Author: UC Berkeley Library
Data Publishing with Dryad Digital Repository
The California Digital Library (CDL) recently partnered with Dryad to provide enhanced data publishing and curation support for researchers. Dryad is a free service that enables researchers to archive and make publicly available their research data for the long term. Dryad replaces Dash, which was the data repository previously available to the university.
Datasets published in Dryad receive a Digital Object Identifier (DOI) and a citation, both of which provide the data a persistent location, identification, and makes the data citable in future use. Additionally, Dryad fulfills many of the data sharing requirements stipulated by funders and publishers, many of whom may require that data be made freely and openly available at the end of a project or upon publication.
Publishing data to Dryad is relatively quick and easy. As a UC Berkeley researcher, begin the upload process by signing in to Dryad using your ORCID ID. The data is then reviewed by a curator, meaning the data is reviewed and enriched to be Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable or FAIR. By making your data FAIR, others in your area of expertise will be able to locate, understand, and potentially reuse the data you generated. Data that is made easily findable and publicly available contributes to raising the quality of scholarly output by making the process of data production transparent. Funders require data publishing to better leverage research dollars and publishers require data publishing to enhance the quality of scholarly literature.
Please visit datadryad.org to explore published datasets. If you have any questions about preparing your data for publication or using Dryad, please contact researchdata@berkeley.edu.
Getting Your Bearings Library Tours
Join other students and get your bearings with a 3-in-one tour of the Doe Memorial Library, Moffitt Undergraduate Library, and the Main Stacks. See these central libraries and learn about the student services they provide.
When: Aug. 28-Sept. 3, 2019 every day (with exceptions) from 11 a.m.-12 p.m. and 2-3 p.m.
Where: Doe Library; tour starts at the north entrance
Tell us what YOU think! Help Interlibrary Services by taking a 3-minute survey.
Have you borrowed materials through Interlibrary Services? We want to hear about your experience.
Please take our three-minute survey. Our mission is to support your research, and your feedback will help us better meet your needs.
WHEN: The survey opens April 15
WHERE: Take the survey here
Deadline for Library Prize for Undergraduate Research coming up soon!
We are accepting submissions for the Charlene Conrad Liebau Library Prize for Undergraduate Research now until April 18 at 5 p.m. Undergraduate students of all levels and disciplines may apply. We especially welcome submissions from lower division students, whose projects are judged separately from those of the upper division. More details are available on the website.
Works in progress are eligible. Submissions are open to research projects from a UC Berkeley course in one of the following terms:
- Lower division: Spring 2018, Summer 2018, Fall 2018, Spring 2019
- Upper division: Summer 2018, Fall 2018, Spring 2019
Update: Moffitt Library’s first floor reopened after flooding
Moffitt Library’s first floor has reopened after flooding forced it to close last week.
The library will be open for studying for RRR week and finals, although working electrical outlets will be in short supply.
The flooding, brought on by heavy rains, had forced an evacuation of Moffitt’s first floor last week and caused classes held on that floor to be relocated.
Stay tuned for updates.
Update: UC Berkeley Library adjusts hours for Thanksgiving week
The UC Berkeley Library is announcing adjusted hours for the week of Thanksgiving after continued air quality issues have led the university to cancel classes.
(Check the hours page for updates.)
The modified hours for Thanksgiving week are as follows:
Monday
Doe Library: 8 a.m.-5 p.m. (shortened hours)
Most other libraries, including the ones below, are open with normal hours:
Moffitt Library: Open 24 hours
Main Stacks: Closing at 2 a.m.
The Bancroft Library
The Bancroft Library
Bioscience, Natural Resources & Public Health Library
Optometry Library
Chemistry Library
Earth Sciences and Map Library
Music Library
Business Library
Environmental Design Library
Anthropology Library
Social Research Library
East Asian Library
Northern Regional Library Facility (NRLF)
Northern Regional Library Facility (NRLF)
Others will be updated as final decisions are made.
Wednesday
Most libraries are open, but all are closing at 5 p.m. due to the holiday.
Thursday
Libraries closed for the holiday.
Friday
Libraries closed for the holiday.
Saturday
Libraries closed for the holiday.
Sunday
Most libraries open normal hours.
New Resource: ACS Reagent Chemicals
The ACS Committee on Analytical Reagents sets purity specifications for almost 500 reagent chemicals and over 500 standard-grade reference materials. ACS Reagent Chemicals provides general physical properties and analytical uses for all reagent chemicals as well as guidelines for standard analytical methods.
The new online version has integrated supplements and updates to provide the most up-to-date content and includes new benefits such as:
- Mobile-friendly operation
- Live links between reagents and methods
- HTML or printable PDF formats
- Fresh, user-friendly interface
You can search ACS Reagent Chemicals in OskiCat or access it through the Chemistry and Chemical Engineering Library Guide under Properties and Data. Contact the Chemical Information Librarian, Kortney Rupp with any issues or questions.
Cambridge Structural Database 2018 Available
The 2018 Cambridge Structural Database System (including ConQuest and Mercury) is available for downloading from the UC distribution site. The Cambridge Structural Database is crystal structure database, with over 900,000 entries for organic and organometallic compounds.
Downloading CSD:
- You must be on the campus network or wifi or using VPN to access the files on that page.
- Don’t forget the site and confirmation codes, which you can get by clicking Berkeley (UCB) link. You’ll need those codes during the CSDS installation.
- CSDS is available for Windows, OSX, and Linux/Unix. It is recommended that you uninstall CSDS 2017 before you start this installation.
- There’s an additional Windows application that can be downloaded separately. CrossMiner is a “novel tool that allows crystal structure databases such as the Cambridge Structural Database (CSD) and the Protein Data Bank (PDB) to be searched in terms of pharmacophore queries.”
- You can also search the CSD structures through WebCSD, without installing any software.
CSDS Documentation:
- What’s new in the 2018 release.
- Information about CSDS, including links to the specific databases.
- Documentation for CSDS.
Please contact Kortney Rupp if you have questions about CSD.
Indian ambassador to the U.S. visits UC Berkeley Library
Navtej Sarna, the Indian ambassador to the United States, visited Bancroft, Doe and the South/Southeast Asia libraries on Monday.
The ambassador, who is a scholar of the Sikh religion, viewed parts of the South Asians in North America Collection, which is housed in Bancroft, and other Library holdings on Sikhism.
Sarna is also a fiction writer, and four of his works are held at the Library: Two are his own fiction works, one is a translation of his father’s short stories, and one is a short travelogue of Jerusalem.
When the Silicon Meets the Road sheds light on challenges of working with digital materials
The LAUC-B Committee on Affiliated Libraries Affairs (CALA) is pleased to present a spring Assembly devoted to a timely topic, When the Silicon Meets the Road: A Digital Research Reality Check. This event will feature three diverse digital researchers — a law professor, a library web services manager, and an Ethnic Studies librarian — all presently working on digital research projects. The focus of their discussion will be the challenges they encounter working intensively with digital materials, and the solutions they employ to meet those challenges. These solutions require both technological and human resources. A special feature of the discussions will be the fruitful interactions among librarians, students, and faculty on these projects.
Date: Tuesday, February 13, 2018, 8:30-9:50 a.m.
Schedule: 8:30-8:45 a.m. Affiliated business and refreshments
8:45-9:50 a.m. Presentations, incl. Q&A
Location: Morrison Library
Presenters:
Sine Hwang Jensen is Asian American Studies Librarian and Comparative Ethnic Studies Librarian at the Ethnic Studies Library (ESL) at UC Berkeley. Ms. Jensen recently won a Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR) grant to fund the digitization of a significant portion of the H.K. Yuen Social Movement Audio Archive, jointly held by ESL and the Bancroft Library. She will describe her work with the Archive, in particular her preparation of students and librarians to produce reliable metadata to describe and afford access to the newly digitized historical recordings.
Michael Lindsey is Director of Library Web Development at the law school at UC Berkeley. He assists Prof. Anne Joseph O’Connell with her ongoing analysis, further described below, of trends in presidential nominations. In this capacity, Mr. Lindsey develops code to glean relevant data from the Congress.gov U.S. Presidential Nominations database. There is no API for the database, nor does Congress.gov provide access to raw data. To keep the data current, he must monitor the database’s evolving public interface, and in some cases the data themselves, to effectively revise his scripts.
Prof. Anne Joseph O’Connell, the George Johnson Professor of Law at UC Berkeley, compiles and analyzes historical and current data reflecting presidential nominations and their confirmations by the Senate to cabinet, agency, and judicial posts. In addition to traditional legal scholarly journals, her work appears frequently in the Washington Post and, most recently, at Brookings. Despite the ready availability of the data she needs at Congress.gov, she and Mr. Lindsey must work continually to assure its normalization, due to the vagaries of its presentation over time.