Why Articles?
Articles give you a short focused treatment of up-to-date content. The articles in scholarly journals go through a peer-review process -- reviewed by experts -- before publication. The result is information that is more reliable.
Use articles from scholarly journals when you need original authoritative research; publications written by scholars or subject experts; factual documented information to reinforce a position; and references that point you to other relevant research.
Scholarly journals are published more quickly than books, although the peer-review process can be lengthy.
(Water quality monitoring, Prince George's County, Maryland; photo by Will Parson/Chesapeake. CC BY-NC 2.0, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.0/.)
Find More on Agricultural Engineering in These Additional Databases
- AGRIS (International System for Agricultural Science & Technology)Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO), United Nations. Includes resources on food and agricultural scientific literature worldwide.
- ASFA: Aquatic Sciences and Fisheries Abstracts (ProQuest) This link opens in a new window
Aquatic Sciences and Fisheries Abstracts (ASFA) is an abstracting and indexing service covering the world's literature on the science, technology, management, and conservation of marine, brackish water, and freshwater resources and environments, including their socio-economic and legal aspects. - Environment Complete (EBSCO) This link opens in a new window
This full-text database offers extensive coverage in the areas of agriculture, ecosystem ecology, energy, and affiliated areas of study. Offering full text and indexing for journals, books and monographs, this is a good resource for students and scholars across all environmental disciplines. - Natural Science Collection (ProQuest) This link opens in a new windowAccess to scholarly journals, trade and industry journals, magazines, technical reports, conference proceedings, government publications and more pertaining to agricultural & environmental Sciences; the biological sciences; and Earth, atmospheric & aquatic sciences.
- TOXLINE (ProQuest) This link opens in a new window
This database, produced by the U.S. National Library of Medicine, provides bibliographic citations and abstracts from the core journal literature in all areas of toxicology, including chemicals and pharmaceuticals, pesticides, environmental pollutants, and mutagens and teratogens.
Related & Multidisciplinary Resources
In addition to the Top Picks on the Home tab, these databases cover a wide variety of multi-disciplinary content:
- Library Catalog - Colorado School of Mines This link opens in a new window
Search the library's catalog for physical and electronic resources to find books, articles, maps, videos, and more. - Engineering Village This link opens in a new window
Engineering Village is the information discovery platform to search across both Compendex and INSPEC databases. The thesauri on Engineering Village comprise the controlled vocabulary used to index articles in the Compendex, Inspec, GeoRef, GEOBASE and EnCompass databases. - ScienceDirect This link opens in a new window
From foundational science to new and novel research, discover our large collection of Physical Sciences and Engineering publications, covering a range of disciplines, from the theoretical to the applied. - SciFinder-n This link opens in a new window
Use CAS SciFinder-n in identifying a chemical substance and its related chemical structures, molecular formula, chemical names, reaction components, regulatory information, and properties, including CAS Registry Numbers®, reaction schemes, step-by-step experimental procedures, detailed conditions, and product yields.
Access Note: Database use is restricted to current Mines-affiliates only and requires an individual user account to access. First-time users must register for an account using your @mines.edu email. - SpringerLink This link opens in a new window
SpringerLink is Springer's comprehensive online delivery platform, providing easy access to millions of resources, including ebooks, journal articles, reference works, and protocols. - Web of Science: Core Collection This link opens in a new window
Access the world’s leading scholarly literature in the sciences, social sciences, arts, and humanities and examine proceedings of international conferences, symposia, seminars, colloquia, workshops, and conventions.
Scholarly, Professional, Popular? Evaluate:
What kind of information do you need? If you are writing for a class assignment, you may be required to use peer-reviewed ("refereed") or scholarly sources. In any case, you should always look for sources that are authoritative.
Scholarly Checklist -- Look for:
- Authors listed, with credentials
- Bibliography, references, or works cited
- Reviewed by peers or experts in the subject
- Published by a reputable publisher
- Purpose is to inform or impart knowledge, not to sell, persuade, entertain
- Appears impartial--few or no advertisements, no emotional language, unbiased
- Includes data, observations, statistics, or graphics to support conclusions
- Includes specialized or technical language or concepts
Authoritative Checklist -- A source can have authority even if it isn't scholarly.
- Author and/or publisher is an expert on the subject, for example:
- Manufacturer's catalogs
- Legal or regulatory information
- Author's affiliations and contact information are available
- Publisher or sponsoring organization is reputable (e.g., for websites, look for the domain; .gov or .edu sites are more likely to contain unbiased information)
- Cites scholarly or high-quality sources in references list/bibliography
Other Criteria to Consider -- These are not definitive, but worthy of consideration:
- Do you see errors in spelling, grammar, data?
- Is the publication in turn cited by other credible works published later?
- How current is the information? (No date? Be suspicious.)