The Van Pelt and Opie Library will offer a workshop on library databases, provided by ProQuest, from 1 to 2 p.m., Thursday, Jan. 21, in Library Instruction Room 242.
Kimberly Bastian, senior customer education and training specialist at ProQuest, will cover basic and advanced functionality of the ABI/Inform and CSA Illumina databases. The session will include an overview of each system, outlining basic searches and user customization. The workshop will include live demos of the products and time for questions from participants.
The ABI/Inform database includes a wide range of business information from journals, company profiles and industry periodicals, including the Wall Street Journal. Coverage includes 1985 to the present, with some indexing coverage back to 1971. ABI/Inform also includes some full-text material.
CSA Illumina has much broader topical coverage, including the Medline, Toxline, and PsychArticles databases, Plant Science and Biological Science resources, GeoRef, the Modern Language Association international bibliography, NTIS database, and other indexing for aeronautics, space, environmental, automotive engineering, materials science and industrial manufacturing. Temporal coverage varies by database. Some sources index material back to the 1960s and earlier.
The workshop is free, but preregistration is encouraged by calling 487-2507 or emailing reflib@mtu.edu .