Faculty Professional Development: Literature Review
This guide provides information on free or low-cost tools available to faculty across the world.
Last Updated: Jan 19, 2024 3:10 PM
Free Databases
Here is a listing from the University at Buffalo Libraries of some databases free to the public, https://research.lib.buffalo.edu/az.php?t=18588
Finding Free Literature
The following repositories are only the tip of what is being produced in the open access publishing world of journals. It is in no ways an exhaustive listing but rather a start. Some tricks when searching the Internet for open access journals.
Keywords to use:
country or continent "open access" (ie. "latin america" "open access")
topic or subject "open access" (ie. "social innovation" "open access")
- Access to Global Online Research in Agriculture (AGORA)From their website:
" AGORA provides a collection of up to 10,000 key journals and up to 26,500 books in more than 115 countries. AGORA is designed to enhance the scholarship of the many thousands of students, faculty and researchers in agriculture and life sciences in the developing world. AGORA is one of the five programmes that make up Research4Life: AGORA, HINARI, OARE, ARDI and GOALI. " - Access to Research for Development and Innovation (ARDI)Part of Research 4 Life. Currently, over 100 publishers provide access to around 30,000 journals, books, and reference works for 120 developing countries and territories through ARDI.
- African Journals Online
From their website:
"Historically, scholarly information has flowed from North to South and from West to East. It has also been difficult for African researchers to access the work of other African academics. In partnership with hundreds of journals from all over the continent, AJOL works to change this, so that African-origin research output is available to Africans and to the rest of the world. "
- AGRICOLA This link opens in a new windowThe U.S. National Agricultural Library's bibliographic database to identify journal articles, government documents, technical reports, books, patents, and audiovisual resources from agricultural sources, including botany, ecology, environmental science, freshwater and marine sciences, and forestry from 1970 to the present. More InfoPUBLIC
- Anthropological Index Online This link opens in a new windowThe Anthropological Index Online (AIO) is published by the Royal Anthropological Institute (RAI) in cooperation with Anthropology Library and Research Centre at the British Museum. It is an index to articles in journals taken by the Library and to films held at the Royal Anthropological Institute. The Library, which incorporates the former RAI library, holds some 4,000 periodical titles (1,500 current) covering all branches and areas of anthropology. Nearly 800 journals, published in more than 40 languages, are indexed on a continuing basis. Records cover 1957 to the present.
The Anthropological Index Online has received generous financial support from the William Buller Fagg Charitable Trust. The retrospective online conversion of earlier records was made possible by grants from the Getty Foundation, ESRC (UK), the Mellon Trust, the Pilgrim Trust and the Marsh Christian Trust. The main work of the conversion, completed in 2000, was undertaken by the UK Higher Education Digitisation Service (HEDS). - Comtrade - (United Nations Commodity Trade Statistics Database) This link opens in a new windowDetailed foreign trade statistics. More InfoData PUBLIC
- Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSRI) D-SpaceThe Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, commonly known as the CSIR, is a world-class African research and development organisation established through an Act of Parliament in 1945.
- Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ)
From their website
"DOAJ is a community-curated online directory that indexes and provides access to high quality, open access, peer-reviewed journals. DOAJ is independent. All funding is via donations, 40% of which comes from sponsors and 60% from members and publisher members. All DOAJ services are free of charge including being indexed in DOAJ. All data is freely available." - Global Online Access to Legal Information (GOALI)From their website:
"A new programme providing free or low-cost online access to legal research and training in the developing world. Academic and professional peer-reviewed journals, publications and databases in selected subject areas of law from the world's leading academic publishers." Your institution must be registered with Research 4 Life to access full text. - Global Open Data for Agriculture & Nutrition (GODAN)From their website:
"The Global Open Data for Agriculture and Nutrition (GODAN) initiative seeks to support global efforts to make agricultural and nutritionally relevant data available, accessible, and usable for unrestricted use worldwide. The initiative focuses on building high-level policy and public and private institutional support for open data." - Global Science GatewayFrom their website
"WorldWideScience.org is a global science gateway comprised of national and international scientific databases and portals. WorldWideScience.org accelerates scientific discovery and progress by providing one-stop searching of databases from around the world (Architecture: What is under the Hood). Multilingual WorldWideScience.org provides real-time searching and translation of globally-dispersed multilingual scientific literature."
- Google Scholar This link opens in a new windowGoogle's trial effort to index the scholarly web
More InfoPartial Full-Text PUBLIC
- Hinari: Research for HealthFrom their website:
"Hinari Programme set up by WHO together with major publishers, enables low- and middle- income countries to gain access to one of the world's largest collections of biomedical and health literature. Up to 13,500 journals (in 45 different languages), up to 60,000 e-books, up to 110 other information resources are now available to health institutions in more than 115 countries, areas and territories benefiting many thousands of health workers and researchers, and in turn, contributing to improve world health." - IBZ Online: [International bibliography of periodical literature on the humanities and social sciences]*Interdisciplinary and international bibliography with access to citations from more than 30 years
*7,000 journals in the humanities and social sciences are evaluated and abstracted currently
Charge to get full text but has a limited index that is freely searchable.
*Subject heading and reference in English and German, article search is language comprehensive
*Weekly updates: 132,000 new entries every year
*Non-restrictive DRM – allows for an unlimited number of simultaneous users campus / institution-wide - INASPFrom their website:
"At INASP, we believe that research and knowledge have a crucial role to play in addressing global challenges and contributing to the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). To realize this potential, we work in partnership to strengthen the capacity of individuals and institutions to produce, share and use research and knowledge, in support of national development. INASP promotes equity by actively addressing the needs of both men and women across all our work and addressing issues of power within the research and knowledge system."
- International Financial Statistics This link opens in a new windowContains approximately 32,000 time series covering more than 200 countries and areas. More InfoData PUBLIC
- National Service Center for Environmental Publications (NSCEP) This link opens in a new windowFull-text of U.S. Environmental Protection Agency documents. More InfoPartial Full-Text PUBLIC
- Open Access Journals: Subject List“Link Library of Open Access Journals” was developed by Dr. Badan Barman.
- Open Access Research in the Environment (OARE)From their website:
"The OARE programme enables academic, research and government institutions in developing countries to gain free or low cost access to an impressive body of research in the environment and related fields. Set up by the United Nations Environment Programme in 2006 together with Yale University and major scientific publishers, OARE provides access to a collection of up to 11,500 scientific journals, 27,000 e-books, 40 databases and other information resources in 118 countries." - Research 4 LifeFrom their website:
Research4Life is the collective name for the five programmes – Hinari, AGORA, OARE, ARDI and GOALI– that provide developing countries with free or low cost access to academic and professional peer-reviewed content online. Eligible libraries and their users benefit from: 1) Online access to up to 85,000 peer-reviewed international scientific journals, books, and databases 2) Full-text articles which can be downloaded for saving, printing or reading on screen 3) Searching by keyword, subject, author or language 4) Resources available in several languages 5) Training in information literacy and promotional support