Conference Reports

Energy, Science and Technology Information: Towards a National Library for the Physical Sciences
STS Database Discussion Group
ALA Annual Conference, July 8, 2000

Judith Gilmore, a senior librarian from the Department of Energy's Office of Scientific and Technical Information (DOE/OSTI), returned to bring ALA members up to date on activities of the DOE. The OSTI web page (www.osti.gov) welcomes users to "The Virtual Library of Energy Science and Technology." Ms. Gilmore briefed the audience on a blue ribbon panel convened by the DOE in May. Workshop panelists included R. Stephen Berry, University of Chicago; Martin Blume, American Physical Society; Jose-Marie Griffiths, University of Michigan; Lee Holcomb, National Aeronautics and Space Administration; Kirk McDonald, Princeton University; Krishna Rajan, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute; Kent Smith, National Library of Medicine; and Derek Winstanley, Illinois State Water Survey. Results of the workshop have been issued in the "Workshop Report on a Future Information Infrastructure for the Physical Sciences," available electronically at www.osti.gov/physicalsciences. Ms. Gilmore posted an announcement on the STS-L on August 2, 2000 in which she states:

"The workshop findings support the need for a common knowledge base that provides comprehensive access and facilitates the reuse of worldwide sources of physical sciences information as well as a point of convergence for ensuring awareness, availability, use and development of information, technologies, and tools. The workshop report notes that the Department of Energy's Office of Scientific and Technical Information could well serve as this point of convergence and lead an initiative through a collaborative effort that encompasses government, industry, academia, and professional associations."

Ms. Gilmore presented an update of OSTI database projects. An overview of DOE research and development activities is available on a web page called "Portfolio" at www.osti.gov/portfolio/. PubScience (pubsci.osti.gov/) added Kluwer to the list of 26 publishers participating in that initiative which provides online access to peer reviewed scientific and technical journal literature with a focus on physical sciences and related disciplines.

Over 1,000 sites are now linked to the gateway PrePRINT Network at www.osti.gov/preprint. A new Alerts service will be launched on the preprint network in August. The International Energy Agency hosts an Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDE), called ETDEWEB at bia.osti.gov/etdeweb/ which contains 3.5 million pages of full text. Federal R+D Summaries (www.osti.gov/fedrnd/), launched in April, offers one-stop shopping for information on NSF, DOE, NIH and other government agencies by making it possible to search across agency files, many of which are full text. "The world's most comprehensive portal to Federal gray literature," is the GrayLIT Network (www.osti.gov/graylit) which is useful for searching DoD, DOE, EPA, and NASA files. Another service, called OpenNet (www.osti.gov/opennet/), provides a searchable database of declassified documents.