Knowledge index: after-hours access to science literature

TIPS - A p r i l 1985

152 tory action of h e m o g l o b i n on EDRF, w o u l d p r o v i d e a novel therapeutic approach to this problem. F. V . D E F E U D I S

Universit6 Louis Pasteur, Faculti de Mide-

cine, 67084 Strasbourg Cedex, France. References

1 Furchgott, R. F. (1983) Circ. Res. 53, 557573 2 Rapoport, R. M. and Murad, F. (1983) J. Cyclic Nucleotide Res. 9, 281-296

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3 Vanhoutte, P. M. and Rimele, T.J. (1982-83) J. Physiol. (Paris) 78, 681-686 4 Furchgott, R. F., Cherry, P.D., Zawadski, J.V. and Jothianandan, D. (1984) J. Cardiovasc. Pharmacol. 6, $336$343 5 Griffith, T. M., Edwards, D. H., Lewis, M.J., Newby, A.C. and Henderson, A.H. (1984) Nature (London) 308, 645647 6 F6rstermann, U., Trogisch, G. and Busse, R. (1985) Eur. J. Pharmacol. 106, 639--643 7 Martin, W., ViUani, G.M., Jothianandan, D. and Furchgott, R.F. (1985) J. Pharmacol. Exp. Ther. (in press)

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Knowledge index: after-hours access to science literature Those of us w h o work in the evenings, either in the lab or at home, can easily and reasonably i ne xp en s i v el y search the scientific literature. All that is required is a c o m p u t e r (almost any computer will do), a m o d e m to hook the c o m p u t e r to the telephone system, and a subscription to Knowledge Index. K n o w l e d g e Index is available in the US, Canada, and the

UK from 6 p m to 5 am (local time) M o n d a y to Thursday. Slightly different hours are available from Friday to Sunday. K n o w l e d g e Index provides access to the references contained in the MEDLINE database compiled by the US National Library of Medicine. This database contains more than four million citations, compiled since 1966 from approx-

W E L C O M E T O K N O W L E O G E INOEX A c c o u n t i n g s t a r t i n g at 1 8 : 3 7 : 3 5 EST ? B E G I N HEDII N o w in M E D I C I N E (MEDI) S e c t i o n M e d l i n e (1980-) (HEDII) D a t a b a s e ? FIND FSH or F o l l i c l e S t i m u l a t i n g H o r m o n e 6477 FSH 1154 F O L L I C L E S T I M U L A T I N G H O R M O N E SI 7631 FSH or F o l l i c l e S t i m u l a t i n g H o r m o n e

? FIND CADMIUM $2 2276 CADMIUM ? FIND $I AND $2 $3 7

$I AND S2

? DISPLAY S3/NEDIUM/I 3/H/I 1333131 84173131 Reproductive e f f e c t s o f low acute doses o f cadmium c h l o r i d e in a d u l t male r a t s . Laskey JW; Rehnberg GL; Laws SCI Hein JF Reproductive T o x i c o l o g y Branch, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Research T r i a n g l e Park, North C a r o l i n a . T o x i c o l Appl Pharmacol (UNITED STATES) ,Apt 1984, (2) p250-5, ISSN 0041-008X Journal Code :VWO ? LOBOFF 9/11/84 18:39:35 EST Session T o t a l : 0.033 Hours $

73

O.SO User 123456

Fig. I. Example of a Knowledge Index search for references dealing with follicle stimulating hormone (FSH) and cadmium.

~) 1985, Elsevier Science Publishers B.V., Amsterdam

0165 - 6147/85/$02.00

8 Osaka, K. (1977) J. Neurosurg. 47, 403411 90kawuasaba, F., Cook, D. and Weir, B. (1981) Stroke 12, 775-780 10 Mcnhany, M. P., Johns, L. M., Leipzig, T., Patronas, N.J., Brown, F.D. and Mullan, S.F. (1983) J. Neurosurg. 58,

356--361 11 Cook, D. A. (1984) Pharmacology 29, 1-16 12 WeUum,G. R., Irvine, T. W. and Zervas, N. T. (1982) J. Neurosurg. 56, 777-783 13 Lee, T. J.-F. (1982) Circ. Res. 50, 870-879 14 Lee, T. J.-F., Kinkead, L.R. and Sarwinski, A. (1982) J. Cerebral Blood Flow Metab. 2, 439-450

imately 3200 journals. Access is also p r o v i d e d to BIOSIS PREVIEWS from Biological Abstracts, INTERNATIONAL PHARMACEUTICAL ABSTRACTS, PSYCINFO, and AGRICOLA from the US National Agricultural Library. K n o w l e d g e Index also provides access to the ENGINEERING LITERATURE INDEX and MATHFILE. In addition to these scientifically relevant databases, a n u m b e r of b u si n ess- o r i en t ed databases are available. To obtain references from Knowledge Index you direct the communications software of the m o d e m to call Knowledge Index via one of the telecommunication networks (Telenet, Tymnet, Datapac, Dialnet). After p r o v i d i n g your password and account n u m ber you tell Knowledge Index in w h i ch database you wish to b eg i n your literature search. Once in the selected database you use the FIND c o m m a n d to select references on the topic of interest. The search can, and usually should, be narrowed by the use of the Boolean operators A N D / O R / N O T . The search can also be narrowed by specifying the year of publication a n d / o r the author. An example of a search is sh o w n in Fig. 1. Once found, the references can be listed using the DISPLAY command. Three versions of DISPLAY are available. 'Short' provides a reference n u m b e r and the title, ' m e d i u m ' adds the authors, journal citation, and author's address, and 'long' adds the abstract (if available). Fig. 1 shows an example of a ' m e d i u m ' display. At first glance, h a v i n g three m o d e s of display seems unnecessary as we usually want as m u c h information as we can get. H o w e v e r , Knowledge Index charges are based on the time you are connected to the service. Thus having three display

TIPS - April 1985 choices p e r m i t s a cost-benefit analysis as the d i s p l a y of the citations is the most time-cons u m i n g part of the search process. S u b s c r i b i n g to K n o w l e d g e Index involves a o n e - t i m e fee of US $35.00. For this fee you are p r o v i d e d w i t h a p a s s w o r d and account n u m b e r n e e d e d to log on to Knowledge Index and two free hours of connect-time. A very c o m p r e h e n s i v e m a n u a l is also p r o v i d e d . The m a n u a l describes the various databases accessible via K n o w l e d g e Index, a n d details of h o w to effectively search these databases. In a d d i t i o n , the m a n u a l p r o v i d e s information on the communication protocols your m o d e m m u s t use to c o m m u n i c a t e with K n o w l e d g e Index and h o w to call up K n o w l e d g e Index via the telecommunication networks. Alt h o u g h the m a n u a l is quite clearly written, a hot-line telephone n u m b e r is p r o v i d e d in case you have problems, which allows you to get (presumably) h u m a n answers to your c o m p u t e r ' s p r o b lems. As noted above, there is also a charge of $24.00 US p e r h o u r while using Knowledge Index. The hourly rate includes the cost of using the telecommunication network. Although Knowledge Index is not cheap, it is quite reasonable

153 c o m p a r e d w i t h other services w h i c h m a y charge u p to $150.00 p e r hour. A n o t h e r a d v a n t a g e K n o w l e d g e Index has over m a n y other services is the lack of a m o n t h l y charge or a r e q u i r e d m i n i m u m of use. Billing is via credit cards. There are w a y s to keep the c o n n e c t - t i m e charges to a m i n i mum. The most i m p o r t a n t is to plan y o u r search before logging on to Knowledge Index. The objective should be to make y o u r search as n a r r o w as possible. At 300 b a u d (the most c o m m o n speed of telecommunication) it takes about one hour to obtain 100 references in the ' m e d i u m ' format. If you have a 1200 b a u d m o d e m the c o n n e c t - t i m e will be reduced b y a factor of four and Knowledge Index does not charge a p r e m i u m for c o m m u n i c a t i n g at the faster speed. If the search cannot be narrowed, the references can be o b t a i n e d in the 'short' format, r e v i e w e d while logged off, and selected ones o b t a i n e d in a longer format after logging on again. (A nice feature of Knowledge Index is that, if you log back on w i t h i n ten minutes, Knowledge Index returns you to where you were in y o u r previous search.) M a n y North American university libraries p r o v i d e access to

' W e r e c o m m e n d the a d o p t i o n o f this redefinition c o l l e a g u e s in the field'

to our

Nomenclature of adenosine receptors The following comments on the Discussion Point on p u r i n e receptors in a recent issue of TiPS m a y be helpfuP. We introduced the A1/A2 nomenclature 2,3 to explain the existence of the two effects, of o p p o s i t e directions, adenosine causes in the astroglial-rich brain cell culture system. At that time it was clear to us that in our brain cell system and with the ligands then available to us, receptor b i n d i n g studies w o u l d only be p o s s i b l e for the A1 receptor but not the A2 receptor. The ECs0 values for the stimulation action of a d e n o s i n e via the A2 receptor were far too high to allow b i n d i n g

studies. W i t h the various synthetic ligands of the a d e n o s i n e receptors that have become available in the m e a n t i m e , the appearance of the p r o b l e m of definition of adenosine receptors either on the basis of their interaction with effector systems (e.g. adenylate cyclase, as in o u r case), or on the basis of p o t e n c y series of drugs, was predictable and inevitable. We agree that any receptor nomenclature will remain prelimi n a r y for quite a while. Eventually the p r o b l e m can only be solved b y sequence analysis of receptor gene D N A a n d of the corresponding (spliced?) m R N A species in dif-

MEDLINE at substantially lower costs than Knowledge Index. O n the other hand, using Knowledge Index eliminates the m i d d l e man. You do not have to explain to a librarian w h a t y o u are trying to find. It is frequently m u c h faster using Knowledge Index than using the library's system. I have found Knowledge Index particularly useful for w r i t i n g grant applications w h e n time rather than cost is a major concern. Using Knowledge Index can also be quite cost-effective w h e n very specific information about a citation is needed. For example, if you n e e d inclusive page n u m b e r s for an article y o u are w r i t i n g and y o u r card file only has the first page n u m b e r , Knowledge Index can p r o v i d e the last page n u m b e r in less than two m i n u t e s and for less than one dollar. In s u m m a r y , Knowledge Index offers direct access to very comprehensive databases of the scientific literature at relatively low cost. It is a particularly attractive service if y o u r c o m p u t e r is already e q u i p p e d w i t h a m o d e m as you only p a y for the time you use it. WILLIAM

H.

MOGER

Department of Physiology and Biophysics, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, B3H 4H7, Canada.

ferent tissues. For the time being we have to settle for less. As we said, our nomenclature was chosen on an operational basis, exclusively envisaging the regulation of one effector system, adenylate cyclase. Nevertheless, just b y looking at the characters used (A, 1, 2), the A1/A2 connotation appears uncommitted to a particular effector system. According to indications in the literature, it is quite likely that a given receptor type (or even subtype) is capable of regulating more than one effector system. To us it seems reasonable to assume that this could well be the case also for A1 and A2 receptors. Therefore, it w o u l d be useful to redefine A1 and A2 receptors b y series of decreasing potencies of adenosine derivatives, as, for example, established b y b i n d i n g studies carried out u n d e r carefully described conditions (method of homogenization, temperature, pH, buffer

1985, Elsevier Science Publishers B.V., A m s t e r d a m

0165 - 6147185/$02.00