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The Library has a three week trial to the eStatement Studies database beginning on Sept. 28. eStatement Studies includes financial ratio benchmarks, industry default probabilities and regional breakouts. Current data and six years of historical data can be exported into an Excel documents.
Please try this database and send your comments to Kendra St. Aubin at kstaubin@bridgew.edu.
Effective from September 28, 2009, EBSCO Animals database has changed its name to Encyclopedia of Animals. Access to this database has also changed. Now, please use the Primary Search database to find articles available in the Encyclopedia of Animals!
From Smithsonian Magazine
Certain travel destinations remind you that you live on a planet -- an old, weathered, tectonic-plate-shifting planet. The Earth has been smothered by glaciers, eroded by wind and water, splattered with lava and slammed by debris from outer space.
Yet these geologic forces have left behind some of the most fascinating must-see sites in the continental United States. Smithsonian picks the top natural wonders in the continental United States.
Among them are Lava Beds National Monument, California; The Ice Age Flood Trail, Washington, Oregon and Idaho; Mammoth Cave National Park, Kentucky; and San Andreas Fault at the Carrizo Plain, California.
The Massachusetts Department of Public Health (MDPH) has many seasonal, H1N1 and pandemic related educational materials available. All of these materials can be accessed by going to its flu website at www.mass.gov/dph/flu .
The Flu: What You Can Do - Caring for People at Home materials are accessed by clicking on Flu: What You Can Do on the right side of the page under Related Links.
In addition to flu specific materials MDPH has an Educational Materials Catalog that lists the many materials available. This list includes posters about hand washing for instance and information about many communicable diseases and other health topics. Some of the materials are available to be downloaded and some can be ordered through its distribution warehouse. This catalog is available at www.mass.gov/dph/epi. It's the fourth bullet under the "Topics" heading. The link name is "Division of Epidemiology and Immunization Educational Materials Catalog".
Banned Books Week (BBW) is an annual event celebrating the freedom to read and the importance of the First Amendment. Held during the last week of September, Banned Books Week highlights the benefits of free and open access to information while drawing attention to the harms of censorship by spotlighting actual or attempted bannings of books across the United States.
Intellectual freedom—the freedom to access information and express ideas, even if the information and ideas might be considered unorthodox or unpopular—provides the foundation for Banned Books Week. BBW stresses the importance of ensuring the availability of unorthodox or unpopular viewpoints for all who wish to read and access them.
Read more at the American Library Association web site.
Find a list of banned books in the Library's general collection.
Find a list of banned books in the Educational Resource Center collection
From SeedMagazine.com
Since writing a bestselling book on her fascinating and complex extra-dimensional theory of the universe, Harvard physicist Lisa Randall has been busy re-imagining it as an appropriately cerebral art form -- opera.
After three years of development, Hypermusic Prologue: A Projective Opera in Seven Planes premiered at Paris's prestigious Centre Pompidou in June and, like Randall's book Warped Passages: Unraveling the Mysteries of the Universe's Hidden Dimensions, it manages to translate the impenetrable world of theoretical physics into something that not only appeals to scientists, but to anyone willing to look beyond the obvious for clues about the nature of reality.
...As its title suggests, Hypermusic Prologue doesn't simply make art out of hard-to-grasp scientific theory, it inverts and renovates the genre of opera with an experimental score, a two-person cast, and minimalist and abstract stage design.
Review of Hypermusic Prologue: A Projective Opera in Seven Planes can be found in the Nature magazine, v. 460, no. 7252, (July 9, 2009): 177.
This conference is three-day, free, education online conference taking place September 29 through October 1, 2009.
"Climate Change" sessions will be of special interest to educators, entire classrooms of engaged students, and to the general public. Throughout the conference, participants will explore Smithsonian research and collections related to the evidence, impact, and response to climate change. Alongside Smithsonian scientists and curators, you will look at the issues surrounding climate change from the perspectives of science, history, and art.
The conference will show the depth of research that the Smithsonian can bring to a current problem. Smithsonian scientists and other experts will lead participants in explorations of Smithsonian research on this important issue via live interactive presentations, moderated forums and demonstrations.
All of the conference sessions will be recorded for later viewing via the Web at: http://www.SmithsonianEducation.org/climate
Among the many presenters are:
* Bert Drake, senior scientist at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center, who leads two major studies of the impact of atmospheric carbon dioxide on ecosystems
* Scott Wing, paleontologist at the National Museum of Natural History, who specializes in prehistoric plant life and its reactions to climate change
* Charles Duncan, collections specialist at the Archives of American Art, who will explore the intersections of art, communications, and ecology.
* Tricia Edwards, educator at the Lemelson Center at the National Museum of American History, who will focus on the work of young inventors concerned with sustainability issues.
Registration is open to everyone at:
It happened 2.3 million light years away and took 3 billion years: time-lapse picture shows one galaxy eating up another.
By Steve Connor SCIENCE EDITOR
The Independent (London)
As cosmic events go, this one is hard to beat. Scientists have built up a dramatic time-lapse picture of one galaxy swallowing up another in a cannibalistic act that takes place over a period of 3 billion years - about as long as it took for slime-like Earthlings to evolve into humans.
Astronomers have been able to witness a feature of galaxy evolution that they have long suspected, but have been unable to visualise, in which one swirling mass of stars devours another that has come within its gravitational sphere of influence.
A telescopic study of the Andromeda galaxy some 2.3 million light years away, the nearest spiral galaxy to our own Milky Way that can be seen with the naked eye, has exposed the galaxy's immense gravitational tides that are eating away at the smaller Triangulum galaxy as it slowly orbits its master.
The full article is available in the Library's LexisNexis database.
The Library of Congress today [September 15, 2009] demonstrated the potential offered by the World Digital Library to enrich the learning of students, both in the classroom and at home, for more than 100 guests in the Library’s Thomas Jefferson Building.
"The world’s greatest treasures, once only available through an in-person visit to a national library or museum in their home nations, now are available to anyone in the world with Internet access," said Librarian of Congress James H. Billington. "And through our joint venture with UNESCO and 49 partner institutions in 32 nations, this information can be obtained in any of seven languages."
The WDL functions in seven languages – Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Portuguese, Russian, and Spanish – and includes content in several dozen languages. The site offers browse and search features that facilitate cross-cultural and cross-temporal exploration. Descriptions of each item, and videos with expert curators speaking about selected items, provide context for users, and are intended to spark curiosity and encourage both students and the general public to learn more about the cultural heritage of all countries.
This is the first program of the Meet the Author Series at the Northeastern University.
Author Ellen Reeves
Wednesday, September 23 @ Noon
440 Egan Center
Reeves, a Northeastern alumnus and job hunting expert, shares her advice on finding, landing, and keeping your first 'real' job. She gives advice on: cleaning up your online act, using a professional email address, crafting your best resume, dressing your best for interviews, networking effectively, and avoiding emailing hundreds of resumes.
"If you're looking for a job, you need this book. And now for a confession: After reading it, I tweaked my own resume!"-Doug Hirschhorn, Ph.D., Executive Performance Coach and Author of Street Smarts
Sponsored by Northeastern University Libraries, Northeastern Career Services, and the Northeastern Bookstore.
From MMWR (Morbility and Mortality Weekly Report)
The first 2009 pandemic influenza A (H1N1) virus infections were identified in the United States in April 2009 (1). By August, the cumulative number of infections in the United States was estimated to be at least 1 million.* This report provides an overview of influenza activity during April--August 2009 and recommendations for the upcoming 2009--10 influenza season. Pandemic H1N1 influenza activity peaked in the United States during May and June and declined during July and early August. However, levels of influenza activity remained above normal for summer months, and focal outbreaks were reported throughout the summer. During the last 2 weeks of August, pandemic H1N1 influenza activity increased in certain areas of the United States. Clinicians and public health officials should be aware that these recent increases might signal an early start to the 2009--10 influenza season, with pandemic H1N1 influenza viruses predominating at least initially.
MMWR can also be accessed from the Library's A to Z Journal and Newspaper Ttitle List.
A link to this portal is now available in the Biological Sciences Quick Study Guide. It's located in the Web Resources section.
The site (www.ebscohost.com/flu) will provide evidence-based clinical information from DynaMed™ and Nursing Reference Center™, EBSCO’s clinical and nursing point-of-care databases, along with patient education information in 17 languages from Patient Education Reference Center™.
The goal of the site is to be open to all and easy to share among medical colleagues, parents, students, faculty, employees and co-workers so that preventative measures are well-known and symptoms and treatment options are understood.
This free web site is made available by EBSCO in response to the public concern about Pandemic H1N1 and the upcoming flu season.
We are pleased to invite you to attend a Panel Discussion on the issue of landmines in Cambodia. The panel is being organized in conjunction with an exhibit currently displayed in the Maxwell Library, "Living With Landmines: Portraits of Cambodians." This powerful exhibit (brought here with the great efforts of Mary Beth Alger and Michael Somers) includes images shot by acclaimed photographer Mr. Tony Hauser. Mr. Hauser will join a panel of BSC faculty, including Jabbar Al-Obaidi, Wing-kai To, and Jonathan White for a discussion of his photographs and the issue of landmines in Cambodia. Please join us in the Maxwell Library Lecture Hall at 4:00PM on Wednesday, Sept 16th and please encourage your students to attend.
More information can be found on Mr. Hauser's work and the library exhibit at the below links:
http://www.vtonyhauser.com
http://library.bridgew.edu/mt/max/2009/09/landmines_exhibit.html
First photons, atoms and molecules. Now physicists want to create a quantum superposition of a virus, which will allow them to perform Schrodinger's Cat experiment for real.
One of the great challenges for quantum physicists is to find quantum behaviour in macroscopic objects. There are obvious examples of quantum behaviour on a large scale, such as superconductivity and superfluidity, but physicists want more.
Having created quantum superpositions of photons, electrons, atoms and even molecules, one of the current obsessions is to create a quantum superposition of a living thing, such as a virus. The question is how to do this and whether it makes any sense to say these things are living at all.
A couple of years ago the US Environmental Protection Agency reported that the energy consumption associated with data centers had doubled between 2000 and 2006, reaching some 60 billion kWh in 2006, roughly 1.5 per cent of the entire US energy use. The EPA says this is expected to double again by 2010.
The report triggered a flurry of interest in ways to reduce consumption. However, Stavros Harizopoulos from HP Labs in Palo Alto and buddies say that almost all the attention has focused on hardware fixes. At the chip level, this means things like dynamic voltage and frequency scaling (DVFS), clock routing optimizations, low-power logic and asymmetric multi-cores. At the platform level they've suggested things like dynamically turning off DRAM, disk speed control and disk spin down.
But what of software fixes? Harizopoulos and co say far less work has been done in this area, partly because there are limited ways in which programmers can control the power hungry process that go on in silico.
The Library has a 60 day trial of AtoZ Maps Online.com through a link on the Library’s home page. The database includes outline maps, political maps, physical maps, thematic maps, climate change maps, environment maps, historic maps, hurricane maps, earthquake maps, volcano maps, fire maps, animal and plant species distribution maps, current event maps, geology maps, topographic maps, and weather maps. All users can download and use any of the many tens of thousands of maps in any way they wish, including use in print and electronic reports. Additional features include 2,700 flag images and icons, 300 geography crossword puzzles, 267 geography lesson plans, 30 interactive geography games quizzes and learning tools, and 14 geography, cartography, GIS and other glossaries.
Please use this resource and send your comments to Kendra St. Aubin at kstaubin@bridgew.edu
The trial will end on November 8th, 2009.
The exhibit is entitled "Living With Landmines: Portraits of Cambodians." The photographer is V. Tony Hauser whose powerful social commentary photography has traveled the world and won many awards. There are two copies of the exhibit currently traveling across North America and Europe. Arranged by Dr. Jonathan White, we are fortunate to have one copy with us this month until September 24th. The exhibit is being housed on the 3rd Floor of the Maxwell Library (turn left at the top of the stairs and it is on the far wall in front of you). To learn more about the exhibit, you can view a description here and click on the top left where it says "Living with Land Mines Exhibition."
http://maxwell.bridgew.edu/login?url=http://atoz.ebsco.com.libserv-prd.bridgew.edu/link.asp?id=3490&sid=156676396&rid=532938&urlSource=AtoZ&lang=en
... Philosophers and biologists have ... for centuries [noted] that humans are universally drawn to music. It consoles us when we are sad, pumps us up in happier times and bonds us to others ...
Some scientists conclude that music's influence may be a chance event, arising from its ability to hijack brain systems built for other purposes such as language, emotion and movement. ... But as a result of that serendipity, music seems to offer a novel system of communication rooted in emotions rather than in meaning.
Recent data show, for example, that music reliably conveys certain sentiments: what we feel when we hear a piece of music is remarkably similar to what everybody else in the room is experiencing. Emerging evidence also indicates that music brings out predictable responses across cultures and among people of widely varying musical or cognitive abilities.
The full article can be found in the Library's Academic Search Premier database.
From BBC News Online
Discovered 13 years ago, and officially added to the periodic table just weeks ago, element 112 finally has a name. It will be called "copernicium," with the symbol Cp, in honour of the astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus.
Copernicus deduced that the planets revolved around the Sun, and finally refuted the belief that the Earth was the centre of the Universe.
... The International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) will officially endorse the new element's name in six month's time in order to give the scientific community "time to discuss the suggestion."
Thanks to all the students who stopped by the Opening Day information table yesterday, grabbed a cookie or filled out an entry form for the Library’s raffle. You made this a successful event and we appreciate your participation! There were more than 100 entry forms completed and the students who won prizes have been contacted. On behalf of the entire staff at Maxwell Library, we wish you success this semester. Remember to drop by and get smart at The Max!
Mike Somers
Director, Library Services
A show of new paintings by Providence-based artist Terry Rose opens at the Anderson Gallery on Wednesday, September 3 and remains open until Friday, October 2nd. This is the first time the works of this artist have been shown on a college campus. A reception for the artist is scheduled for Thursday, September 10 from 4:30 until 6:00 at the Anderson Gallery.
The magnificent paintings comprising "Beyond Possibilities" hover between abstraction and representation. On the one hand, the works are subtle and intricate arrangements of color, shape and nuanced manipulations of perceived space. But on the other, the paintings evoke such imagery as microscopic life, spores, clouds, dark voids and atmospheres. These images appear to morph before our eyes, to dissolve and reform, to come in and out of focus. To create his floating worlds, Rose coats an aluminum panel with wet varnish and then drips varnish oils, inks, micron pigments (solutions that contain suspended particulate matter), and enamel into it.
The gallery is open Monday through Friday from 8:00 a.m. until 4:00 p.m. Questions, please call X2766.
by Guy L. Clifton, M.D
Rutgers University Press, 2009
By 2018 Medicare and Medicaid will consume about one-third of the federal budget. American businesses now pay three times as much of their payroll for health care as global competitors, a figure that is expected to worsen as health care grows at twice the rate of the U.S. economy.
In Flatlined, Author Guy L. Clifton, M.D lifts the veil of secrecy on twenty-first century health care and delves into the realities of good people caught in a bad medical system. Arguing that a lack of coordinated care and quality medical practice benchmarks result in high levels of redundancy and ineffectiveness, Clifton proposes that the key to reducing health care costs, improving quality, and financially protecting the uninsured, is to reduce wastefulness, and offers a solution for achieving success.
The September eBook of the Month is provided through the generous support of Rutgers University Press. This ebook will be available with free, unlimited access September 1-30, 2009. You can go the Library's NetLibrary web site to read this book online. (If the link doesn't work, please use the refresh button to reload the page.)
Starting from Setember 1st, 2009, you will see this new interface in action when you search any one of the Gale's InfoTrac Databases including Academic OneFile, General OneFile, Health Reference Center Academic, General Business File ASAP, Gale Virtual Reference Library, Educator's Reference Complete, Student Edition, The New York Times, Expanded Academic ASAP, General Reference Center Gold, and Massachusetts History Online.
What are the key features:
■ Color-coded tabbed results for easy clarification
■ Citation generation in multiple formats including MLA and APA
■ Helpful user-interface and document tools
■ Search Within Results
■ Visual searching
■ Language translator into 8 languages including Spanish, French, simplified Chinese, and more
■ Instantly access content in multiple Gale databases from a single starting point
■ Simplified browsing and allowing for refined browsing by subject and publication type
■ Allowing to create individual account profiles, save searches, and receive search alerts with RSS export
■ Enhanced search results that incorporate context-sensitive multimedia, including
images, video and podcasts
■ Web 2.0 sharing tools, including Del.icio.us, MySpace, Reddit, Digg, Facebook, Newsvine and more
If you would like to learn more about these new features, please contact a reference librarian. Navigation Guide and PowerSerach Basic are also available.
