As the amount of electronically published material for scientists increases, driven by the rapid growth of the Internet, information retrieval skills are now vital to the scientific researcher. The value added by services such as SciFinder and its academic counterpart SciFinder Scholar is increasingly important in relation to finding quality, evaluated online information.
This text is aimed at researchers, librarians, scientists and students in the chemical, life, medical or physical sciences. It should act as a useful text to be used by library staff in developing a SciFinder training programme. By giving a “behind the scenes” look at the databases and how to develop search strategies and apply scientific methods the text aims to enable effective and efficient use of a valuable electronic resource. It is clear however that the book does not intend to merely replicate user materials already available for the database online.
The text is written in a clear and concise style, first explaining what SciFinder contains in terms of depth and scope. Exploration techniques, starting with simple research topics are developed, moving on to more developed searches for chemical substances. Diagrams of the chemical structures and screen shots from the database are integrated throughout. The advanced section focuses on searching for chemical reaction, clearly illustrating the power of the database’s indexes, offering detailed examples of different options available.
I would recommend this text to the serious scientific researcher who will use the database on a regular basis and needs to go beyond the help already offered by database providers. It will also be of value to librarians who require to integrate context and theory related to scientific searching into training programmes.
A companion Webiste is available at http://www.wiley.co.uk/ridley providing answers to the problems set at the end of each chapter, this could be developed further to take advantage of the interactivity the Web offers for learning, as at the moment there are just word documents available for download.
