Natural Sciences Library

Dr. Abram Hoffer, a well-known and somewhat controversial psychiatrist, was born and raised in Saskatchewan. Over the course of his long career Dr. Hoffer collected a large library of materials relating to his interest in mental health, nutrition, and orthomolecular medicine. The donation of his personal collection consists of 1,520 books, of which he authored or co-authored 65 (including translated works and various editions). Find out more about the collection.

Visit the exhibit. Browse the collection in the catalog.

CANSIM and other products are free for everyone to access from their web site.

On February 1, 2012, self-serve standard products available on the Statistics Canada website—including CANSIM and census data products—will become free of charge.

Statistics Canada will maintain current pricing practices for products such as print publications, maps, CD-ROMs, and custom products and services.

Licensing restrictions for the use of Statistics Canada data products will be removed.

For more information, contact Media Relations at 613-951-4636.

The above change does not affect the dissemination of survey data files (microdata files) under the Data Liberation Initiative (DLI) license. These files can only be accessed through either ODESI or EQUINOX. Please contact Data & GIS Services at refdata@library.usask.ca if you have any questions.

Submissions for 2012 Reaxys PhD Prize are open!

The Reaxys PhD Prize is awarded for original and innovative research in
inorganic, organometallic and organic chemistry, which demonstrates
excellence in methodology and approach by a candidate currently studying for
a PhD or having completed a PhD after January 1, 2011.

Three Prize Winners will each receive $2000. Prize Winners and
Finalists will be invited to attend the Prize Symposium and Poster Session.
This will be held during the 2012 Fall ACS Meeting in Philadelphia. The
Symposium is sponsored by the Division of Inorganic Chemistry and
co-sponsored by the Division of Organic Chemistry.

Submissions are open until February 15 2012.

In order to submit and for more information visit:
http://prize.reaxys.com

Have you tried USearch?

USearch allows you to search for articles, books, images, etc., all in one place.

Try it for yourself at library.usask.ca!

The University Library participates in a province-wide program, which purchases access to a number of electronic information resources (e.g. Canada Info Desk). Please provide your feedback on the resources purchased by this initiative by taking a 5-10 minute online survey. Closes December 16th.

When the Library is closed, you can log on from home to the Learning Commons computers and access your documents. To see what computers are available from the LC, check http://uremote.usask.ca.

These computers have a wide variety of programs including:

• Microsoft Office Professional 2007
  
• Visio – Flowcharts and Diagrams
  
• Microsoft Publisher – Marketing Materials
  
• Adobe Acrobat – Create PDF
  
• SPSS
  
• SAS, and
  
• other multimedia, web and library tools.
  

View this video guide to see how to set this up from home.

Open Access Week is October 24-30, 2011.

Open-access (OA) literature is digital, online, free of charge, and free of most copyright and licensing restrictions.Peter Suber, Berkman Fellow, Harvard University, A Very Brief Introduction to Open Access

Interested in discovering what journals are open access (OA)? Check out the DOAJ - Directory of Open Access Journals. As of September 15, 2011 they listed 7000 open access journals that make more than 600,000 articles available for everyone to use.

There are many benefits of open access. Not only can people outside of the academy or scholars in developing country with limited funds for subscribing to journals benefit, but all researchers benefit from OA as no single library can subscribe to every scientific journal title.

To find out more about "open access" as an author, publisher or researcher, visit:

• Open Access Blog @ UofS Library by DeDe Dawson, Natural Sciences Librarian
• Open Access Guide - An introductory guide to Open Access (OA) information and resources.

The NFB Film Series @ The Murray Learning Commons will be shown at the Collaborative Learning Lab on Thursday, October 20th at 11:00 am and 7:00 pm.

Waterlife follows the epic cascade of the Great Lakes from Lake Superior to the Atlantic Ocean, telling the story of the last huge supply of fresh water on Earth. Filled with fascinating characters and stunning imagery, Waterlife is a cinematic poem about the beauty of water and the dangers of taking it for granted.

Narrated by Gord Downie, lead vocalist of The Tragically Hip and Waterkeeper's Trustee of Lake Ontario. Featuring music by Sam Roberts, Sufjan Stevens, Sigur Ros, Robbie Robertson and Brian Eno. Directed by Kevin McMahon. Produced by Gerry Flahive, Kristina McLaughlin and Michael McMahon Introduction by Li Zhang, Head of Natural Sciences Library.

Introduction by Li Zhang, Head of Natural Sciences Library.

Read an assortment of papers by the winners here!

Academic Integrity:

Is it 'common knowledge' or plagiarism?

Is it collaboration or cheating?

What is a "fair dealing" copy?

I've been accused of academic dishonesty. What will happen?

Academic Integrity Awareness Week
October 3rd-7th, 2011

See a listing of the events taking place: http://www.usask.ca/integrity/

Faculty, Staff and Graduate Students are reminded to renew or return all long-term loan items before September 30, 2011 after which time overdue fines will begin to apply. You can renew these items yourself by linking to your library record through PAWS (http://paws.usask.ca), or directly through the University Library web site (http://sundog.usask.ca/patroninfo/). Be sure to verify the renewal(s) and view the new due date. Items exceeding the maximum number of allowed renewals must be handled at the Circulation Desk of the branch owning the item(s).

Welcome new and returning students!

Please see our new online orientation to the Natural Sciences Library: Nat. Sci. Library 101

Monday - Thursday: 8:00am - 8:00pm
Friday: 8:00am - 5:00pm
Saturday: Closed
Sunday: 12:00pm - 5:00pm

Find out about changes to copyright practices at the UofS this year and how the Library can help. Visit our new Copyright LibGuide!

Photo ID cards available Room 280, Administration Building
Aug 15 - Sept 23. Monday to Friday: 8:30 to 4:30.

The Natural Sciences Library is pleased to welcome Cindy Ho, a new term librarian for the 2011-2012 session.

Cindy Ho is the Liaison Librarian for Physics, Civil and Geological Engineering, Electrical and Computer Engineering, Environmental Engineering , and Mechanical Engineering. Contact Cindy via email, phone Cindy at 966-5978 or visit her in IB08.2 in the Engineering building.

The desktop/client version of SciFinder will no longer exist on July 1, 2011. All of our 7 simultaneous user seats will switch to the Web version on that day. Please remove the software from your computers then.

If you haven't yet signed up for a user account for SciFinder Web - do so now... it's easy! Watch this quick tutorial to guide you through the process.

Or you can go directly to the registration form here.

Starting on Sunday May 1 the Natural Sciences Library will be on our summer hours:

Saturday & Sunday: CLOSED

Monday - Friday: 8:30am - 4:30pm

Have a safe & happy summer!

Open Access (OA) literature is digital, online, free of charge, and free of most copyright and licensing restrictions. Want to learn more about Open Access? Check the UofS Library's new LibGuide:

http://libguides.usask.ca/open_access

Our Reference Collection has now moved to the current journals and maps area on our main floor.

Our Popular Science Collection has moved to near the New Books shelves.

This Collection is comprised of donated books from the UofS community. They are not part of our regular collection so you do not need a card to sign them out. Borrow and return them at your leisure - no due dates or fines!

"Chemistry - our life, our future" is the theme of the UNESCO designated International Year of Chemistry in 2011.

Come see our new display in the Natural Science Library cabinet!

The American Chemical Society (ACS) has launched a free e-journal to celebrate the International Year of Chemistry: the IYC Virtual Journal.

And Nature.com has created a special website to celebrate this designation. It will be updated throughout the year with news and commentary on this most central of sciences. To begin with check out What Lies Ahead : Ten leading chemists set priorities for the forthcoming decades, and reveal the scientists they find inspiring.

CrossFire will no longer exist as of December 31, 2010. You can now access Beilstein, Gmelin, and the Patent Chemistry Database through Reaxys, the online replacement for CrossFire that the U of S Library has subscribed to.

It is anticipated that databases on the ProQuest or CSA Illumina platforms will be migrated to a new platform this week.

This will impact (among others):

GeoRef
AGRICOLA
BioOne
Biological Sciences
Plant Science
COS

If you have created a "My Research" account in any of these databases this will NOT be migrated to the new platform. You will need to create a new account and recreate any alerts that you had set up in the old platform.

Attention Instructors:

Natural Sciences Library now has an online form that you can fill out when putting items on Reserve for your courses.

Note that Internet Explorer 7.0 or higher or the latest versions of Firefox or Safari are required for optimum use of SciFinder. Chemical Abstracts Service does not support the Internet Explorer 6 platform for the web version of SciFinder due to its inability to support newer web standards.

Now that the library catalogue has been restored, it is possible for you to renew your library items. Please visit your closest branch library to report any fines accrued as a result of our downtime.

“Open Access” to information – the free, immediate, online access to the results of scholarly research, and the right to use and re-use those results as you need – has the power to transform the way research and scientific inquiry are conducted. It has direct and widespread implications for academia, medicine, science, industry, and for society as a whole.

This is the 4th annual international Open Access Week!

Things to do:

*Come by the Natural Sciences Library to see our display on Open Access.

*Read the Open Access @ UofS Library blog

*Watch this short video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y9Jh_GffRPU

CrossFire
The client/server application to access Beilstein & Gmelin will be decommissioned December 31, 2010. After this date you will no longer be able to access these databases using CrossFire. The Library has subscribed to the new online application, Reaxys, which replaces CrossFire and also provides access to the Patent Chemistry Database (in addition to Beilstein & Gmelin).
Try out Reaxys today!

SciFinder Scholar
It has just been announced that Chemical Abstracts Service (CAS) will decommission the client/server version of SciFinder June 30, 2011. All of our 6 seats will be allotted to the SciFinder Web after that date.
Register with SciFinder Web today and try it out! Currently we have 2 seats allotted for the Web version.

Any concerns or training requests for Reaxys or SciFinder can be directed to Natural Sciences Liaison Librarian DeDe Dawson.

On Wednesday, October 6, as part of Academic Integrity Awareness Week, there will be four sessions on citation and style guides:

Smart Enough to Cite Sessions

Using RefWorks -- Mê-Linh Lê, Health Sciences Liaison Librarian -- 9:30-10:30 a.m., Murray Library Room 161
MLA Basics: An Introduction to MLA Style -- Dr. Ella Ophir, Assistant Professor of English -- 11:00 a.m-noon, Murray Library Room 102

Chicago Manual of Style Online: An Introduction to Chicago Style, Turabian and Rampolla -- Donna Canevari de Paredes, Humanities Liaison Librarian, 1 - 2:30 p.m., Murray Library Room 102

APA Basics: An introduction to APA Style -- Dr. Jane Preston, Position Analyst - College of Education and MaryLynn Gagne, Education Liaison Librarian, 2:30-3:30 p.m., Murray 102,

Further information on Academic Integrity Awareness Week Activities

Want to learn some useful tips for searching in the Library catalogue? Want to learn how to find scholarly articles in Library databases? Sign up for one (or both!) of these hands-on sessions:

Effective Searching in the Library Catalogue
Tuesday October 5, 12:30pm-1:30pm
Rm 161 Murray Library

Introduction to Web of Science and Scopus
Tuesday October 5, 2pm-3pm
Rm 161 Murray Library

There are 20 spaces available for both sessions. Please register by emailing DeDe Dawson, Natural Sciences Liaison Librarian: diane.dawson@usask.ca

September 27th to October 1st Daily tours and demos 2- 2:30 PM. Sign up at the Natural Sciences Library (map) Circulation Desk.
Contact DeDe Dawson for more info: 966-1913.

You may have noticed that we have a new website! Please tell us what you think of the website - and especially our Natural Sciences Library homepage. And watch for our official website launch celebrations in September.

RefWorks has released a new version: "RefWorks 2.0". When you sign into your RefWorks account you will see a link in the top right corner to RefWorks 2.0. Not all the bugs have been worked out of the new version yet, so we will continue to provide the classic interface in parallel. See more info on the e-Resources News blog.

Thomson Reuters has just released the 2009 Journal Citation Reports (JCR). From the press release:

"The most widely used tool for assessing the world’s leading journals, JCR and the metrics it offers — including Journal Impact Factor — empower users to objectively evaluate a journal’s performance and its influence on research globally. "

The U of S Library subscribes to JCR - so you can check out the Impact Factor of your favourite journal by finding Journal Citation Reports under the "J" in our Databases list. Or you can click on this link.

We now have online access to the chemistry journals Synlett and Synthesis. We will continue to receive the print version to the end of 2010.

The Natural Sciences Library now has a News & Events blog. Subscribe to our RSS feed!