is also available).  Select the “Full text articles” box (next to the Search Box or on the left side of the page).  The Results List will be initially sorted by ‘Library & Relevance’, but you can also sort by Author, Title, and Date.  Click the title link of the article or the “View Now” or “View Full Text” link to see more of the article and then download a pdf of it.  (You can also click “Find It @ Your Library”, select ‘Central Washington University’ and find out what access we have to that article here.)

If the article, book, DVD, CD, etc. that you wish or need to acquire appears to not be available through Summit please consult one of our talented Help Desk Librarians.  It is quite possible that we have access to the article through one of our other databases, or that the book, article, etc., can be gotten through Interlibrary Loan.

Brooks Library Online Catalog - CATTRAX
Cattrax is the online catalog that describes nearly all the materials held by the Brooks Library: books, government documents, maps, microforms, journals, and other items.  Below is everything you might want to know about how to use Cattrax - but all you need to know to start searching is summarized in the numbered items and note directly below:

Using Cattrax to find an item in the Brooks Library:
1. Enter a search term – a word, a phrase, whatever – in the search box.

2. Use the drop-down menu to select whether you wish to do a keyword/word search, a title search, a subject search, an author search, or one of the other options.  Click 'Search'.

3. Results that are 'relevant' to the search term that you used will be retrieved.  Examine the results.  Repeat steps 1 through 3 as needed.

*** Note: Information is often described in several different ways; you may need to try a variety of terms before you find ones that provide you with the information you are looking for. And spelling counts.***

More Information about Cattrax:
You can sort the results by 'relevance', date or by title, by clicking on those words below the Search Box.

Click on a title to see a detailed bibliographic record about that title.  The ‘bib record’ will contain a variety of additional information about the book: the author, location, call number, often a summary, status, subject terms, etc.  Any and all of that information can be important clues.

The ‘bib record’ will also have a link to a location map, two ways to send the information to your mobile phone, a citation tool, and will often have book cover images.

You can also save the ‘bib record’ to either ‘My Lists’ (requires you to use your ‘Library Log-in’) or you can ‘Save to Bag’ and remember to email, save, or print the resulting list of titles before you finish your session with Cattrax.

Once you have saved the useful results of your first search you can perform more searches – perhaps starting by opening the author link, the subject terms (towards the bottom of the ‘bib record’), or the 'Call #', in a new browser tab, or using the search box to start a totally new search using what you have learned so far from your search.

(Note: the books are in Call Number order on the shelves and clicking on the "Call #" will display a list of books in something like 'shelf order', which can help you find some good ideas for searching Cattrax.  It is also a good idea to look on the shelves, discovery happens in many ways.)

When you finish your session with Cattrax remember to email, save, or print the ‘Save to Bag’ list of items that you found.

Additional Cattrax Information:

• Note: the “Request” service located in the upper left of a 'bib record' page is only available for Center Campus Students.  This is because the Center Campus Students would need to use more than the stairs or the elevator to get the book from the Brooks Library.  (If you are a Main Campus student wishing to check out a book in a Center Library please consult the Circulation Desk.)


• The ‘Modify Search’ link at the top of any Cattrax page is almost the same as the ‘Advanced Search’ option.  The ‘Modify Search’ option is very useful for narrowing down your list of results.  The "Limit/Sort Search" option is a way to narrow your Subject, Author, or Title search results.


• If you have the citation for an article you can select Journal/Serial Title to find out what kind of access (print/digital, which issues/years) we have to a particular journal.  We often have access to a journal through more than one database.  If you do not succeed in locating the journal or article that you need please consult one of our charming Brooks Library Librarians, or submit a request to our very resourceful Interlibrary Loan Department.


• If your professor said that something you needed to read was 'on Reserve' (the professor may have said 'in the library' or something else roughly equivalent) you can check our Reserved List by searching in Cattrax by course name or by the professor's name.


• Last, but certainly not least, if what you are looking for is not available in Cattrax try repeating your searches in Summit.  Summit enables you to search the catalogs of 37 academic libraries in Oregon, Washington, and Idaho and request materials owned by those libraries; a courier service provides near-daily delivery of library materials here to Central Washington University.


• Summit Notes: There is usually a three to five day interval between your making a request and receiving the book, DVD, or other item.  Summit is part of Worldcat.  Each result will have a notation "Libraries that own this item:".  Items owned by a Summit member library can be requested by clicking the purple 'Request Summit Item' button.  Items owned by a Worldcat Library will need to be requested through Interlibrary Loan.

The book collection is shelved on the 3rd (A-J) and 4th (K-Z) floors of the main campus library and shelved by Library of Congress subject classification.  The Government Documents, Maps, and Microforms are on the 3rd floor.  The Music Library is on the 4th floor.  Our physical journal, magazine, and serials collection is on the 2nd floor.  DVDs, video tapes and films are on the 1st floor.  Children's Books are on the 4th floor.  Cattrax also contains links to a variety of e-books, and links to digital materials located elsewhere.

WorldCat
WorldCat is an essential service run by the imaginatively named Online Computer Library Center (OCLC).  OCLC is a nonprofit, membership, computer library service and research organization dedicated to the public purposes of furthering access to the world’s information and reducing information costs.

WorldCat aspires to be a library catalog for the entire world; it contains all the records cataloged by the more than 72,000 OCLC member libraries around the world.  WorldCat offers millions of bibliographic records and includes records in 400 languages.

The more than 179 million records cataloged by OCLC member libraries include books, manuscripts, websites and internet resources, maps, computer programs, musical scores, films, slides, videotapes, DVDs, newspapers, journals and magazines, sound recordings, articles, chapters, and papers.  The dates covered in WorldCat range from before 1000 BCE to literally earlier today.

The Basic Search is useful when you know precisely what you are looking for.  The Advanced Search is the default search and works well for most everyone.  There is also an Expert Search available in which you can write your own Boolean Search Expressions.

Assistance is available from WorldCat at this link, and from Brooks Librarians at this link.

Agricola
Contains citations to approximately 680,000 books from the National Agricultural Library collections, and citations to 1.8 million professional journal articles covering 1979 to the present.

American Museum of Natural History Scientific Publications

AMNH scientific publications disseminate the results of laboratory investigations and fieldwork conducted by museum scientists and their colleagues in the areas of zoological systematics, paleontology, geology, evolution, and anthropology.

ArticleFirst
The Online Computer Library Center, Inc. (OCLC) provides this index of more than 27,000,000 of the articles published since 1990.  The articles are from over 16,000 journals, covering nearly all fields of knowledge.  The items indexed include every article, news story, letter, or other item listed on the table of contents page of the journal.  This database also provides, for most items, a list of libraries that have the journal title – information that makes finding the article in the Brooks Library Collection, or through Interlibrary Loan, much easier.

Please ask the Reference Help Desk, on the 1st Floor of the Brooks Library, or at (509) 963-1021, for any assistance you might wish in searching this index or searching for citations found in the index.

CQ Researcher

Each week CQ Researcher explores in depth a single "hot issue in the news”.  The topics range from social and teen issues to environment, health, education, science, technology, and more.  There are 44 reports produced each year, including four expanded reports.  Access is available online for issues back to 1991.  Each 12,000-word CQ Researcher report can be read in its entirety or by section, each report includes a background and chronology, an assessment of the current situation, tables and maps, pro/con statements from representatives of opposing positions, and bibliographies of key sources.

CQ Researcher is an excellent database to look in when you are ‘looking for a clue’.  The extensive bibliography each article provides serves as a wonderful way to find more information about your topic.
 

Entrez Search and Retrieval System
Entrez is a search and retrieval system that integrates information from databases at NCBI. These databases include PubMed Central for articles, nucleotide sequences, protein sequences, macromolecular structures, whole genomes, and MEDLINE.

JSTOR Biological Sciences

Contains the complete back files of over 100 core scholarly journals in fields such as biodiversity, conservation, paleontology, and plant science, in addition to introducing new areas such as cell biology and zoology. These journals have been digitized back to the first issue published.  You may limit the journals to search biological science and zoology journals only.  In the Advanced Search screen, simply limit the search by selecting "Biological Sciences"  "Zoology"  or multiple science disciplines in the alphabetical list within the Available Disciplines section  before hitting the "Search"  button.  You can click on the red arrow beside the Biological Sciences check box to see a complete listing of journal titles and year span.

MEDLINE
Indexing and abstracts for journal literature in medicine and biology from 1965 - present.

Nutrition Abstracts

Topics and journal articles indexed include food composition and nutritive value, Human health and nutrition, disease and therapeutic nutrition, and physiology and biochemistry of nutrients.

Ornithological Worldwide Literature (OWL)

OWL is a compilation of citations and abstracts from the worldwide scientific literature that pertain to the science of ornithology. A major attraction is its coverage of the 'grey' literature, which are not abstracted by commercial databases such as Zoological Record or the Science Citation Index. OWL deals chiefly with serial publications such as periodicals but also announces new and renamed journals and provides abstracts of other serial publications, conference proceedings, reports, and doctoral dissertations. Papers dealing exclusively with domestic and pet birds and their husbandry are excluded unless they are applicable to non-domestic birds.

PLoS: Public Library of Science

PLoS, the Public Library of Science, is a free collection of seven online, peer-reviewed journals covering fields in science and medicine, including focused publications on biology, genetics, pathogens and tropical diseases. All of the journals are well-regarded.  These journals run on an open access model, whereby the publication is "...freely available for you to read, download, copy, distribute, and use (with attribution) any way you wish."

 

ScienceDirect
Online platform for journals published by Elsevier.  Full text of journal articles back to 1995 from over 100 journals published by Elsevier in business, humanities, and the sciences. Also access to citation/abstract information for titles to which the library does not subscribe. 

Web of Science

Index, abstracts, bibliographies, and cited references to articles from over 6,400 of the world's leading scholarly science and technical journals covering more than 150 disciplines.

Wiley Online Library

Full text of journal articles (most full text is back to 1997 to 2009) in over 250 journals in business, science, technology, and law, education, psychology and medicine.

U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science

The Office of Science manages fundamental research programs in basic energy sciences, biological and environmental sciences, and computational science. In addition, the Office of Science is the Federal Government's largest single funder of materials and chemical sciences, and it supports unique and vital parts of U.S. research in climate change, geophysics, genomics, life sciences, and science education.

USGS Biological Resources

Within the USGS is the Biological Resources Discipline, which is in charge of disseminating scientific information regarding the management of the nation's biological resources.

Aquaculture Network Information Center (AquaNIC)

The Aquaculture Network Information Center (AquaNIC) was conceived in 1994 by the former USDA-Extension Service (currently Cooperative State Research, Education and Extension Service) as one of the nation’s first network information centers to serve as a gateway to the world’s electronic aquaculture resources.

Biometrics Catalog

"The Biometrics Catalog is a U.S. Government sponsored database of information about biometric technologies including research and evaluation reports, government documents, legislative text, news articles, conference presentations, and vendors/consultants."

Science.gov

Your portal to U.S. Government scientific and technical information and data "searches over 55 databases and over 2100 selected websites from 13 federal agencies." Now also available as Science.gov Mobile!

Index Fungorum

This world database of fungal names contains over 370,000 names of fungi (including yeast, lichens, chromistan fungi, protozoan fungi and fossil forms) at species level and below. It has been derived from a number of published lists.

Index Herbariorum

"Included in the on-line edition of Index Herbariorum is information for 3,382 herbaria in 168 countries and 10,475 staff members associated with these herbaria. Information for over 80% of the herbaria has been updated, and 526 herbaria have been added since the eighth edition of INDEX HERBARIORUM. Information is available for searching by institution, city, state, acronym, staff member, correspondent, research specialty, and important collections. Telephone and fax numbers and e-mail and URL addresses are included. Note that the Index is fully searchable on research specialty, so it also serves as a PLANT SPECIALISTS INDEX. "

Index to Plant Chromosome Numbers

"The Index to Plant Chromosome Numbers is an NSF funded project that aims to extract and index original plant chromosome numbers of naturally occurring and cultivated plants published throughout the world. A committee of voluntary contributing editors, located in various parts of the world, reviews sets of serial titles assigned to them and returns the information to the editors for collation in the Index. Chromosome indexes are published every two years. The Index to Plant Chromosome Numbers project has been based at the Missouri Botanical Garden since 1978. Data from published indexes from 1984 onward are available for consultation through this facility."

International Code of Botanical Nomenclature

This site contains the nomenclature used for plants. Note that the print version is the official version, and check Appendix I to see how hybrids are named. There are also additional terms used for some plants found in agriculture, forestry and horticulture. These terms can be found within the International Code of Nomenclature for Cultivated Plants, (print only), the most current edition being the 7th (2004).

Toxnet [United States National Library of Medicine]

Databases on toxicology, hazardous chemicals, environmental health, and toxic releases.

National Biological Information Infrastructure

"Images related to nature and the environment. The library's collections include photographs of plant and animal species, scenic landscapes, wildlife management, and biological fieldwork. Submitted by the NBII and numerous partners, most images are freely available for general, educational, and scientific use." NOTE: The size of the pictures are rather large and take awhile to download.

U.S. Fish & Wildlife Gateway to Digital Media

From the U.S. Fish & Wildlife website:  [this gateway contains the] "...National Image Library--the Service's collection of public domain still photos. You may search all the images through the National Image Library link, or you may search by individual collections, which are listed underneath."  The collections are divided up by regions as well as an historic image library.  You can search using the search engine or by browsing a list of keywords.  All images in these databases are copyright free and available in the public domain.

Western Washington Flora

Collection of almost 170 images of plants from Western Washington state. Searchable; or browse by Latin or common name. Records include plant description, habitat, flower color, plant height, leaf structure, and many other details. From the University of Puget Sound.

World Biodiversity Database

"A continuously growing taxonomic database and information system that aims at documenting all presently known species (about 1.7 million) and to make this important biological information worldwide accessible."  Includes drawing or photograph of each species.

Association for Women in Science and Engineering

Aim is to advance the participation of girls and women in the sciences, from biomedicine to mathematics and the social sciences, in engineering, and in the technologies, in all areas and at all levels.

Center for North American Herpetology

The Center for North American Herpetology serves as a data bank for information about North American amphibians, turtles, reptiles, and crocodilians, and promotes the study and conservation of them by financial support of selected publications, photography, and any other appropriate medium, as well as the establishment of awards for excellence in research about these fascinating creatures. The herpetofauna in the United States and Canada consists of approximately 590 species.

dmoz Open Directory Project: Biology Associations

Portal to biology associations grouped by field of study.

EnviroLink

EnviroLink is a non-profit organization... a grassroots online community that unites hundreds of organizations and volunteers around the world with millions of people in more than 150 countries. EnviroLink is dedicated to providing comprehensive, up-to-date environmental information and news.

Nature Network

Nature Network is the online meeting place for you and fellow scientists to gather, talk and find out about the latest scientific news and events. Science is an international endeavor and deserves a global stage for discussion. Scientists can also benefit from interactions at the local level. That's why you'll see an increasing number of local city hubs on Nature Network, starting with Boston and London.

Arctic Portal
The Arctic Portal serves as a comprehensive Internet gateway to Arctic information. Featured areas such as “Science,” “People,” “Business,” “Projects,” and more are grouped into categories for easy access. An alphabetic list of acronyms commonly used in the Arctic literature is given, and an interactive map allows users to choose different Arctic variables and attributes for simple geographic analysis. Current weather conditions across the Arctic can be accessed by the map, and Arctic Webcams are available for viewing. Other features include several Arctic news feeds, a mailing list, and a calendar of upcoming Arctic events.

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Arctic (NOAA) Theme Page
Hosts an abundance of Arctic links organized into two main headings. Under the “Scientific” heading are links to Arctic data, data centers, research programs, and technical information. Under “General Interest” are links of more casual appeal containing facts, news, and teaching tools about Arctic history, native peoples, exploration, and current events. An extensive gallery of Arctic photographs and imagery, streaming Webcams, informative essays in full-text, and an Arctic FAQ are showcased

Biodiversity and Biological Collections

 Within these pages you will find information about specimens in biological collections, taxonomic authority files, directories of biologists, the Delta system and links for hundreds of biodiversity and collection resources.

Biological, Agricultural and Medical Resources from INFOMINE
Large annotated collection of Internet resources related to biology, agriculture and medicine. Resources have been determined to be of use as a scholarly information resource in research or educational activities at the university level.

Biology Online
Includes tutorials, a dictionary, a forum for posting discussion questions, and a portal to other biology and science websites.

Biology Project

Designed for high school and college biology students, this site has problem sets and tutorials in Biochemistry, Cell Biology, Chemicals and Human Health, Developmental Biology, Human Biology, Immunology, Mendelian Genetics, and Molecular Biology.

BiologyBrowser

Do a search using the term "biography" to bring up a list of nearly 100 biographies of biologists. Some of the biographies also suggest related websites. Site maintained by Thomson Biosis.

Biozone: Bio Links Online Database
This site contains over five hundred links covering such topics as biology, biotechnology, diseases, evolution, and microbiology. Links are organized into sixteen main topics and sixty-five subtopics that support health and science education.

ConservOnline
ConservOnline is a one-stop, online, public library, created and maintained by The Nature Conservancy in partnership with other conservation organizations. The library makes conservation tools, techniques, and experience available to a broad community of conservation practitioners. This site is intended to foster learning and collaboration, and provide information and support to anyone making conservation-related decisions.

EarthTrends: The Environmental Information Portal

From the World Resources Insitute, comprehensive online database that focuses on the environmental, social, and economic trends that shape our world.

Entomology Index of Internet Resources

Organizes entomological informational resources on the Internet to allow easy location. Entries are arranged by (1) content type, (2) biological taxonomy, and (3) entomological subdiscipline; information may be sorted in a variety of ways, including an advanced directory search which allows users to locate information by state. Information includes software, video, and audio products. This ongoing project, sponsored by the Iowa State University entomology department, now spans more than a decade.

FishBase

The most comprehensive and widely consulted database on the world's fish species. It encompasses 29,000 species, more than 76,000 synonyms, 209,800 common names, 40,100 pictures, and 37,300 references, and draws on support from 1,280 collaborators. Information on fish biology is structured in more than 1,000 database fields grouped into 60 major and 70 minor tables; altogether the database offers more than two million records.

History of life through time
From the University of California Museum of Paleontology.  This web site helps to investigate and promote the understanding of the history of life and the diversity of the Earth's biota through research and education

Intute: Health and Life Sciences

Links to hand-selected and evaluated Internet resources for students, lecturers, researchers and practitioners in the Health and Life Sciences.  Formerly known as BIOME.

Kimball's Biology Pages
This superb free Web site is truly deserving of the numerous awards and commendations it has received. Although a portion of the information is derived from Kimball's Biology (6th ed., 1994), the author (emer., Tufts and Harvard) updates the site at least monthly, incorporating new research. The format and links work well with the highly multifaceted nature of this discipline. Material is presented in a well-organized, logical sequence with excellent explanations of key concepts, allowing students to see relationships easily. The illustration and indexing are similarly well done. The site offers a search engine, A-Z index, and table of contents, along with a section on biology news. More than just a textbook, this site can function as an encyclopedic dictionary of biology.

Internet Public Library Arts & Humanities Resources

Interesting and sometimes educational websites are featured on this annotated, topical gateway of websites.  Each website is recommended and annotated by a librarian working for the Librarians Internet Index as a quality resource.  You can also quickly group resources by domain type, so it is easy to see which sites are commercial, from organizations, and from the government.

Microbes.info: The Microbiology Information Portal

Excellent portal site that gathers Web-based information, from general topics to environmental, food, industrial, and medical microbiology.

National Library of Medicine

The NLM is the world's largest biomedical library. This website provides information about all of its major programs, including medical research, medical history, biotechnology, and HIV/ AIDS resources.

National Science Digital Library

From the website: "NSDL was established by the National Science Foundation (NSF) in 2000 as an online library which directs users to exemplary resources for science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education and research. Access to most of the resources discovered through NSDL is free; however, some content providers may require a login, or a nominal fee or subscription to retrieve their specific resources."  You can search for audio, video, interactive resources, data and full text articles.

National Science Foundation - Biological Sciences
This link takes you to the NSF directory page for Biology. Here you can find links to biology organizations, funding opportunities, and information on how to prepare a grant proposal and current news topics and scientific discoveries.

Nature.com

Nature is a weekly journal of science.Nature.com contains subject areas on physics, along with sections on chemistry, life sciences, medicine, earth sciences and the environment.  The website also includes podcasts of the Nature show and videos.  Some of the information contained in here (journal articles, etc.) may have a full text option but are available only to subscribers of Nature.com.  To access an article, try searching the CWU Library catalog and "Electronic Journals" webpage for journal titles to which CWU Library owns a subscription.

NEARCTICA
"Nearctica combines original material and heavily annotated links to bring you all of the natural world of North America. Highly organized, easy to access by either keyword or a very extensive index of topics, and presented in a simple manner."

Neuroethics

This up-to-date informational gateway to the emerging ethical issues from the different branches of neuroscience (e.g., neurology, psychiatry, cognitive science, and psychopharmacology) is easy to navigate; information is clearly displayed and very creditable. Most of the links are to academic literature; they direct users to downloadable articles or abstracts that can be accessed through full-text database services.

 

OAIster Catalog of Digital Resources
OAIster is a catalog more than 25 million records of open access digital resource.  The Catalog was built by harvesting information from open access collections around the world  The digital resources in OAIster include items such as digitized books and articles, born-digital texts, audio files, images, and movies.

The OAIster Catalog is searchable by title, author/creator, subject, language, keyword and several other forms of metadata.  Searching in the OAIster Catalog is by Boolean Search (And, Or, Not).  Like playing chess the best way to become good at boolean searching is to do a lot of boolean searching.  Here are the 'basic moves' for searching the OAIster Catalog:

Combining the search terms 'Cat' and 'Dog' (Boolean)
    Cat and Dog
    Cat or Dog
    Cat not Dog
Note: 'and', 'or', & 'not' are in drop-down boxes to the left of the search boxes.

Plurals, truncation, and wildcards
    Use + for plurals (s and es)
    Use * for truncation
    Use # for a wildcard character
    Use ?N for up to N characters

Adjacent terms (proximity)
    Cat w Dog    (Cat is followed by Dog)
    Cat wN Dog  (Cat is followed by Dog with at most N terms between)
    Cat n Dog     (Cat is next to Dog, either order)
    Cat nN Dog   (Cat is within N terms of Dog, either order)

The available Limiters are Year, Document Type, and Language.  A Basic Search and an Expert Search interface is also available.  You can also create an account that will enable you to save searches.

NOTE:  Sometimes OAIster may direct you to items that are access restricted.  The Librarians in the ARC or at any of the service desks can help you with accessing information that is ‘access restricted’ and with any questions that you might have.

Stem cells in the spotlight
In light of the recent debates over stem cell research, this Web site provides an introduction to stem cells and their uses for those interested in learning more about the subject. It gives the general public a background in the many areas surrounding stem cell work so that people can make informed opinions about the subject. Step by step, each topic is logically presented with detailed definitions, animation, and appropriate links for further investigation. Topics include an introduction to stem cells, the different stem cell sources, the goals of stem cell research, current stem cell therapies, designing experimental models, recent studies on Parkinson's disease, and ethical issues surrounding stem cells.

Strategian: The Strategic Guide to Quality Information in Biology, Chemistry, Computer Science, Mathematics, Medicine, Physics, and Psychology

Searchable database with lots of links, including a database that provides citations to important articles, books, documents published before 1969.

Tree of Life Web Project
"The Tree of Life Web Project (ToL) is a collaborative effort of biologists from around the world. On more than 4000 World Wide Web pages, the project provides information about the diversity of organisms on Earth, their evolutionary history (phylogeny), and characteristics. Each page contains information about a particular group of organisms (e.g., echinoderms, tyrannosaurs, phlox flowers, cephalopods, club fungi, or the salamanderfish of Western Australia). ToL pages are linked one to another hierarchically, in the form of the evolutionary tree of life. Starting with the root of all Life on Earth and moving out along diverging branches to individual species, the structure of the ToL project thus illustrates the genetic connections between all living things."

Virtual Library of Biochemistry and Cell Biology
Provides links to other websites on biochemistry and cell biology.

MedlinePlus

MedlinePlus will direct you to information to help answer health questions. MedlinePlus brings together authoritative information from NLM, the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and other government agencies and health-related organizations. Preformulated MEDLINE searches are included in MedlinePlus and give easy access to medical journal articles. MedlinePlus also has extensive information about drugs, an illustrated medical encyclopedia, interactive patient tutorials, and latest health news.

PIVOT (Formerly COS Funding Opportunities)
COS Funding Opportunities has been replaced by COS PIVOT. 

This database provides access to funding opportunities as well as scholar profiles, with the ability to add your own scholar profile and to view the profiles of various research organizations.  PIVOT allows you to also prioritize and save your searches to receive weekly alerts.

You must register your own account and log in thereafter in order to use PIVOT.   Registration and log in is in the upper righthand corner of screen.

Previous CWU users of COS Funding Opportunities may log in with their existing username and password, as the accounts have been transferred over into PIVOT. 

NOTE:  For some opportunities, sponsors accept only a limited number of proposals or applications from an institution, or require an institution to rank or prioritize applications before submission. Please contact the Office of Graduate Studies and Research before applying if an opportunity is marked "Internal Coordination Required".

Pivot Video Tutorials

Darwin Digital Library of Evolution

The Darwin Digital Library of Evolution is based at the American Museum of Natural History Library. The goal of this undertaking is to make the full literature of evolution available online within a historically and topically coherent structure. The work of Charles Robert Darwin is our pivot, but our framework includes the 17th century to the present and encompasses the history of evolution as a scientific theory with deep roots and broad cultural consequences. DDLE is a pilot project drawing on resources of members of the Biodiversity Heritage Library Consortium1 contributions are included from the Natural History Museum (London) and the Missouri Botanical Garden.

Darwin's Fishes : An Encyclopedia of Ichthyology, Ecology, and Evolution
Print Location: Ref QL614.7 .P38 2004

Presents a unique encyclopedia based upon everything that Charles Darwin ever wrote about fish. Entries are arranged alphabetically and can be about, for example, a particular fish taxon, an anatomical part, a chemical substance, a scientist, a place, or an evolutionary or ecological concept. The reader can start wherever they like and are then led by a series of cross-references on a fascinating voyage of interconnected entries, each indirectly or directly connected with original writings from Darwin himself. Along the way, the reader is offered interpretation of the historical material put in the context of both Darwin's time and that of contemporary biology and ecology.

Exploratorium Learning Studio

The Exploratorium, a science museum founded in 1969 by physicist Frank Oppenheimer, contains a number of science / art / human perception exhibits within the San Francisco Palace of Fine Arts.  The Exploratorium's website acts as both an exhibit space for sound and video webpages, and as an indexed megasite of award-winning web pages covering all areas of science.

National Tropical Botanical Garden: Meet the Plants

Learn about plants from tropical regions of the world by browsing sections for uses of plants (such as clothing or medicine), regions, types of plants (such as trees), and rare, poisonous, and edible plants. Plant profiles feature descriptions, photos, and (in some cases) audio clips. Also includes a photo gallery. From the National Tropical Botanical Garden, a nonprofit group "dedicated to discovering, saving, and studying the world's tropical plants and to sharing what is learned."

Scientific American: Ask the Experts

"Queries range from the profound (Is it possible to travel through time?) to the everyday (How does a.microwave oven cook food?) and from the interesting (What illnesses do insects get?) to the surprising (How do whales sleep without drowning?"