All research papers must start with researching your subject and finding legitimate sources. But what is the easiest and quickest way to get all that information? Here are just a couple of many underused resources that are available to all students.
UC-eLinks
UC Davis has a large store of electronic resources accessible online or in print for students to check out. Anyone can use this resource, but only UC faculty, students or staff have access to the UC-licensed e-journals and other full text resources. All of these resources are available automatically when on campus, or through the Library VPN when off campus.
Using UC-eLinks
In order to use this resource, simply link to a local campus or UC systemwide catalog holdings and go to cdlib.org/services/d2d/ucelinks/ to see if it has a certain item either in print or electronic format at any UC campus. The item or items will be delivered directly to you if you use your campus document delivery service, or you will be notified when the item arrives at the library. If it is electronic it will come directly to your computer. If you need help you can use Ask a Librarian. This allows you to contact a librarian in person, via telephone, email or even on an online chat.
UC Davis Harvest Catalog
This is an online source of the UC Davis library. To use, simply choose the category you want to search for. The three most useful categories for research are listed below.
Course Reserves
In Course Reserves you can search by title, instructor or course name and find books the library has in stock for you to use. This is the best place to look for course textbooks or books that are related to the class. These tend to be hard copies since most are textbooks.
Journals and Serials
In this category you can narrow your search with your field choice and find sources on any number of subjects you want. The catalog will provide many options based on what keywords you search for, so mix up what you search for each time to get multiple sources. These are a mix of online and hardcopy sources.
Electronic Journals
Searching in this category you can narrow your search by author, title, keywords or a number of other fields. Since all of these are stored electronically, this is easy access for a late-night paper. If it is electronic you will see an online link with volume and date ranges. Follow the link provided to locate it and then you can use the PDF version to print.
The UC system truly has an amazing catalog of research material. All of it is available with just a few clicks.
KELLY MITCHELL can be reached at science@theaggie.org.
