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FIG - Forensic Science 2008

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This page should help you with your library research assignment. Feel free to contact me with questions. You may also want to try the UO Libraries LibX Toolbar for your browser!


Chat with Victoria!


Annie
Librarian for: Chemistry, Geological Sciences, and Physics
Contact info: 346-3076, vmitch@uoregon.edu

Find an article here:


Other specific databases to try:

Academic Search Premier

  • Good for its mix of popular, news, and scholarly articles. You have to exercise your critical evaluation skills to help determine what's what. (Do NOT rely solely on their limit to peer-reviewed feature--it is not reliable.)
Legal Periodicals Full Text
  • If you want a more legal analysis of the issue(s). Not all journals are available in full text.

Medline or PubMed
  • Having essentially the same content, these databases index the biomedical literature, including articles on forensic medicine. The Medical Subject Heading for fingerprints is "dermatoglyphics"(!)

Web of Science

  • Interdisciplinary science database, a heavily-used source for science (and social sciences) literature. Highly recommended.


Google Scholar

  • Google for academics.
Look here for more information on Searching the Web

Breaking forensic science news

 

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Reference Sources

(located in the Science Library if a print source; for online sources you must be on campus, or an authorized UO user if off campus, to access)

Encylopedia of Forensic Sciences (3 vols.) SCI REF HV8073 .E517 2000

  • This excellent source includes an extensive section on fingerprinting.
Facts on File Dictionary of Forensic Science SCI REF HV8073 .B426 2004

Forensic Science: An Illustrated Dictionary SCI REF HV8073 .B677 2004

Gale Virtual Reference Library
  • A number of encyclopedias are included here. See particularly the Encyclopedia of Science, Technology, and Ethics.
Guide to Information Sources in the Forensic Sciences SCI REF HV8073 .H66 2006
  • This points you to important information sources in various specialties of forensic science, including web sites, professional associations, etc.

Oxford Reference Premium

  • Contains many dictionaries, including scientific and legal; also a few encyclopedias and Oxford "companions", which provide more depth of information.
Compare the above reference sources with:
Wikipedia
  • Do the articles have identified authors? Are the authors credentials and affiliations available? Do the articles have references or bibliographies? If so, are there differences in the kinds of references given?
  • Wikipedia is a very handy, free Internet source, but it is not always reliable or the best source. For a humorous demonstration of this phenomenon, watch this excerpt of the Colbert Report on Comedy Central. (Some improvements have been made to Wikipedia since this segment aired.)
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Evaluating Sources


This web page contains a wealth of information on evaluating information sources both in print and on the Web: Critical Evaluation of Information Sources

To determine whether a particular periodical (magazine, journal) is scholarly (peer-reviewed, refereed) or popular, see these pages:

What is "peer-review"?

Here are a couple of pdfs that provide good explanations of what it is (and is not), and why it's particularly important in the sciences:
(NB: both of the above are produced in the UK, so there are a few Britishisms that may not make sense)

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Tutorials

How to read a scientific journal article

Evaluating Websites


Maintained by: Victoria Mitchell, vmitch@uoregon.edu
Last Modified: 11/03/2009