May 1997

News Astronomy Mathematics Membership PAMnet Physics Announcements Conference Sponsors PAM Dinner PAM Open House Volunteer Opportunity From the Editors Corrections Chair's Message SLA Schedule Reports Chair Treasurer

Physics News H. Sylvia Toombs

AMERICAN INSTITUTE OF PHYSICS The American Institute of Physics has made a number of its journals available electronically since the beginning of 1997, many have been made accessible before the tentative schedule dates. Similar to some other agreements, paper subscribers may provide electronic access to their users if they so desire. An institution can register its ip addresses to gain access with no user passwords or names being required for viewing. ELECTRON CELEBRATION As part of the centenary celebrating the discovery of the electron, the Institute of Physics and the Science Museum in London have mounted a web site at http://www.iop.org/Physics/Electron/Exhibition/. This site is being made available in conjunction with an exhibit at the Science Museum opening on April 16, 1997. Additional historical information and resources are available at a related web site http://www.iop.org/Physics/Electron/. NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES For those that might be interested, the Publications of the National Academy of Sciences are electronically accessible at http://www.pnas.org/about.shtml. Free access is available for paper subscribers or academy members. Questions may be directed to subspnas@nas.edu. PHYSICAL REVIEW LETTERS (PRL) Mina Chung informed PAMnet members on March 26 that PRL backfiles were again electronically available from 1995 forward. Files are searchable and browsable for anyone with PRL-online access. Any comments or questions about this publication can be directed to Mina Chung. INSPEC INSPECmatters reports (March, 1997, no. 89) that the Institute of Physics (IOP) and INSPEC are pursuing a joint project for linking citations in the electronic versions of the IOP's journals to the INSPEC citation database. Users can view abstracts of the references to help determine the value of the citations for further research, thus saving them time. This project is scheduled to become available in the Spring of 1997. INSTITUTE OF PHYSICS Our congratulations to the Institute of Physics (IOP) for having been awarded the Corporate Web Site of the Year by the Corporate Publishing Awards on February 13, 1997. Many of us have looked at the IOP's web page for information and electronic access. ARTICLES OF INTEREST The March 1997 issue of Scientific American includes an article by Clifford Lynch entitled: "Searching the Internet : combining the skills of the librarian and the computer scientist may help organize the anarchy of the internet" (pp. 52-56). It's interesting reading and has generated considerable e-mail discussion on the bulletin boards. Take a look at it if you have not yet seen it. Another publication that includes bits of useful information for the physics librarian is Computers in Physics. The Guide to the internet section with the Internet Goldmine is often informative.