Identify what type of information you need to find
As a scientist working in the biological sciences much of your information and data is gathered experimentally in the laboratory and field, but published information is also very important. The amount of scientific information published each year is growing at an exponential rate and it can seem a bewildering and daunting task to try to find what you need amongst it all. However, there is a structure in the way information is generated and communicated, and an understanding of this will guide you through the maze of knowing where to look, and when!
Detailed information generated in the formal research process is usually first published either as an article in a journal; or a report to the organisation funding the research; a thesis for a higher degree; or in the published proceedings of a conference; or indeed a combination of these.
Figure 1 shows how, in time, such detailed information is summarised and published in less-specialised levels of publication such as specialised books, monographs or textbooks.
Reference Works
Eventually information is summarised still further and is published in `reference books' which are compilations of facts and data, e.g., dictionaries, encyclopaedias, databooks, directories, handbooks, manuals.
Figure 1: Structure of literature
When you first start out researching a topic you start at the bottom of the structure of the literature diagram and work your way back up. So the first step to carry out your search strategy is to define your keywords. So your information need is for data.
Example
Rachel looks in some dictionaries and encyclopaedias, which help to define her topic and give her some more keywords:
- genetic engineering
- genetic manipulation
- genetic modification
- recombinant DNA technology
- gene therapy
- somatic cell
- somatic cell therapy
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