• Day 1
• Day 2
• Day 3
• Day 4
• Day 5
• Day 6

Resources

• *LAB SAFETY**
• Laboratory notebook
• Graphing tutorial
• Molecular biol tips
• Writing assignment
• Bios 211 web site
• Searching literature

Other links

• Bios 111 honor code
• Graphing quiz (rice only)

Literature Search Guide

Primary vs. Secondary Sources

In scientific writing, authors cite findings from previous researchers to provide a foundation for their rationale, give credit for developing of a procedure, validate their research findings, or stress the significance of the research topic. Regardless of purpose, the primary research article is the most frequently cited form of publication.

Secondary sources

Secondary sources summarize or comment on data that were presented in primary sources. Because secondary sources include public interest pieces in commercial magazines as well as review articles published in scientific journals, the intended audience may be general or specific. Like primary sources, secondary sources may have figures and tables; however, in secondary sources these elements are used to summarize or show examples of research from the cited primary sources. While not the preferred source for most citations, scientific review articles do cite many primary sources that may be useful.

Citing sources

Almost all citations in a scientific paper refer the reader to the primary source. Review articles intended for a specialized scientific audience are cited on occasion when the topic has been covered in many relevant primary sources. Still, if one primary source can be singled out as the seminal work on the topic, it should be cited. For example, many research papers may have followed a pioneering paper by Smith in 1998. If Johnson later reviewed this field in 2006, an author might cite this as (Smith, 1998; reviewed in Johnson, 2006).

Searching for Sources

Online tools to search scientific databases are easily accessible. Articles are archived with keywords to aid in searching. Scientific databases can be general or specialized in particular subjects. In the next section, this handout describes one widely used general subject database, PubMed. In addition, recent upgrades to Google search such as Google Scholar have made it increasingly easy to locate primary sources. Many journals have content available online, which may be article abstracts or full articles. Articles are frequently archived and stored as downloadable PDFs. Most journal sites with full article access require that you or your institution have an online subscription.

PubMed

PubMed (www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed) is sponsored by the National Library of Medicine and contains citation listings for for biomedical and life science journals as early as the 1950s. Clicking on one of the search results usually retrieves the article abstract and links to the full text from the journal’s website, if available at your institution. Advanced search features are also available to limit your search by author name, journal title, keyword, or dates of publication.

Google Scholar

Google (www.google.com) can search for scholarly articles from academic publishers, professional societies, and university presses that are related to your topic.  Under the “more” tab at the top of the Google search page, select “Scholar” to use this search function. Clicking “Advanced Scholar Search” to the right of the input field allows you to use more detailed search criteria based on author, journal or publication title, or a selected date range. In the search results, articles with the note “Full Text @ Fondren” have full content available online for those connected via Rice computers.

Choosing Search Terms