Articles - If you are looking for a quick read, breaking information on a very current topic, or some very specific information, an article from a journal (also called a periodical, or a serial, or a magazine) is likely the resource for you.
Citations and indexes - If you are doing in-depth research on a topic and you want to ensure that you find a large amount of the information that is extant, indexes, abstracts, and citation databases may helpful. These will help you find that certain material exists and will help us gain access to it for you, but will usually not link you directly to it. If you find a citation you want to read in full, visit our Interlibrary Loan Guide for directions on obtaining a copy. These requests have to be processed individually by several participants and will take several days or weeks to be fulfilled so they are not useful for research that requires fast turnaround.
Conference Proceedings - Conference proceedings are published in conjunction with a one-time or a recurring meeting focused on a particular discipline. Serves as a forums for the presentation, scrutiny, and discussion of research and are usually peer-reviewed or refereed. These are most often found in academic journal databases along side other academic articles or on the webpage of the specific professional organization who hosted the conference.
eBooks - For an in-depth and comprehensive exploration on a topic a book may be the best choice. eBooks are identical in content to the print version of the same title and ISBN (International Standard Book Number, often found as the barcode on the back cover.) However, sometimes the images, tables and figures may not be formatted correctly or appear as aesthetically pleasing as in the print version. The eBooks available to you through the Mardigian Library are immediately accessible from your computer and most are able to be read by multiple users simultaneously. Often they allow downloading of a certain number of pages and by creating a personal account you can often mark them up online and save your personal notations.
Standards are a set of technical definitions and guidelines. A set of "how to" instructions for designers, manufacturers, and users. Standards promote safety, reliability, productivity, and efficiency in almost every industry. Standards can run from a few paragraphs to hundreds of pages, and are written by experts with knowledge and expertise in a particular field. There are many standards created by many governing bodies, licensing agencies, and accreditors. To see more detailed information on what standards are and how to use them follow THIS LINK. If you are ready to look for the standard that fits your present need click on the "Standards" tab in the box below.
Technical Reports - describe the process, progress, or result of ongoing research into a technical problem; may include recommendations for further study or offer conclusions; usually written by a researcher and often not peer reviewed outside the authors' organization.
Video Databases - These databases contain visual files and can deliver content which may be easier to understand by seeing it. Where eBooks sometimes fall short on the visual elements, video databases can allow you to witness "first hand" things you may ever get to see in person due to safety, temporal, or distance related reasons. These can be especially helpful when you want to see a system in action or when you are looking for easy to follow direction on performing a specific task.
White Papers - Written by industry practitioners or product or service vendors, "white papers" argue the benefits of a specific technology, product, or method for solving a specific problem; present research findings or give a list of tips for solving an issue; or highlight a product or service from a particular vendor.
As used in a library context, databases are large collections of information, usually from varied creators, which are collected into a form that allows them to be searchable using simple keyword searches or advanced search queries using Boolean operators and can be refined with through the use of filters.
The information contained in the databases we provide access to at through the Mardigian Library is wide ranging including: articles, ebooks, technical standards, theses & dissertations, streaming video, conference proceedings, and datasets. The databases that I thought would be relevant to your likely research areas are found in this page, separated by the kind of information they contain and by the format through which the information is presented.
To do research that significantly crosses over into other areas of interest please visit the complete list of databases at UM-Dearborn by following THIS LINK and sort by your subject of interest.
To see the curated list of resources available in every format and for each engineering topic use THIS LINK.
The Mardigian Search on the library's home page is a very powerful tool in that it can perform a federated search of all the materials we have access to here at once. Use it as a starting point to help you find where to start your search but please do go into the individual databases that best fit your information need in order to do advanced searches and return all the best quality information on your topic.
If you are looking for articles you can read, in full, right now, limit your search to "full-text". Indexes, abstracts, and citation databases will help you find that certain material exists but will not link you to it. If you do find a citation you want to read in full, visit our Interlibrary Loan Guide for directions on obtaining a copy.
If you are looking for articles that have been vetted by others in the industry prior to their publication, limit your search to "peer-reviewed only".
