Researching a Topic

 

  1. Search primary literature databases and other internet resources

a.       Finding articles in journals (PubMed database):

Under the Òuseful linksÓ section, from my web page (http://www.science.smith.edu/departments/Biology/cwhitezi/default.html) you can access the National Library of Medicine-Advanced PubMed Search.  This will allow you to search for articles in numerous journals, spanning many areas of biological research.  You can enter keywords to bring up articles relevant to your topic.  You can refine your search in the following ways:

                                                                          i.       Search by author

                                                                            ii.       Search by journal

                                                                              iii.       Search by date (you can limit to only recently published articles)

                                                                             iv.       Hit the ÒRelated ArticlesÓ link next to an article you know is helpful.  This will lead you to other articles of interest.

 

Please ask me for a quick demonstration on how to search using the PubMed database.  Your paper should be based upon primary journal articles so it is a necessity that you learn to use this database.

 

    1. Other sites on my website:

Other sites for microbiology sites, journals, professional organizations, and governments institutes are linked from here.  The CDC and NIH have informative websites and some journals (Emerging Infectious Diseases, MMWR) are published electronically.

 

  1. Find a review on the topic

A review gives an overall summary and status report on the progress in a specific research area.  Because reviews are printed in journals that are published frequently, they tend to be more up to date than books and less lengthy.  Reviews are found in:

 

    1. Review journals:  Trends in Microbiology, Current Opinion in Immunology Today, Immunology Today, Annual Review of Microbiology,  Annual Review of Immunology, Microbiology and Molecular Biology Reviews
    2. In journals with primary articles:  Short reviews can often be found in Journal of Bacteriology, Applied and Environmental Microbiology, Infection and Immunity, Journal of Virology, and Cell as well as other general science journals (Science, Nature, Proceeding of the National Academy of Sciences).
    3. Edited books:  In these books, each chapter is a short review on a given subject and stands alone from the other chapters in the book.

 

To find a review, use PubMed (or another database) and set the limits to show you only articles that are reviews.

 

  1. Find a book on your topic

Realize that books are inherently going to have older information in them as compared to journals since it takes years to get a book through the writing, editing, and publication stages.  However, books can be helpful to get you started and give you the background necessary to more fully understand the area of focus for your paper.  Use the library catalog to find books, but also browse through the books.  It is often difficult to guess the actual keywords that will bring up the perfect book.  The microbiology and immunology books are shelved close to one another in the Young Science Center.  The genetics/molecular/biotechnology books are in a different section that you should also check out.

 

 

4.       Use an internet search

You can type in key words and you may be able to find additional sites with useful information.  However, beware of the information and/or the source.  There is no peer review on the internet nor is it necessarily updated.  You will need to be able to cite the information so make sure it comes from a credible source and that the information can be traced back to a peer-reviewed journal.