Handbook of the Birds of the World, and Handbook of the Mammals of the World

The Balfour Library purchases each volume in both of these book series as they are published.

We are very sorry that the receipt of Handbook of the Birds of the World, vol. 15: Weavers to New World warblers was so delayed, but it is now available in the library. Vol. 16: Tanagers to New World blackbirds, is due to be published imminently and we will let you know when it has arrived in a New Acquisitions post on this blog. These vols. are kept in the Quarto (large size) section of the library, just inside the main doors, at shelfmark range qK (47-63). Vol. 16 will conclude this series.

Handbook of the Mammals of the World, vol. 2: Hoofed mammals, is now available in the library. This series is also kept in the Quarto section of the library, at shelfmark range qY (19-).

These vols. are for reference use only in the library.

For more information on these series, please see the publisher Lynx Edicions' website at: http://www.lynxeds.com/

New acquisitions

New books purchased:

Developmental plasticity and evolution, by Mary Jane West-Eberhard. New York, NY: Oxford University Press; 2003. Balfour Library shelfmark: EO (308ii-iii).

Handbook of the mammals of the world. 2. Hoofed mammals. Chief editors Don E. Wilson, Russell A. Mittermeier. Barcelona: Lynx Edicions; 2011. Balfour Library shelfmark: qY (20) (Quarto, large size shelves).

Meiofauna marina: biodiversity, morphology and ecology of small benthic organisms. Vol. 19. Chief editors Andreas Schmidt-Rhaesa, Kai Horst George, M. Antonio Todaro. Munich: Verlag Dr. Friedrich Pfeil; 2011. Balfour Library shelfmark: GHN (129xviiii). 

Donations:

Five weeks with Lapland birds: an account of the Cambridge Lapland Expedition 1955, by S. J. J. F. Davies. Perth, WA: Curtin University of Technology; 2010. Balfour Library shelfmark: qKZ.4 (34) (Quarto, large-size shelves).

New theses:

Ant community structure in the high canopy of lowland dipterocarp forest, by Kalsum binti Mohd Yusah. Cambridge; 2011. Balfour Library shelfmark: Thesis (502) (Library Office).

Boldness and social interactions in three-spined stickleback (Gasterosteus aculeatus), by Jennifer Harcourt. Cambridge; 2010. Balfour Library shelfmark: Thesis (499) (Library Office).

Cooperation in cleaner fish mutualisms: the role of repeated interactions, by Jennifer Oates. Cambridge; 2011. Balfour Library shelfmark: Thesis (504) (Library Office).

The evolution of gene regulation in Diptera: a study of molecular antagonists of the achaete-scute genes and their role in the evolution of thoracic bristle patterns, by Marta Costa. Cambridge; 2011. Balfour Library shelfmark: Thesis (500) (Library Office).

Genetic architecture and ecological speciation in Heliconius butterflies, by Richard Montague Merrill. Balfour Library shelfmark: Thesis (498) (Library Office).

Migratory strategies and population dynamics in the black-tailed godwit (Limosa limosa), by Charlotte H. Chang. Cambridge; [2011]. (M.Phil.) Balfour Library shelfmark: Thesis (500) (Library Office).

Worldwide MHC class I and II diversity in humans, by Nouar Qutob. Cambridge; 2010. Balfour Library shelfmark: Thesis (501) (Library Office).

Christmas vacation borrowing from the University Library

Christmas vacation borrowing for undergraduates begins at the

University Library from Friday 18th November. The return date will be set at Thursday 19th January, 2012. 

Undergraduates may borrow up to five books between these dates, and must be aware that the books are subject to recall throughout the vacation. Books may be returned by secure post to the following address:

Book Returns

Cambridge University Library

West Road

Cambridge

CB3 9DR

The UL offers vacation borrowing over the Christmas and Easter vacations. It does not offer an extended loan period during the long summer vacation, but all current undergraduates may borrow for the normal two week period throughout the long vac.

Readers who normally borrow for eight weeks will see no change in their borrowing allowances.

How students do their academic reading - survey with prizes to win

I've been asked to pass on this message, intended for undergraduate and postgraduate students:

Hello fellow hard working readers,

Would you like to have less competition for core books on your reading lists? Would you like to have access to easier library tools and spend less time on finding reading materials? Would you like to have a clearer picture of what to read and when?

Don't we all? And this is just the tip of the iceberg.

A current Arcadia (UL/CARET) project is currently doing research into how students like you do their academic reading here in Cambridge, in order to help solve problems just like these, and to help shape a modern 21st century library experience. But we can't do a good job without understanding how students read every day, what are your real life needs, what are the ups and downs, and how do you deal with current problems around reading. So if you have a little time, we would be extremely grateful if you could help out. You can help in many ways, and there are cool prizes up for grabs too, like Amazon Kindles, book tokens and Amazon  vouchers.

You can sign up and learn more about the research here:

http://camreading.tumblr.com/helpout

Looking forward to hearing from you,

Oszkar Nagy

Arcadia Fellow - Student Reading in Theory and Practice project

oszkar@caret.cam.ac.uk

Rare book on display in the Library

There is now a different book on display in the Library: Elementa ornithologica iconibus vivis coloribus expressis illustrata. Edicio secunda, by Jacob Christian Schaeffer. Ratisbonae, Typis Breitfeldianis, 1779.

Balfour Library shelf mark:  qK (8).

The book is open at: Plate 38: Cockerel. This is a beautiful, hand coloured engraving of the bird, skilfully rendering all the colours of its bright and varied plumage. He is so lifelike that he appears to be strutting right off the page. The plate includes a diagram of the bird’s tongue, and this was included for most of the birds illustrated throughout this work. It was erroneously assumed that if songbirds in particular were to speak, it was necessary to ‘loosen’ their tongues.

Jacob Christian Schaeffer (1718-1790) was a German dean, professor, botanist, mycologist, entomologist, ornithologist andinventor. He studied theology at the University of Halle, became a teacher in Ratisbon, and eventually became an extraordinary professor. He was also awarded the titles of Doctor of Philosophy and Doctor of Divinity by two German universities and became Pasteur in Ratisbon in 1779.

In Elementa ornithologica Schaeffer organised birds according to his own system of classification.  He divided birds into two classes, Nudipedes (those with naked legs) and Plumipedes (with feathered legs). These two groups more or less correspond to the Land and Water birds classification of previous authors.

Schaeffer published several works, including this one, as well as Elementa entomologica in 1776, of which the Balfour Library owns a copy. He was aware of the difficulties in hand-colouring the engravings in the works he published and recommended that colour charts be made: he suggested that fixed criteria for discerning different colours should be defined, that each defined colour should be given an unambiguous name, and that this combination of colour and name should be made available to the public by way of samples. When it came to mixing the colours for the charts, he recommended that one should imitate as closely as possible the colours that one found in plants and animals.

Schaeffer also experimented with electricity and optics, tried to manufacture his own lenses and paper, and became famous for having made one of the first washing machines!

Sources:

Tim Birkhead. The wisdom of birds: an illustrated history of ornithology. London: Bloomsbury; 2008. Balfour Library shelfmark: K (227). (An illustration of a starling from this work is included in this book on p. 251).

International League of Antiquarian Booksellers http://www.ilab.org/index.php

Jacob Christian Schäffer. Wikipedia article at

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacob_Christian_Sch%C3%A4ffer

Kärin Nickelsen. The challenge of colour: eighteenth-century botanists and the hand-colouring of illustrations. Annals of Science, Volume 63, Number 1/January 2006, pp. 3-23. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00033790500151177 

Michael Walters. A concise history of ornithology: the lives and works of its founding figures. London: Christopher Helm; 2003. Balfour Library shelfmark: K (225).

Having trouble accessing ejournal@cambridge via Lapwing? Use eduroam.

I've discovered that it isn't possible to download articles from journals via ejournals@cambridge at http://camsfx.hosted.exlibrisgroup.com/cambridge/az from your laptop using the Lapwing wireless network. 

It's all to do with proxy server settings here at the university, apparently. The solution is to use the eduroam wireless network instead of Lapwing.

Eduroam is (according to eduroam http://www.eduroam.org/) 'the secure, world-wide roaming access service developed for the international research and education community. Eduroam allows students, researchers and staff from participating institutions to obtain Internet connectivity across campus and when visiting other participating institutions by simply opening their laptop'.

Undergraduates may think that they wouldn't need to know about this, and I don't think it has really been advertised to them much, but actually it's quite a stable wireless network available in many departments and colleges in the university (including the Department of Zoology), that they may find easier to use than Lapwing.

Potential eduroam users need to do a bit of simple configuration on their laptop before leaving Cambridge to travel to the academic institution they will be visiting - and this is what any student or academic / research staff member can do to be able to just use eduroam in and around the University of Cambridge. For instructions, and to find out which institutions participate in eduroam nationally and worldwide, see the University Computing Service website at: http://www.cam.ac.uk/cs/wireless/eduroam/localusers.html. 

Can I use eduroam to access the wifi newtwork from my smartphone?

Yes, you can configure your smartphone to use the eduroam wireless network. See the University Computing Service mobile devices website for instructions on how to do this for your iPhone/iPod touch/iPad, Android, Nokia, Windows mobile, or Blackberry phones: http://www.cam.ac.uk/cs/mobiledevices/. 

What is ejournals@cambridge and why should I use it rather than Google?

ejournals@cambridge is the University Library's official alphabetical list of all the online journals that it subscribes to.

Most of the time, using a machine on the cam.ac.uk network or on on your laptop, you will be able to simply do a search on Google or Google Scholar for a journal article and then download the full text. However sometimes, having found a link to the article, you may be asked for a password or payment to be permitted to download the full text, even though the journal is subscribed to by the University. ejournals@cambridge gives you the definitive details of what full text coverage is subscribed to, and gives you the links to the full text of it.

So, next time Google says 'no', try ejournals@cambridge!

Available now: a guide to using Twitter in university research, teaching, and impact activities

The short guide to 'Using Twitter in university research, teaching, and impact activities', is available to download as a PDF.

Although it's been put together by the LSE (London School of Economics), it is actually quite a generic guide and can be used by all academics and researchers across disciplines.

I think it's a great resource. After a brief explanation of what Twitter actually is, the guide goes on to cover topics including: 

• Setting up your Twitter account;
• Useful Twitter terminology;
• Tweeting styles;
• Building up your followers;
• Using Twitter for research projects;
• Using Twitter in departments;
• Using Twitter alongside blogging;
• Using Twitter in teaching;
• Resources (such as academics on Twitter, related blog posts, guides and articles).

I actually came across this guide having read a Tweet from a fellow librarian. Click here for more information and to download the guide: http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/impactofsocialsciences/2011/09/29/twitter-guide/

Charles Darwin on Land and at Sea - online exhibition

The Charles Darwin exhibition at Christ's College is now available online at: http://www.christs.cam.ac.uk/darwin2009/

It is based on their 2009 exhibition and celebrates the achievements of one of the most brilliant and influential scientific thinkers in history, and includes a section on his time at Christ's.

Web of Knowledge now available on your mobile - updated post

You can access Web of Knowledge from anywhere at any time using your Web of Knowledge username and password, including from your mobile phone.

It's easy to create an account (which has to be done from a computer on the Cambridge network) - just follow the instructions here: http://wokinfo.com/about/mobile/

I have successfully searched Web of Knowledge (WoK) from my Android smartphone. Since I was logged on to the university's free wifi via EduRoam (or you could log on to Lapwing) I found that I could actually open the full text PDFs of articles I retrieved. I have just tested accessing WoK from my phone while connected to my own mobile phone network and found that I could also download the full text PDFs, for journals where the university has a subscription. I bookmarked the mobile site on my browser and was asked to login using my WoK password as I had previously set it up.

The mobile version has the ability to search within individual products (e.g. Web of Science), as well as the All Databases search.

You can sort, refine, email, add records to EndNote Web, link to full text, view times cited counts, search history.

Pretty impressive?! Give it a go and let me know how you get on.

Rose Book-Collecting Prize 2011-2012

Attention student book-collectors! 

Your chance to win £500 

You can enter any type of collection provided it is solely owned by you and has been collected by you. The books do not have to be especially valuable - a collection of paperbacks, put together with imagination, is equally eligible. 

The contest is open to all current undergraduate and graduate students of the University of Cambridge. 

The closing date for entries is the first day of Lent Full Term, Tuesday 17 January 2012. 

Full details of how to enter are given on the University Library website at http://www.lib.cam.ac.uk/bookprize/