Power Dissemination: Five Ways to Open Your Research to the World

Publish in an Open Access journal. This assures that everyone has access to the full text of an article from the moment it is published, and authors retain all copyrights and can continue to use their content in the same or other ways. Use the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) to search for journals, or check The Eigenfactor Index of Open Access Fees, a tool quantifying the cost-effectiveness of open access journals represented in Journal Citation Reports.

Take advantage of publishers’ offers of post-publication sharing policies with HowCanIShareIt.com from the repository Figshare, a project supported by most of the major publishers. Scroll down to browse Publisher Sharing Policies. Another excellent resource is Sherpa/Romeo, where you can confirm journal copyright policies. Continue reading

Director’s Reflections…Welcome to HSLS!

BarbaraEpstein2014_gray
Barbara Epstein
HSLS Director
bepstein@pitt.edu

Welcome to all our new and returning students and faculty! After the relative quiet of the summer, it’s refreshing to see new faces, greet old friends, and feel renewed energy in the air.

You will see many changes underway in Falk Library. While there will still be the same number of study seats in the library, the “fishbowl” quiet study area is closed permanently, and the study carrels are being relocated to the opposite end of the library’s main floor. This new area, along with the study area to the right of the main entrance, will be reserved for health sciences students, and accessible using your Pitt ID as a swipe card. Continue reading

search.DataJournals: a Tool to Discover Data Published within Data Journals

Data journals are a means to share datasets and communicate detailed information about the methods and instrumentation used to acquire the data.

However, locating datasets shared via these publications can be challenging, as PubMed includes very few data journals and does not provide full-text searching to easily locate information not found in the title or abstract of an article. To facilitate this discovery, HSLS created a federated search portal named search.DataJournals, which searches the full text of four open access data journals: Data in Brief, Genomics Data, GigaScience, and Scientific Data.

A query will search across all fields of the data article including data description, materials, methods, instrumentation, data source location, and data accessibility. Search results are aggregated and ordered by relevance and can be filtered by clustered topical categories that are created on the fly based on the textual information of the retrieved records.

Contact HSLS Data Services if you have questions about using this tool, locating datasets, or sharing data.

~Melissa Ratajeski

Liaison Librarians Support Your Research and Scholarship

Faculty librarians are integrated as liaisons into undergraduate and graduate programs in the six schools of the health sciences, as well as other health sciences research and clinical departments throughout the university. Liaison librarians are subject specialists who provide support for research and scholarship in many ways, such as by:

  • Participating on curriculum committees
  • Designing course-integrated instructional sessions that teach research skills specific to a course or an assignment
  • Customizing classes or presentations on timely, relevant topics such as data management or scholarly communication
  • Collaborating on research projects
  • Participating on systematic review teams and grant projects

Patricia Weiss (left), Research and Instruction Librarian, has joined Barbara Folb (right), Public Health Informationist, as HSLS co-liaison to the Graduate School of Public Health.

For more information, please contact your liaison librarian.

~Renae Barger

On Borrowed Time: Pulp Fiction Treasures in Falk Library

Falk Library has recently opened a new exhibit of signed prints, original artwork, and published comics titled “Doc Savage: The Supreme Adventurer and Physician.” The featured items are on temporary loan to the library from a private collection.

Doc was a nickname of Clark Savage Jr., MD, a physician and scientist who “practiced” his medicine under the most challenging circumstances and in the most unusual places. He traveled the world, along with his six aides, battling against sinister crime lords and evil geniuses. Doc’s adventures have captivated generations of readers and inspired many illustrators. He was, according to Marvel icon Stan Lee, the forerunner of all modern superheroes.

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HSLS Staff News

The HSLS Staff News section includes recent HSLS presentations, publications, staff changes, staff promotions, degrees earned, etc.

News

Michele Klein-Fedyshin, Research & Clinical Instruction Librarian and School of Pharmacy Liaison, received a Grace and Harold Sewell Memorial Fund Stipend from the American Association of the Colleges of Pharmacy (AACP) toward attendance at their annual meeting in Nashville, TN, from July 15-19, 2017.

Kate Flewelling, Executive Director, NNLM Middle Atlantic Region, has been named one of 50 Distinguished Alumni by University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, School of Information Studies. She will be honored as part of the School’s 50th Anniversary celebrations.

Publications

Author names in bold are HSLS-affiliated

Jonathon Erlen, History of Medicine Librarian, published “New Dissertations” in Nursing History Review, 2018, 26: 279-280.

J. Zhu, M. Klein-Fedyshin, Research & Clinical Instruction Librarian, and J.M. Stevenson published “Serotonin Transporter Gene Polymorphisms and SSRI Tolerability: Review of Pharmacogenetic Evidence” in Pharmacotherapy, June 27, 2017. (Online)

Classes for September 2017

HSLS offers classes on database searching, software applications such as Prezi, bibliographic management, and molecular biology and genetics. For more information, visit the online class calendar.

Classes are held on the first floor of Falk Library (200 Scaife Hall) in Classroom 1 and on the upper floor of the library in Classroom 2. All classes are open to faculty, staff, and students of the University of Pittsburgh. They are also open to UPMC residents and fellows, who will need to show their UPMC IDs.
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