What’s new at CSA

Vicki Soto, Aquatic Sciences Supervisor

vsoto@csa.comCraig Emerson, Vice President,

Editorialcemerson@csa.com

CSA Illumina

• New Usage System – various reports to evaluate and manage your CSA Illumina account

• COS Funding Opportunities – database of funding opportunities (grants, fellowships, prizes, etc.)

• Community of Scholars – directory of more than 1 million researchers in over 200 disciplines and 8 countries

CSA Illumina: Full-text linking

Sample publishers include:• ASM Journals• Bioline International• Elsevier Science Direct (3 packages)• JSTOR (2 packages)• IEEE (4 packages)• Soil Science Society of America• Wiley (15 packages)

ASFA: ASFA Partnership

There are now 59 ASFA Partners

• 4 UN Co-sponsoring partners

• 10 International partners

• 44 National partners

• 1 Publishing partnerFull directory http://www.fao.org/fi/asfa/partners.asp

ASFA: ASFA Partnership

New ASFA Partners:• INAHINA – Instituto Nacional de

Hidrografia e Navegaçao, Mozambique• Living Aquatic Resources Research

Center (LARReC), Lao People’s Democratic Republic

• Phuket Marine Biological Center (PMBC), Thailand

• Northwest Atlantic Fisheries Organization (NAFO), Canada

Serial Sources: New Titles

• Marine Biology Research• International Journal of Recirculating

Aquaculture• Ocean Science• Marine Drugs• Ships and Offshore Structures• Estuaries and Coasts• International Journal of Oceans and

Oceanography

Retroactive Indexing Projects:

• Kenya: 4,000 records • Belgium: 10,000 records dealing

with the North Sea• Russia: 310 records of Barents and

Norwegian Seas literature 1938-1971 translated from Russian

• Russia: 700 records of Caspian Sea literature 1779-1970 (complete)

ASFA Database: Recent References

Process to include recent, but un-indexed records into the ASFA database.

Records will be identified as indexing in progress.

Include all titles, not just select serial sources.

CSA Discovery Guides

• Hydrothermal Vent Communities (C. Scearce)• Ice Core Proxy Methods for Tracking Climate Change (C.

Readinger)• Tsunamis and the International Response: Economic,

Social and Environmental Dimensions (B. Fertig, T. Foster, I. Nicholas)

Upcoming• The Venice Lagoon• Mercury in Fish

http://www.csa.com/discoveryguides/discoveryguides-main.php

CSA’s “Deep-Indexing” Project

-an Index to Figures and Tables

in published research

Researchers are data-

hungry

Identifying data – within context – not easy

Why a Figures & Tables Index?

• Figures and tables represent the distilled essence of research – the closest thing to the raw datasets

• These objects are not currently indexed directly

• They are often hidden in the overall context of the article

• If we can make these objects visible by indexing each table & figure, we would provide an extremely valuable research tool to focus literature searches

Table 1. Depth, physico-chemical and sedimentological variables.

Title of Article: “Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons and changes in the trophic structure of polychaete assemblages in sediments of Todos os Santos Bay, Northeastern, Brazil”

Why are these data invisible to traditional searches?

1. A search for “copper and toxicity” will retrieve many articles in which these variables weren’t actually studied.

2. Data presented in articles are not necessarily the focus of the research:

• literature searches can be focused with greatly increased accuracy

• allows researchers to draw connections between disparate subjects, identifying avenues of new research rather than simply providing answers

• a side benefit… the index facilitates the collection of figures and tables that could be used in reports and presentations, a bonus for teachers and undergraduates

Finding data is great, but the overall value of a Tables & Figures Index includes:

What will indexing involve?1. Categorization• What “type” of object is represented... a map, a graph?

2. Addition of Descriptors• What are the dependent and independent variables?• What are the units?• What are subject, taxonomic, geographic terms?• Is there statistical information?

…Figure – Graph – 3D Surface PlotFigure – Graph – Histogram/Bar ChartFigure – Illustration – Gene/Protein – Maps & SequencesFigure – Illustration – Molecular StructureFigure – Map – Bathymetric MapFigure – Map – Topographic MapFigure – Photograph – Satellite Image…

What is the status of the Tables & Figures Index?

• >1,000,000 indexed tables and figures

• >1,000 journals monitored (and rising quickly)

• 10-yr backfile for many serials (and expanding back)

• Focus on publisher agreements (e.g. AAAS, AFS, ASM, AMS, BioOne, Blackwell, Cambridge University Press, Elsevier, Oxford University Press, Taylor & Francis, etc.)

• Modifications to CSA Illumina to incorporate the index

Article-level Search Results will include “pinkies”

Abstract Records will include “thumbnails”

Tables & Figures can be searched directly

Full display of tables/images in “Object Record”

Object-level indexing and identification of predictive relationships

Object-specific Attribution:

"Overwhelmingly, respondents said the ability to

search for specific types of objects would make a

difference in their search and discovery processes…

... save time

... work more efficiently

... aid in presentations

... find more relevant results."

Tenopir, C., & Sandusky, R.J. (2006). The Value of CSA Deep Indexing for Researchers - Draft Final Report

The researcher response so far…