General Engineering Research Guide

Subject Librarian: Fred O'Bryant

I'd like to schedule a Research Tutorial

 

Databases/Indexes	Web Resources	Go To
Book Indexes Conference Paper Indexes Upcoming Conferences Index Current Awareness Services Dissertations Journal Article Indexes 4th Year Theses VIRGO (Library Catalog)	Comprehensive Subject Lists Organizations Patents Reference Sources Standards Technical Reports	Go To: School of Engineering and Applied Science Return To: Subject Guides Menu Brown Library Homepage

Recommended Reference Works
McGraw-Hill Dictionary of Scientific and Technical Terms CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics CRCnetBASE    CRC Press Handbook and Reference Collection in addition to ENGnetBASE ENGnetBASE    CRC Press Engineering Handbook and Reference Collection Knovel Library    Engineering and Science Handbook and Reference Collection	Scientific and Technical Acronyms, Symbols and Abbreviations Referex    Large collection of engineering e-books and references Safari Tech Books Online

Databases / Indexes

Book Indexes

Search these databases for books.

• VIRGO
  Information on over 4.7 million books, journals, and other items held in the University of Virginia's libraries, including business, health sciences, and law.
• Canada Institute for Scientific and Technical Information Catalogue
  Search for books, technical reports, journals and conference proceedings in all areas of science, engineering, health sciences and agriculture.
• Center for Research Libraries Online Catalog
  The Center for Research Libraries (CRL) is an international not-for-profit consortium of colleges, universities, and libraries that makes available scholarly research resources to users everywhere. These resources include many hard-to-find and scarce items often not readily available elsewhere. UVA faculty and students may request books from CRL's collections via Interlibrary Services.
• Linda Hall Library of Science, Engineering and Technology
  The Linda Hall Library, a private institution funded by endowment, serves the scientific research community as a resource for engineering and technical materials, including over 600,000 volumes, 1.1 million microforms, U.S. Patents since 1946, and subscriptions to 16,500 journals.
• TransCat - Transportation Library Union Catalog
  Contains holdings information on anything related to transportation (engineering, financial, economic, environmental, legal, sociological, human factors, safety, etc.) held by some of the country's top transportation libraries, including the Virginia Transportation Research Council Library.
• WorldCat (FirstSearch)
  Contains records from thousands of North American libraries.

 

 

Conference Proceedings Indexes

Search these databases for citations to conference proceedings papers.

• Conference Papers Index 1982+ (CSA)
  Provides citations to papers and poster sessions presented at major scientific meetings around the world.
• PapersFirst 1993+ (FS)
  Citations of papers presented at worldwide meetings, conferences, expositions, workshops, congresses and symposia. Updated monthly.

 

 

Journal Indexes

- Search these indexes for citations to journal articles.
- To get more information about a database, click the information icon ( ).
- Additional databases are available on the Brown Library Databases page.

• Aerospace and High Technology Database 1962+ (CSA)
  Aeronautical engineering, space science and related areas.
• ANTE: Abstracts in New Technologies & Engineering 1981+ (CSA)
  Includes new technologies in all areas of engineering, science and allied subject areas.
• Civil Engineering Abstracts 1966+ (CSA)

Covers all areas of civil engineering, forensic engineering, and related fields.
• Computer and Information Systems Abstracts 1981+ (CSA)
  Provides a comprehensive monthly updates on the latest theoretical research and practical applications in computer science.
• Computer Database 1996+ (Infotrac Web)
  Use this database to find computer-related product introductions, news, and reviews in areas such as hardware, software, electronics, engineering, communications and the application of technology.
• Compendex 1969+ (Engineering Village)
  The world's premiere interdisciplinary engineering database.
• INSPEC 1969+ (Engineering Village)
  Physics, electrical engineering, computers.
• INSPEC Archive Science Abstracts 1898-1968 (Ovid)
  The Inspec Archive Science Abstracts provides access to 71 years of science abstracts in the fields of physics, electrical engineering, and control technology. In addition to the abstracts, this database includes the accompanying tables, graphs and diagrams when available.
• Mechanical & Transportation Engineering Abstracts 1966+ (CSA)
  Provides citations, abstracts, and indexing of the serials literature in mechanical and transportation engineering and their complementary fields.
• Mechanical Engineering Abstracts 1981-2002 (CSA)
  Surveys and summarizes the worldwide literature in mechanical engineering, engineering management, and production engineering, presenting theoretical perspectives as well as specific applications.
• Medline 1950+ (Ebsco)
  World's premiere database for biomedical and health-related topics, including biomedical engineering.
• METADEX 1966+ (CSA)
  Materials, metals and metallurgy.
• SciFinder Scholar
  Chemical engineering and chemistry. (Available in the Chemistry Library or on designated SEL workstations. Contact library staff for assistance. Certain restrictions apply to the use of this software.)
• TRIS Online (Transportation Research Information Services) 1960+
  Transportation and civil engineering topics.
• Web of Science (Science Citation Index) 1987+
  Containing Science Citation Index, Social Science Citation Index, and Arts & Humanities Citation Index, Web of Science offers multidisciplinary searching and seamless access to cited reference searching. The WOS databases include bibliographic and citation information for articles from over 5,700 science and engineering journals, as well as social sciences and humanities journals. Updated weekly.

 

 

Current Awareness Services

Many journal publishers and database vendors offer alerting services which you can use to have journal tables of contents or other information about articles of interest E-mailed to you on a periodic basis. Some of these services appear below. You can learn more about keeping current in your field at Alison McNab's Keeping Your Research Up to Date web page or at the Engineering Current Awareness Services web page from the Edinburgh Engineering Virtual Library (EEVL).

• Amedeo.com
• Cambridge Journals Online
• Cambridge Scientific Abstracts (CSA)
• EBSCOhost Electronic Journals Service
• Emerald Alerts
• Infotrieve
• Kluwer Alert Services
• Ovid
• Oxford Journals Content Alerting
• SARA - Scholarly Articles Research Alerting
• ScienceDirect (Elsevier)
• Springer Link Alert

 

 

4th-Year Theses

The Department of Science, Technology, and Society makes available a Thesis Manual for your use in completing your undergraduate thesis project. This manual contains much useful information, including a Guide to Information Services and Sources, which describes many of the things the Brown Science and Engineering Library can provide for you as you complete your project.

Locating 4th Year Theses in VIRGO

Information about the 4th year engineering theses done by SEAS students is included in the library's VIRGO online catalog. (Access to some older 4th year papers is possible but not simple; ask a librarian for assistance.) The catalog records for 4th year theses can be located in either of two basic ways:

If you are interested in seeing a list of all the theses done for a specific department:
Go to the VIRGO Advanced Search screen. In the "keyword anywhere" box enter name of the engineering department that interests you. Note that not every department sponsors theses. In particualr those on biomedical engineering topics are listed under Engineering Science. Materials Science topics are also listed in various of the areas shown below rather than as a separate department. Acceptable names are:

Next, scroll down to the "Search Limits" portion of the screen and from the "Library" pull-down menu select SCI-ENG. Then from the "Item Type" pull-down menu select THESIS-4th. Click on the SEARCH button; you should receive a list of those 4th year papers done in the selected category. Note that some categories have many more papers than others. The normal sorting order is most recent year first; you can select other sorting arrangements by using the "Sort by" pull-down menu option, if you wish.

You can also search for a keyword (or keywords) in the title of a 4th year paper:
Enter the keyword(s) in the "keyword anywhere" search box and set the "Item Type" and "Library" as described above. You can limit your keyword search to a particular year by entering the desired year in the "Publication year" box. If you are interested in a paper by a particular author, enter that person's name in the "Author" keyword search box.

Note that 4th year papers do NOT have normal Library of Congress subject headings assigned to them; thus, a "Subject" keyword search will NOT work. Use the "keyword anywhere" search box to perform the equivalent of a subject search.

If you have questions about searching for 4th year theses, do not hesitate to contact a library staff member for assistance.

 

Web Resources

Comprehensive Subject Lists

• Academic Info — Engineering
• AVEL Sustainability Knowledge Network
• BUBL Link — Engineering and Technology
• Critically Analyzing Information Sources (Cornell University Library)
• DMOZ, the Open Directory Project — Technology
• EEVL - The Internet Guide to Engineering, Mathematics and Computing
• Engineer on a Disk
• Engineering Central Links for Engineers
• Engwho — the Engineering Search Engine
• FirstGov for Science
• Galaxy — Engineering and Technology
• GlobalSpec - Components and Suppliers Database
• Industrial Quick Search Directory
• Internet Resources for Engineering [pdf file, British slant]
• Librarians' Index to the Internet — Science, Computers and Technology
• National Science Digital Library
• NSPE Code of Ethics for Engineers
• Process Register
• Science and Engineering Resources for Your PDA
• WWW Virtual Library — Engineering
• Yahoo Index - Engineering

 

 

Organizations

• CIRS.net (Scientific Organization Portal)

   

• Aerospace Industries Association
• American Indian Science and Engineering Society
• American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA)
• American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE)
• American Institute of Mining, Metallurgical, and Petroleum Engineers
• American Nuclear Society
• American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE)
• American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE)
• American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME)
• Association for Computing Machinery (ACM)
• Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society
• IEE — Institution of Electrical Engineers
• IEEE — Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
• Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences
• Materials Research Society (MRS)
• Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE)
• Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers
• Society of Women Engineers (SWE)
• SPIE — International Society for Optical Engineering
• Union of Concerned Scientists
• Women in Technology International

 

 

Patents

• Patent Information on the Web

 

Standards

• Scientific Standards Information on the Web

 

Technical Reports

• Technical Reports Information on the Web

 

 

Questions? Call the Brown Science and Engineering Library Information Desk at 924-3628.