Instruction in Chemical Literature
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A SYMPOSIUM
Library Searching An Industrial User's Viewpoint W. A. Hendrickson Physics and Materials Research Laboratory, Central Research Laboratories, 3M Company In any area of science and technology personal recognition and career advancement result from the successful satisfaction of previously set goals. There are many factors that contribute to the realization of project goals; however, one common key factor may simply he a solid foundation in the literature of the field. In college and graduate school the nascent scientist is taught to make effective use of the library by attending lihrary use courses or by hands-on experience necessary to complete research projects or pass exams. This formal and informal instruction provides the basic foundation for good lihrary use habits and consequently can provide one of the most powerful tools in research available to any chemist. It is imperative that the broadest, strongest hackground in lihrary science be made available to students to help ensure their professional success. The importance of a solid foundation in the lihrary is most apparent to a student upon graduation when there is no longer a professor available for questions or research direction, and the lihrary becomes the best place for help. Since a majority of chemists enter the industrial field after graduation, a large number of chemists not only must face the loss of a research advisor's direction and help, hut also must cope with a new type of research in the laboratory. It is only reasonable that a change from basic research in an academic setting to applied research in an industrial setting would change the lihrary searching techniques that are needed. Consequently, it is critical that a new industrial chemist be exposed to alternative searching techniques prior to graduation or that his hackground in library searching be hroad enough to make the transition from basic to applied research without unnecessary confusion in the library. To illustrate the differences that the academic and industrial researcher face in research goals and hence library searching techniques, consider a research project directed at modifying the absorption maximum of a dye molecule by varying the suhstituents on the parent molecule. In an academic laboratory the overall goal of the dye modification project might he to correlate molecular orhital energies with the suhstituent Hammett u values. For this research project a reasonable lihrary search strategy would probably include
dye synthetic procedures, spectral analyses, molecular orbital energy calculations, and other theoretical considerations. Since the main thrust of this project is theoretical and not synthetic, the focus in the lihrary searching would he more directed toward spectral analysis, molecular orbital energies, and the correlation of the suhstituent parameters rather than any synthetic references beyond those necessary to prepare a representative series of dye molecules. Hence, this project permits a lihrary searching procedure in a relatively small numher of subject areas and allows comprehensive coverage of the suitable literature. Now consider the same proiect in an industrial settina. As befnre,the project's gonls-are wavelength modificution hy substituent suhstitutiun. In an industrinl project such as this an understandinfi of the electronic inwractions being studied in the academic laboratory are extremely useiul in initiating and dirrrting the project; however, a substantial nmount of extra research is needrd to bring these dyes to a useful purpose. In this case the overall goalmight he the use of the dyes for polyester fiber dyeing. The new industrial chemist and academic researcher are faced with some of the same problems of lihrary searching in synthesis,analysis, and theory; however, other important areas of research such as polyester fiber dyeahility, dye stability, dye toxicity, colorfastness, scale up, and cost must also he considered in the total research program. While a new chemist may not have to address each immediately, as the project progresses time must be devoted to the applied aspects of the project also if the whole project is to succeed. Hence, initially the researcher may focus on the basic aspects of the research in both the laboratory and the lihrary to determine the direction that the applied research should take. The basic research lihrary search should be little problem to the new chemist as the journals, abstracts, and other reference materials are those that were learned in college and graduate school. The remaining topics such as polyester dyeahility, colorfastness, etc. are initially outside the researcher's area of expertise and experience, and in many instances these new areas can he much more difficult to search efficiently in the library. In short, an industrial lihrary search
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FIGURE iI
FIGURE I
TIME
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Figure 1. Academic user's library time management.
Figure 2. Industrial user's library time management.
requires hn~adercoverage of topics in areas that may be particularly difficult to search using the methods learned in ttcademi~trainin~. The hroad nature of industrial research is not the real nrohlem in the actual research or the librarv searches, as given = - - ~-~~~~ enough time a large number of seemingly inrelated &e& can he mastered. Unfortunately, time is the one commodity that no one has enough of, particularly in a research environment. Industrial research. unlike academic research, is tmified h s rapid research direction changes that can he especially vexing to a new chemist accustomed to the research continuity in academia. To illustrate the differences that rapid research direction changes can make on the library searching strategy, consider the lihrarv time manaeement in the academic and industrial settings. In a basic research project, as in academia, long range, continuous vroiects are needed. The time demand that such a project needs for lihrary searching is shown in Figure 1where knowledge in the field is plotted versus time spent on the project. upon entering a new field, the academic researcher presumably begins with a minimal amount of pertinent knowledge in that field. As the lihrary searching strategy is developed and commenced, slow increases in knowledge occur as shown by the initial slow rise of the plot in Figure 1. However, as the retrospective search proceeds, the level of awareness increases dramatically. This rapid increase in knowledge continues until it reaches a point where a majority of the retros~ectivesearching is completed and the researcher now becomes more concerned with the current awareness aspects of library usage. The slope of this plot is a relative measure of the time necessary for each phase of the project. Therefore, it is readily seen that it takes more time to conduct comprehensive retrospective searches than current awareness searches. The ideal situation that every researcher strives for is one in which the time-intensive, retrospective searching has been done and the less demanding, current awareness searching can proceed. I t is only in a long range project as in academic research that the current awareness mode of library searching can oredominate. By con&t,>onsider the library time usage for an industrial chemist. If knowledge versus time is plotted as in the previous case for an industrial chemist and presented in Figure 2, two important differences are seen by comparison to the figure for academic chemists. First, instead of a long term commitment to one area of lihrary searching, the industrial chemist changes the area of lihrary searching frequently and this results in the many fluctuations seen in Figure 2. Secondly,since no one area is stressed for extended periods, a current awareness mode of lihrary searching is harder to achieve and maintain. The large fluctuations in librarv searchine seen in Fienre 2 are a result of the research direction changes mentioned earlier. These research direction changes are brought about by management interests, laboratory direction changes, or immediate product
problems that must he addressed. The changes that occur may he as simple as using the previous dyes on polyethylene or as drastic as starting a completely new project un printing plntts. The lareer the rrsearch change the more dislocation in the lihrary leaching and less charke for reaching and sustaining a current awareness mode of lihrary searches. However, even with the most drastic research changes, eventually a broad based. more diffused tvDe of current awareness mode of searching is developed,";nd this is indicated by the slowly risine level of the lot in Figure 2. Therefore, while the initial chanie from a continuous mode of research in academia to a fluctuating mode in industry can he difficult and traumatic, the proper-lihrary techniques can smooth this transition. This ~ r o h l e mof fluctuating research and concomitant diffiLdt;es in library search& are faced by every chemist enrerine industry and solved hv one of two solutions. In rhe extreme cases the new chemist can have or develop the neressary library skills to address this prohlem or he can simply ignore the whole problem and he limited in research outlook, library skills, and career success. Hy making the attempt at the former solution, the chemist finds it easier to switch projects while still contributing significantly. The question then becomes, "What are the important aspects of lihrary searching thar would help in dealing with the hroad tluctunting character .~~ - - - -of industrial research"" Ohviouslv. for nnv given individual and project different lihrary searching methods and tools are most hel~ful.Therefore, rather than attempt to present ageneral ovewiew which wuuld probably he larkinr in concrete ideas or observations I would like to present specific examples on what changes I have found necessarv in mv lihrarv searching- to accommodate the industrial research environment. I find it convenient to divide my libran, searching into three categories compriuing two retnfipective searching s t 4 o n s and one current awareness sectim. In graduate school 1 was able to do an adequate retrospective search by using Chemical Abstracts, the card catalog, and a variety of reference hooks such as Beilstein or GmelG. By using the above as a starting point and then rigorously searching out the references in the articles that were found. a com~letesearch was accom~lished. The one major requirement fo; this type of searchingk time. Since time is the one factor that is not in overabundance in industry, other tools for retrospective searching must he found. Other abstracting services that are available, for example, are particularly-useful. Until I was faced with the prohlem of multiple research areas to search in a limited time, Chemical Abstracts was all I needed. Other abstracting services such as Physics Abstracts or Metals Abstracts do a better job of classifying their areas than Chemical Abstracts and their use can dramatically shorten some types of retrospective searches. One other obvious addition that an industrial chemist must face in retrospective searching is the patent literature. Due to the importance to industry of patents,
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Journal of Chemical Education
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special care and effort is taken to insure that new chemists are familiar with searching for and understanding patents. Even with this in-house training it would be more than helpful to a new chemist to already have some small idea of how a patent is put together and how to read a patent prior t o beginning work. In essence, this means that some time in a lihrary use course should he set aside for this purpose. The division of retrospective searching into two sections is somewhat artificial; however, the second class of retrospective searching techniques comprises one tool, Science Citation Index, which I believe is so useful that it deserves special recognition. Science Citation Index provides a means of dramatically increasing the speed of searches where few pertinent reference papers have already been found. I recently had a prohlem where I was able to find only one article on a particular mass spectrometric technique. Using that one article as a starting point, I had three Science Citation Index searches run and obtained ten useful papers that helped me in my research. For me Science Citation Index is one of the best ways to do retrospective searches, yet I found that few persons are familiar with it. I believe that a real service could he done for chemists both in industry and academics if librarians would spend more time on the benefits of Science Citation Index and how to make the best use of it. The third area of library searching is current awareness. The many resources that are available to me make being an industrial chemist extremely pleasing. For instance, the diversity and number of journals that are available make it easy to cover the broad variety of topics needed in my work. Unfortunately, the number needed to he perused has grown from 4 or 5 in graduate school to perhaps 15to get a basic coverage
of my areas of interest. Hence, I find that current awareness methods that I did not need in graduate school such as Chemical Titles, Current Contents, and computer searches are quite helpful. My initial experience with computer searches was confusing to say the least and overwhelming a t best. Whether the search is a retrospective search or a current awareness search. I have alwavs tried to make the search broader than necessary to cover"all the information that may he in the literature. This obviouslv results in an overahundance of information, and the time to wade through it was almost ~rohihitive.However. in the last six months the 3M ~ i h r a i ~ e r v ihas c e started p&ting the abstracts with either Chemical Abstracts or patent comDuter searches, and that one change takes the area of computer searching from a challenge to a real pleasure. Therefore, even though a large amount of useless information may result, decisions on %s worth do not have to be made on title alone, and an abstract eliminates the need to spend time looking up the abstract. In essence, the research changes that occur in moving from academics to industrial work changes the type of library searching techniques needed and broadens the variety of literature that must be checked. The major point that I think needs to be stressed is that industrial research is fast paced and anv and all techniaues to eet into the lihrarv and out aeain rapidl;should he used: A solii foundation in librrary seareKing is needed to succeed in industrv. Particular areas that I feel need moreattention include more exposure to patents, work with other abstractine servicey.Scirncc Citariorr Indrx, and continued improvem&t in computer searching techniques and printout data.
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