Science Buddies: "Ask an Expert"

I am currently doing research to narrow down my project idea for next year. I was able to do all of my research for my fresh and soph projects without ever buying a journal article from pubmed, etc. but I really want to get to the next level as a jr. I was wondering if you had any suggestions about whether or not it is really worth paying $30-$40 per article to get more up-to-date and advanced info about my topic? Its a pretty big investment especially if I'm going to want to buy 5 or more... Is there any inexpensive way to access these? Student discounts or anything? Its really frustrating not being able to read past the abstract of so many articles.
Any suggestions would be great! Thanks!

Hi mm12024,

I would go to any collage or university library in your neighborhood. Talk to a librarian, they might allow you to read or photocopy the articles that you need.

Alternatively, post the information about you articles of interest here I will see if I can find them for you.

Maybe the moderators can comment on whether I can post the PDF version of the articles that you need here. I am concerned about the copyright infringement.

Good luck,
Rooz

Hello!

I would recommend you to search for recent journals on google scholarly. It gives you a list of journals/articles organized by date.

As Rooz suggested, colleges and universities often have purchased databases that allow their students to get free access to scholarly materials.

You can always ask permission to use their system to obtain full free access to needed journals.

If you check out PubMed, some journals are free online. In addition, you can check out Science Direct for more articles.

Hope this helps!

-Grace

Hi there,

You have already gotten some great advice from Rooz and Grace. I just wanted to expand on what they have already said.

The address for Google Scholar is http://scholar.google.com. You can find a lot of great articles (often for free!) online through Google Scholar.

For those you cannot access free online, a local college or university is probably your best option. If you use a computer in the university library, or even connect yours to the internet on campus, you can usually access all the articles to which that university has a subscription. That should hopefully get you what you need.

Best,
Heather

mm12024,

I definitely agree that by visiting a local public university's library, it would result in a substantial contribution to your project.The weeks of brainstorming and extensive library research is ESSENTIAL for an outstanding project.

If you unfortunately do not live near a university, I suggest checking out your public library's e-resources. I am assuming at least somebody in your family has a library card that you could use to sign-on from home.

Best of luck!
Travis Sigafoos