LibGuides: Mining and Minerals Engineering: finding and using library resources for assignments: 4. Research databases

Activity

Tutorial: How to search within a database

Web of Science Search Activity

Databases for your subject

GeoScience World This link opens in a new window Full text database covering geoscience literature.
IMMAGE: the reference database for the international minerals industry This link opens in a new window Database of scholarly material on the international minerals industry. Supports literature searching relating to Mining, Metallurgy and Geological Exploration.
Knovel This link opens in a new window Knovel is a technical information database for engineers and scientists. It provides handbooks, technical and general reference works, and data books as well as best practice guidance, process and design applications, interactive graphs and tables of material and substance properties data, and equations for engineering disciplines.
OneMine This link opens in a new window Online global mining and minerals library.
ScienceDirect This link opens in a new window Peer-reviewed journals, articles, book chapters and open access content, primarily covering science, technology, and medicine, but also including some social science and humanities subjects - notably, business & management, accounting, finance and economics.
Web of Science This link opens in a new window A bibliographic index to the world’s leading scholarly literature in the sciences, social sciences, arts, and humanities, supporting comprehensive literature searching. NOTE: not all results will provide the full-text content. Use the "check for this at Exeter" option to find out if the Library provides access to the full text.

What is a database?

Research databases enable you to see what has been published in the area you are researching. They contain detailed records of thousands of journal articles, book references and conference proceedings. These records usually include the article title, authors, abstract (a brief summary), keywords (to enable your search to find it) and more.

Why should I use a database?

They are a valuable way of searching for published scholarly research across a wide number of sources
You can build complex searches using sophisticated search interfaces. There will be plenty of options to refine your searches, ensuring that the results are likely to be relevant to your needs
They contain huge numbers of records, and thus provide comprehensive subject coverage
They also provide frequent (often daily) indexing, and so are very up to date

It is important to note:

Some databases provide full text access to the articles themselves.
Some databases are primarily indexes or bibliographic databases, and although they provide information about the content of a journal article, they may not provide full-text access to the actual article itself.
Some databases are a mixture of full-text and indexed/bibliographic access.

So, when searching databases, be prepared for an extra step.

After finding a relevant article or book you need to check whether you have access to that item, either in print or in full-text online. Many of the databases will have a Check for this at Exeter button; clicking on this link will check whether we have access to the item.

Core databases for your subject

OneMine This link opens in a new window Online global mining and minerals library.

A full text database of technical papers, reports and journal articles from mining and minerals societies such as the Society of Mining Engineers (SME), Canadian Institute of Mining (CIM), AusIMM.and SAIMM.

Knovel This link opens in a new window Knovel is a technical information database for engineers and scientists. It provides handbooks, technical and general reference works, and data books as well as best practice guidance, process and design applications, interactive graphs and tables of material and substance properties data, and equations for engineering disciplines.

A key source of technical information for engineers and scientists. Knovel provides interactive graphs and equations, plus ebooks and databooks. Knovel has a section on Mining Engineering & Extractive Metallurgy.

Watch Knovel video tutorials to learn more.

Find maps in geological journal literature by search terms or by geographic region. Links to the full text of the articles are included. Most maps are georeferenced and the data can be integrated into tools such as ArcGIS and GoogleEarth.

Watch this demo of (7 mims) to learn how to use the database

ScienceDirect This link opens in a new window Peer-reviewed journals, articles, book chapters and open access content, primarily covering science, technology, and medicine, but also including some social science and humanities subjects - notably, business & management, accounting, finance and economics.

A database of peer-reviewed journals, articles and book chapters and open access content. Primarily covering science, including earth and planetary sciences, technology and medicine

Get started by using the Make the most of your access to ScienceDirect pdf

ScienceDirect: make the most of your access

ScienceDirect

Web of Science This link opens in a new window A bibliographic index to the world’s leading scholarly literature in the sciences, social sciences, arts, and humanities, supporting comprehensive literature searching. NOTE: not all results will provide the full-text content. Use the "check for this at Exeter" option to find out if the Library provides access to the full text.

Web of Science (WoS) is one of the key research databases that enables you to search across global literature on a topic. You can use sophisticated search techniques to help pinpoint the information you need. You can also use WoS functionality to link through to full text (where available) and examine related references and cited references in order to broaden your research.

See below for brief instructions on how to search the database and try the Activity in the left hand column.