Library Guides: BIOL 1221: Molecules to Humankind: Search for articles

Recommended databases for this class

Academic Search Complete
This database includes full-text articles from almost every discipline; articles come from both peer-reviewed journals and popular sources such as magazines and newspapers.
Web of Science Core Collection (WOS)
This databases indexes peer-reviewed journal articles from what they consider to be the best journals in the sciences, social sciences, arts, and humanities. Use the unique Cited References Search to find articles that cite an author or work -- this allows you to track citations forward in time. Content dates from 1900 - present.
Biological Abstracts
This database indexes peer-reviewed journals in the life sciences fields, including biology, biochemistry, biotechnology, botany, pre-clinical and experimental medicine, pharmacology, zoology, agriculture, and veterinary science. Content dates from 1926 - present.
PubMed (includes MEDLINE)
The most comprehensive medical database. This resource covers peer-reviewed journal articles about medicine, dentistry, nursing, physical therapy, biomedical research, clinical practice, administration, policy issues, and health care services.
Google Scholar
Enables users to search specifically for scholarly literature, including peer-reviewed papers, theses, books, preprints, abstracts and technical reports from all broad areas of research.

Government information sources

MedlinePlus
Offers reliable, up-to-date information about diseases, conditions, and wellness issues in language you can understand. Includes a medical encyclopedia and a medical dictionary, extensive information on prescription and nonprescription drugs, health information from the media, and links to thousands of clinical trials. There is also a Spanish language version. Produced by the National Library of Medicine and the National Institute of Health.

Interested in more websites from the National Institute of Health or the National Library of Medicine?

Narrow your Google search to a specific domain or website by doing a site search:

"healthy aging" site:gov (searches all U.S. government websites)
"healthy aging" site:colorado.gov (searches some of the government websites for the state of Colorado).
"healthy aging" site:state.co.us (searches the rest of the government websites for the state of Colorado).

The ABCs of Database Searching

A. Break your topic down into the main ideas, or keywords. Then combine your keywords into a search query:

Link main ideas together with AND to get fewer search results:

aging AND brain

Link related terms together with OR to get more search results:

healthy OR normal

B. Use quotation marks " " to search words as a phrase:

Searching “healthy aging” excludes articles about healthy eating or rapid aging.

BE AWARE of what your quotation marks are excluding -- searching "healthy aging" excludes articles that talk about aging in a healthy manner.

C. Use an asterisk * to search for multiple word endings:

health* = health OR healthy OR healthier OR healthiest, etc.

What's an article database?

An article database allows you to search for articles on a particular topic.

Article databases differ by:

Subjects included:
Some databases index articles from a specific discipline, such as forestry or medicine, while other databases index articles from many different disciplines. ankylosaur clip art image

Document & publication type:
Some databases focus on indexing one type of document, such as scholarly research articles or popular news articles. Other databases index a mix of publications types.

Dates included:
Some databases index articles published several hundred years ago up to the present, while others only index recently published articles.

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