Websites and database that help to find scientific information

Websites and database that help to find scientific information

In the fast-paced world of scientific research, access to reliable and up-to-date information is crucial. Databases and search engines play a vital role in helping scientists find, organize, and analyze data, as well as stay updated with the latest research findings in their fields. From scholarly articles and journals to experimental data and research reports, these tools provide invaluable resources for researchers across various disciplines. In this entry, we will delve into this world and show you that there is something more than Google. Google is such a powerhouse in the world of Internet that it hides other search engines from us. We simply do not know about the existence of most of them. Meanwhile, there are still a large number of excellent search engines and databases in the world that specialize in science books, papers, and other scientific information. Whether you’re a seasoned researcher or just starting out in the world of science, this list will provide you with valuable insights into the tools that form the backbone of modern scientific research.

Here is a list of sites that might help you:

1. ORG (https://archive.org/details/texts) – The Internet Archive, a 501(c)(3) non-profit, digital library of Internet sites and other cultural artifacts in digital form. It is like a paper library, but provide free access to researchers, historians, scholars, people with print disabilities, and the general public. It’s mission is to provide Universal Access to All Knowledge.
2. Refseek (refseek.com) – search engine for academic resources. More than a billion sources.
3. WorldCat (worldcat.org) – search the content of 20,000 global libraries. But it is only a catalog, no content available.
4. Bioline International (bioline.org.br) – non-profit scholarly publishing cooperative committed to providing open access to quality research journals published in developing countries. BI’s goal of reducing the South to North knowledge gap is crucial to a global understanding of health (tropical medicine, infectious diseases, epidemiology, emerging new diseases), biodiversity, the environment, conservation and international development. IT provides a platform for the distribution of peer-reviewed journals (currently from Bangladesh, Brazil, Chile, China, Colombia, Egypt, Ghana, India, Iran, Kenya, Malaysia, Nigeria, Tanzania, Turkey, Uganda and Venezuela).
5. RePEc (Research Papers in Economics) (http://repec.org) – initiative that seeks to enhance the dissemination of research in Economics and related areas. Volunteers from 102 countries collected nearly 4 million publications.
6. gov (www.science.gov) – searches over 60 databases and over 2,200 scientific websites to provide users with access to more than 200 million pages of authoritative US federal science information including research and development results.
7. PDF Drive (pdfdrive.com) – largest website for free download of PDF books. Claim more than 225 million titles.
8. Base Search (base-search.net) – one of the most powerful search engines for academic research texts. More than 100 million scientific articles, 70% of which are free
9. Google Scholar (scholar.google.com) – widely used search engine for scientific literature. It indexes scholarly articles, theses, conference proceedings, and other research materials across various disciplines. It provides access to a vast database of academic resources and offers features such as citation tracking and alerts for new publications.
10. PubMed (pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov) – free search engine provided by the U.S. National Library of Medicine and the National Institutes of Health. It focuses on biomedical and life sciences literature and includes articles from reputable journals in fields such as medicine, biology, and health sciences. PubMed offers advanced search options and provides access to a large collection of scientific articles.
11. Scopus (scopus.com) – comprehensive abstract and citation database that covers a wide range of subjects, including science, technology, medicine, social sciences, and more. It includes a large collection of peer-reviewed journals, conference proceedings, and patents, and offers advanced search options, citation tracking, and other features.
12. Web of Science (webofscience.com) – another popular search engine for scientific literature and is widely used by researchers across disciplines. It includes a vast collection of articles from various fields and offers features such as citation tracking, author identification, and journal impact factor analysis. All since 1975.
13. IEEE Xplore (ieeexplore.ieee.org) – search engine specifically designed for researchers in the field of electrical engineering, computer science, and related disciplines. It provides access to a vast collection of technical papers, conference proceedings, and standards from the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) and other organizations.
14. Microsoft Academic (academic.microsoft.com) – search engine for academic research that covers multiple disciplines, including science, technology, engineering, medicine, and social sciences. It provides access to a large collection of scholarly articles, conference proceedings, and patents, and offers features such as citation tracking and author profiling.

Worth mentioning are also the databases and search engines that are listed below, although they require paid access but most often the access is provided by Universities:

1. ACS Journals (https://pubs.acs.org/) – full texts of journals published by the American Chemical Society.
2. ACM Digital Library (https://dl.acm.org/) – collection of publications in the field of computer science and computer technology.
3. AIP Journals (https://publishing.aip.org/) – access to full texts of selected journals from the American Institute of Physics database along with full access to archival volumes.
4. APS Journals (https://journals.aps.org/) – full texts of journals published by the American Physical Society with a full range of archival volumes (PROLA).
5. BIS: Bibliographia Internationalis Spiritualitatis (http://cpps.brepolis.net/bis/introduction.cfm?) – database that offers an academic bibliography in spiritual theology, Carmelite studies and theological anthropology and is proposed by the Pontifical Theological Faculty Teresianumin cooperation with the Institutum Carmelitanum, both located in Rome. As of December, 2020, it includes the bibliography since 2007 and counts with about 16,000 entries and 200 reviews.
6. Bibliographie de civilisation médiévale (https://www.brepols.net/series/bcm-o) –  multidisciplinary international bibliography of books on medieval history.
7. Bibliographie Annuelle du Moyen Âge Tardif (https://www.brepols.net/series/bamat-o) – bibliography of late medieval texts and authors.
8. Bibliography of British and Irish History (https://royalhistsoc.org/publications/bbih/) – bibliography of the history of Great Britain and Ireland partly with links to full texts.
9. Cambridge Core (https://www.cambridge.org/core) – collection of journals from the renowned publishing house Cambridge University Press in the field of science and medicine as well as humanities and social sciences.
10. Central and Eastern European Online Library (https://www.ceeol.com/) – repository of academic e-journals and e-books in the field of humanities and social sciences from and about Central and Eastern Europe.
11. De Gruyter (https://www.degruyter.com/) – multi-field database of full-text journals published by De Gruyter publishing house.
12. EBSCO AGRICOLA (https://www.ebsco.com/products/research-databases/agricola) – database containing bibliographic records from the National Agricultural Library of the US Department of Agriculture. AGRICOLA provides millions of citations related to the field of agriculture. Citations include journal articles, book chapters, theses, patents, software, audiovisuals, and technical reports supporting research in agriculture and related sciences.
13. Embase (https://www.elsevier.com/solutions/embase-biomedical-research) – comprehensive biomedical database. It contains the most important items of international biomedical literature from 1947 to the present day.
14. JSTOR (https://www.jstor.org/) – the most popular multidisciplinary database among students and PhD candidates that allows you to browse archival issues of scientific journals, usually with access to full texts of articles.
15. Oxford Academic Journals (https://academic.oup.com/journals) – full-text collection of over 950 journals from Oxford University Press, one of the leading scientific publishers in the world.
16. Project MUSE (https://muse.jhu.edu/) – database of full-text journals in the field of social sciences and humanities edited by scientific societies operating in countries on all continents of the world.
17. ProQuest Central (https://www.proquest.com/) – database of scientific journals, books, industry publications as well as reports or dissertations, largely available in full text. The thematic scope includes, among others: humanities, social sciences, business and economics, health and medicine, as well as news and international affairs.
18. RSC Journals (https://pubs.rsc.org/en/journals) – full texts of journals published by the British Royal Society of Chemistry.
19. SAGE Journals (https://journals.sagepub.com/) – database by a global academic publisher of books, journals, and library resources with a growing range of technologies to enable discovery, access, and engagement. Alarge collection of journals representing a wide range of scientific disciplines. Allows access to full-text articles since 1999.
20. Springer Link (https://link.springer.com/) – Full texts of qualitatively selected scientific journals and books published by Springer Verlag.
21. Tylor & Francis (https://www.tandfonline.com/) – Search and explore the millions of quality, peer-reviewed journal articles published under the Taylor & Francis and Routledge imprints.

And those are just a “few” databases and scientific research search engines out there. There are many more. How many of the listed above did you know? 😉