GEOBASE — geography, geology, oceanography, international development

The Penn Libraries have added GEOBASE to its collection of online article indexes. This new database brings coverage for ecology, geology, geomechanics, oceanography, human and physical geography, and international development.

GEOBASE, produced by Elsevier, merges into one database the contents of seven print abstract and indexing journals:

• Ecological Abstracts — covering global and general ecology, marine ecology, tidal & estuarine ecology, freshwater ecology, terrestrial ecology, general microbial ecology, weeds pests and diseases, pollution, nature conservation, economic ecology, evolution & palaeoecology, general theory & methods. (~960,000 records, 1974-present)

• Geographical Abstracts : Physical Geography — covering Earth studies, synoptic geography, landforms, the Quaternary, sedimentology, soils, hydrology, meteorology and climatology, remote sensing, mapping and GIS. (1989-present, ~930,000 records)

• Geographical Abstracts : Human Geography — covering theoretical geography, methodology and techniques, envirnoment, environmental resources and resources management, historical geography, population geography, people and regions, rural studies, urban studies, national, regional, and community planning, environmental planning, exchange and development, agriculture, iindustry and services, transport and communications, and recreational geography. (1989-present, ~865,000 records)

• Geological Abstracts — covering mineralogy, geochemistry, geochronology, igneous, metamorphic, and sedimentary geology, stratigraphy, the Quaternary, palaeontology, regional geography, structural geology and tectonics, geophysics, seismology, engineering geology, environmental geology, economic geology, energy sources, and extraterrestrial geology. (1989-present, ~810,000 records)

• Geomechanics Abstracts — covering tectonics and structural geology, hydrogeology, properties of rocks and soils, in-situ stress, site investigation and field observation, analysis techniques and design methods, rock breakage and excavation, rock and soil reinforcement and support, surface structures, and excavations. (1997-present, ~140,000 records)

• Oceanographic Literature Review — covering all fields of oceanography including science, mathematics and methods as well as policy, laws, economics and resource management. (1993-present, ~400,000 records)

International Development Abstracts — covering topics and issues relating to developing countries, including agriculture and rural development, environment and development, industrial policy, social policies such as health, housing, and education, health, demography, gender and culture, aid, international relations and politics. (1982-present, ~350,000 records)

GEOBASE is a very large bibliographic database, having ~3,260,000 records describing journal articles, conference papers, books and book chapters. Coverage is strongest for items published since the mid-1970s, with selective indexing extending back to the 1890s. The database adds 200,000 records each year.

GEOBASE is an international database. Only 20% of principal authors are American. China (9%), UK (8%), Germany and Canada (5% each), Australia and France (4% each), Spain, Italy, and Japan (3% each), India, Netherlands, Brazil, Switzerland, Sweden, and Russia (2%) lead the 160 countries represented by GEOBASE-indexed authors. While 93% of its records describe English-language publications, works in 50 languages are represented with Chinese (2%), French, German, and Spanish (1%), and Russian the most frequent.

GEOBASE is hosted on the Elsevier's Engineering Village platform, where it joins Compendex and Knovel, the important engineering databases. The EV interface offers citation downloading in many bibliographic formats, and it supports alerts and RSS feeds. Penn readers will see PennText Article Finder links for locating fulltext among the Penn Libraries ejournal holdings.