When looking for academic journal articles you can use the 'everything' search in Library Search or search directly in the databases below, which we’ve selected as being most relevant to your subject area.
Databases are the best place to find academic journal articles as they offer advanced search tools, metric data, and export options for referencing. These databases also often provide access to information types such as conference papers, book chapters, review articles, trade magazines, and more. BrowZine can also be used to explore e-journal titles in your subject.
While most of our collection is now available digitally, some titles may only be accessible in print. You can find these journal titles using an ‘everything except articles’ search in Library Search.
You’ll also find links to essential reading for your programme in your module reading lists on Canvas.
Key Databases and E-journal Collections
Databases will either provide you with the full text of the journal or they will give you the bibliographic details of an article. Where full text is not available, look for the
link and follow this to see if we have the full text available via Library Search.
Subject databases
Subject databases are tailored to particular subject areas. They tend to use precise terminology relating to the subject area, making searches more accurate, and can include subject specific tools and features.
- Aqualine This link opens in a new windowThe Aqualine database provides comprehensive focus on trade, technical and scientific literature concerning all aspects of water resources. Major subjects of coverage include water resources and supplies management, water legislation, water quality, potable water distribution, wastewater collection, water treatment technologies, wastewater and sewage treatment, and ecological and environmental effects of water pollution.
- Compendex (Ei Engineering Village) This link opens in a new window
Compendex® in Engineering Village is an interdisciplinary engineering database with over 9 million records referencing 5,000 engineering journals and conference materials dating from 1884. Coverage includes nuclear technology, bioengineering, transportation, chemical and process engineering, light and optical technology, agricultural engineering and food technology, computers and data processing, applied physics, electronics and communications, control, civil, mechanical, materials, petroleum, aerospace and automotive engineering as well as narrower subtopics within all these and other major engineering fields. Numeric data is indexed so results can be filtered within specific data parameters.
- ENDS Report This link opens in a new window
An online news source covering key environmental topics. It offers commentary and analysis on environmental policy and legislation, exploring the implications for business across the carbon, environmental and sustainability agenda.
- IEEExplore This link opens in a new window
Delivers full text access to high quality technical literature, journal articles, conference papers and standards, from the IEEE and IET. Covers topics such as electrical engineering, computer science, and electronics.
- Knovel eBook Collection This link opens in a new window
As well as all aspects of engineering, Knovel is useful for biotechnology, computing, food science, marine technology, molecular biology and chemistry. Subjects covered include technical reference books. There are Interactive graphs and tables,material and substance properties data and interactive equations. The Data Search tool can be used to build queries around different materials or substances.
- Policy Commons: Global Think TanksGlobal Think Tanks is a collection of objective, fact-based research from the world’s leading policy experts, think tanks, IGOs and NGOs. It provides in-depth search and access to some 5 million reports from over 25,000 organisations.
Multidisciplinary databases
Much like Library Search, multidisciplinary databases cover a wide range of topics and are a great place to scope your search, or to use if your topic covers more than one subject area.
- American Chemical Society Publications Journals This link opens in a new windowEJ Collections from the American Chemical Society
- CAB Abstracts This link opens in a new windowCAB Abstracts is a comprehensive agriculture and land use database, containing information from 1910 to date
- Construction Information Service (CIS) This link opens in a new window
This database is particularly useful for architects, civil and structural engineers, building control officers, building services engineers and other professionals in the construction industry. CIS provides fundamental industry information and legislation, as well as additional sector material. The extensive range of full-text documents cover all aspects of the building, engineering, design and construction process in the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland.
- Greenfile This link opens in a new windowGreenFILE offers well-researched information covering all aspects of human impact to the environment. Its collection of scholarly, government and general-interest titles includes content on global warming, green building, pollution, sustainable agriculture, renewable energy, recycling, and more. The database provides indexing and abstracts for approximately 538,000 records, as well as Open Access full text for more than 5,800 records.
- Proquest Natural Science This link opens in a new windowThe Natural Science Collection includes key agriculture, aquatic science, biology, dentistry and nutrition databases, with many full text journals.
- Royal Society of Chemistry Journals This link opens in a new windowEJs from the Royal Society of Chemistry
- SAGE Research MethodsThis platform provides a wealth of materials to help support research methodology. It includes chapters, articles, videos and case studies. There are other tools e.g. The Methods Map and the Project Planner Tool to help you plan your research effectively.
- Science Direct This link opens in a new windowScienceDirect provides full text-access to journal articles published by Elsevier.
- Scopus This link opens in a new windowAs a comprehensive, multidisciplinary resource, this database indexes peer-reviewed journal articles, books, book chapters, conference proceedings, and trade publications. It supports cited reference searching to explore the literature in depth, along with tools for citation tracking, author and affiliation searches, visual analysis of results, journal analysis, and author identification for those interested in publishing.
- Web of Science This link opens in a new windowWeb of Science is a multidisciplinary database, which indexes scholarly journal articles, books, book chapters and conference proceedings. It provides cited reference searching, so you can navigate forward and backward through the literature to uncover all the information relevant to your research. Use citation reports to see citation activity and geographical trends and the ‘analyse results’ tool to identify trends and publication patterns.
- TechRxivTechRxiv (pronounced "tech archive") is an open, moderated preprint server for unpublished research in electrical engineering, computer science, and related technology.
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