Category Archives: E-Journals

And the Greatest Film of All-Time Is…

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… Alfred Hitchcock’s 1958 suspense classic, Vertigo. Or at least, it is according to Sight & Sound‘s panel of critics!

Every year over 800 cinema critics, academics and film industry professionals vote on their favorite films. For the last 50 years, Orson Welles Citizen Kane (1941) has been at the top, but this year Hitchcock’s classic has finally usurped it by by 191 votes to 157.

The rest of the top ten comprise of Tokyo Story (1953), La Regle du jeu (1939), Sunrise (1927), 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), The Searchers (1956), Man with a Movie Camera (1929), The Passion of Joan of Arc (1927) and 8 1/2 (1963).

The complete top 100 list will be published in September’s issue of Sight & Sound, and a full interactive poll of the critics choices, along with a poll conducted among film directors, on the Sight & Sound website later in the month.

The library has copies of several of the films featured in this run-down, including Vertigo and Citizen Kane, as well as many other popular films, to say nothing of a considerable wealth of material, in print and online, about these movies and many, many other classics of the silver screen spanning every conceivable genre.

We also have access to Sight & Sound online, as well as hard copy back issues dating back to the journal’s humble beginnings as the Monthly Film Bulletin. Why not pop down and have a browse and see what the critics made of your favorite movies back in the day?

Vertigo film poster by Andy Z, reproduced under CC License from Flickr.

Think you know all there is about the Olympics?

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 Here’s a question – how many times has London hosted the Olympic Games?*

OK, that one is easy, but you may well want to delve a little deeper into the history of the Games and what better way than to start with the Library? Sprint, jog or walk sedately (preferred option) down to shelf location 796.48 on Level 2 of the Library and you will find several bays of books on the subject.

 Alternatively, look into any of the Library’s 300 sports e-journals for specialist articles. How do you do that? I’m glad you asked. Just check out the Sports category of E-journals A-Z on Library Catalogue Plus or better still, use SportDiscus to search all things sport by subject. Did you know, for instance that there are 103 articles on the Olympics and Loughborough? No, nor did I. If you cannot wait to use this superb full-text database, in addition to finding it via Library Catalogue Plus, SportDiscus is also available via the EBSCOhost app on your mobile – just don’t try to search while jogging!

And it doesn’t stop there. Take a look at Nexis** for current and historic newspaper coverage from newspapers around the world, or the archival copies of The Times, Guardian, New York Times and Mirror with its wonderful collection of photographic images from the Games.

Just pop into the Library at any time and a librarian will be delighted to show you around our collections and resources.

* The answer is three times, 1908, 1948 (it should have been 1944 but the war got in the way) and 2012

** SportDiscus, Nexis and the newspaper archives are available from the Select Database options on Library Catalogue Plus.

Pictured is the 1948 London Olympic Games Poster, image copyright theirhistory, reproduced under CC Licence from Flickr.

Fair VAT on E-Publications for the Academic Community

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Please take a moment to consider signing Eduserv’s e-petition urging our Government to reduce the VAT burden on e-publications.

Universities and colleges are obliged to pay VAT at the full standard rate, which is currently 20%, on their subscriptions to electronic academic journals, books, newspapers and magazines.

We believe that they should be treated in the same way for VAT as printed publications. Printed versions of the same resources are zero-rated in the UK; in the rest of Europe VAT is applied at the reduced rate, currently 5%.

This extra VAT burden means that libraries have less to spend on electronic publications making it very difficult for them to move towards e-provision.

Electronic publications are greener, save valuable storage space and offer increased availability for the majority of users. 

Sign our e-petition to urge our Government to do one of two things:

  1. Introduce zero-rated VAT on electronic academic publications.
  2. Or, if it is not feasible to add electronic publications to the list of zero-rated goods then to follow other European countries and apply VAT at the reduced rate now and consider reducing this to 0% as soon as possible.

We need 100,000 signatures for the topic to be debated in the House of Commons. Anyone can sign:

• You will need to provide your name, address and email
• You can choose to receive email updates from the government about the e-petition

Sign here http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/28226

Thank you.

‘Principia’ amongst scientists

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Time and Motion. CC licensed image from Flickr.

 

Isaac Newton, renowned physicist and mathematician was born in December 1642 in Lincolnshire.

 

Newton studied and later lectured at Cambridge University, the library of which has a collection of his manuscripts in the Portsmouth and Macclesfield Collections.

 

Closer to home you can find out more about Newton’s life and work in the Dictionary of Scientific Biography. Other related resources available to Lboro staff and students are:

 

AIP journals

American Physical Society journals

IoP journals

JSTOR mathematics and statistics collection 

Royal Society journals and archive

Interested in Getting a Paper Published?

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Undergraduates! Have you ever wondered about how to get a paper published in a journal? Or indeed, which journal to approach? Then look no further!

Reinvention: A Journal of Undergraduate Research is an online, peer-reviewed journal publishing high-quality undergraduate student research. The journal is produced, edited and run by students and staff at the University of Warwick through the Reinvention Centre ( Warwick and Oxford Brookes University). All papers submitted undergo a rigorous peer review process and are screened by the editor and refereed by two or three anonymous referees before publication.

The journal is published bi-annually and is open to submissions from all undergraduate students, from any discipline or subject, in the UK and overseas and submissions will be accepted up to 6 months beyond graduation. They’re currently looking for submissions for the next issue in April 2012 – why not have a go?

For further details and back issues of the journal, visit the journal website at:

http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/cross_fac/iatl/ejournal

The Final Countdown … E-journals in 2010

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The results are in. All around the campus the air is thick with anticipation. Yes, it’s that time of year when we can reveal which top ten e-journals you have voted the most popular in 2010!

In tenth spot, muscling in with 5,654 downloads is the magnificently named Joe Weider’s Muscle & Fitness

Those cool cats in the School of Business and Economics will rejoice to see the Journal of Economic Literature at number 9 with 5,689.

At number 8, the International Journal of Project Management is no slouch at 6,112 downloads.

The Journal of Sports Sciences at number 7 with 6,773 downloads is showing that Sports Science is racing ahead in the field.

In at number 6 with 7,018 downloads to it’s name is the Journal of Applied Physiology

At the half way mark with 7,313 is another strong showing for Sports Science, the Journal of Sport Behavior

The physicians have promised me that there has been no doctoring of the results with the British Medical Journal in fourth place garnering 8,724 downloads.

The physicians must have teamed up with Sports Science to produce 8,794 for Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise in third place.

And on the medical theme again, in second place with 9,277 is the American Journal of Public Health.

Way out in front, though, the 2010 winner is … drum roll … Sports Illustrated with 13,985 downloads.

Congratulations to all who made 2010 a record breaking year. Remember! If you want to influence next year’s results, log on to MetaLib and start downloading now!

 

Intelligent Buildings International – trial

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 “Going beyond traditional engineering and architecture solutions, the Intelligent Buildings International (INBI) journal examines new methodologies and tools for intelligent buildings, smart materials and systems, and explores the wider context beyond theoretical foundations, linking practical solutions with philosophical or sociological considerations.”

To access the journal please go to  http://earthscan.publisher.ingentaconnect.com/content/earthscan/inbi

The trial will run until 2nd January 2011 (for off-campus access please login to the Library pages via th eRemote Working Portal at https://vpn.lboro.ac.uk/+CSCOE+/logon.html or login with your Athens username and password).

We welcome feedback – good or bad – on this trial, please contact Steve Corn mailto:S.C.Corn@lboro.ac.uk with your comments.

Limited Access to Library Resources (Weekend 20th-23rd)

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As part of the electrical shut downs taking place across campus this summer, there will be very limited access to a variety of library online resources over this coming weekend when the planned shut down of the Llibrary’s electrical supply takes place.

This will begin from Friday evening (20th August) at 5.30PM, and will continue over weekend (Saturday 21st and Sunday 22nd) until Monday morning (23rd), when we hope to have everything up and running by about 10AM.

The following online resources shall therefore be completely unavailable over this period:

  • The Library Catalogue
  • Metalib
  • SFX
  • Online Reading List system
  • The Institutional Repository.

However, all is not entirely lost! You may still access the majority of the library’s databases and electronic journals through the publishers’ own sites (using the necessary passwords and usernames where prompted).

We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause and will of course keep you up to date as regards further developments or possible disruption.

More Nature

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Nature

More Nature online

The Library has recently extended access to the electronic archive of Nature, probably one of the most well-known and highly regarded peer-reviewed scientific and technological journals in the world. The new purchase means that readers will be able to peruse all the issues of Nature from 1950 to 1996 and the current five years online. And it doesn’t stop there. The excellent search engine on the Nature web site means that you can easily find articles published since the first issue in 1869 and read them in print or microfilm!

Try it out today! Click on the above link or find the journal on MetaLib. Off campus access available using Athens username and password or by logging in to the Remote Working Portal.

JSTOR Plant Science

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Loughborough University now has access to JSTOR Plant Science.

‘JSTOR Plant Science is an online environment that collects global plants content, tools, and people interested in biological and plant science….with more than 20,000 paintings, photographs, drawings and other images.’

Plants can be seached for by family name, genus and species, as well as where collected.  Specimens range widely from as far afield as Australasia to Antarctica. 

 JSTOR Plant Science also provides links to journal titles such as Journal of Earth Sciences, and the Irish Naturalists’s Journal dating back to 1925. as well as illustrations of artifacts such as fruits and seeds, plant stems and cones. 

 JSTOR Plant Science is a unique resource for those studying environmental science, plant biology, agriculture,  natural sciences and conservation.