Guide to Science Direct

Science Direct is a database of over 3,800 journal titles.

It covers a wide range of science subjects including Health Sciences, Social Sciences and Humanities, Life Sciences and Physical Sciences and Engineering.

To access the database

  • Go to the homepage of the NICS Library Service
  • Click on the link to Online Databases on the left hand side.
  • Select Science Direct from the list of databases
  • Click the help icon in the top right hand corner for assistance and online tutorials.

To carry out a general search

  • Enter keywords/ author/ journal or book title/ volume/ issue / page number and search.
  • Refine your results using the filter options in the left hand margin by selecting year, publication type, topic and content type.
  • Click relevance to sort your results.
  • "Download PDFs" will download all full text results, or when not available, abstract only.
  • When an article is available in full text a green square will appear beside it, a white one displays if not.
  • "Advanced search" allows you to build a more concise search. You can search journals, books, reference works and images.
  • To search for a specific journal: search for the journal title on the home search. You can browse through the issues on the left hand side.
  • "Expert" search allows you to build a more complex search using Boolean connectors e.g. “heart attack” AND “stress”.
  • Register / sign in allows you to save searches and set up alerts.

Popular Science Direct titles:

Business Horizons
Child Abuse & Neglect
Journal of Dairy Science
The Lancet
Trends in Food Science & Technology

Please contact a member of the NICS library team if you require training or assistance using this database nicslibrary@finance-ni.gov.uk