Response to the Current Pandemic by the Information Community
NOTE: This news and resource page is being updated daily, as information makes its way to us. The content is not confined just to those from the NISO membership. Did we overlook something that your organization is doing? Please send releases and announcements to Jill O'Neill, Director of Content, NISO, at joneill@niso.org.
May 2020
ASTM Standards & COVID-19 (Web Site Update, ASTM, accessed on May 25, 2020)
ASTM International is providing no-cost public access to important ASTM standards used in the production and testing of personal protective equipment - including face masks, medical gowns, gloves, and hand sanitizers - to support manufacturers, test labs, health care professionals, and the general public as they respond to the global COVID-19 public health emergency. Click “Access” below, register if you are a new user to our reading room and then you may access and download a PDF of the standards relevant to the global health pandemic. You will be asked to login at no cost to you.
COAR Recommendations for COVID-19 Resources in Repositories (Press Release, Coalition of Open Access Repositories, May 25, 2020)
Around the world, research related to COVID-19 is being undertaken at unprecedented rates and rapid sharing of early research outputs at the international level is critically important. Many governments and funders are requiring immediate open access to COVID-19 outputs in the form of preprints, data and so on. With over 5,000 repositories around the world providing open access to data, articles, preprints and other valuable products of research, the international repository network represents critical research infrastructure. However, coordination and interoperability across repositories will to ensure that repository resources are available and discoverable.
Therefore COAR is making the following recommendations for repositories and repository networks (Full text here).
ACM Introduces New Award to Recognize Research that Uses High Performance Computing to Combat COVID-19 (Press Release, May 12, 2020)
ACM, the Association for Computing Machinery, today announced the inception of the ACM Gordon Bell Special Prize for High Performance Computing-Based COVID-19 Research. The new award will be presented in 2020 and 2021 and will recognize outstanding research achievements that use high performance computing (HPC) applications to understand the COVID-19 pandemic, including the understanding of its spread.
RSNA publishes COVID-19 radiology surge and post-surge preparedness guidance (Press Release, RSNA, May 11, 2020)
The Radiological Society of North America (RSNA) COVID-19 Task Force has published new documents on COVID-19 surge preparedness and post-COVID-19 preparedness for radiology departments.
The RSNA COVID-19 Task Force Surge Preparedness document lays out a series of steps hospitals can take to prepare for an influx of COVID-19 patients during the outbreak. These steps include patient screening, rapid triage environments and redeploying radiologists to the front lines.
WebMD Health Services Adds New Series to Help Employees Navigate COVID-19 Mental Health Challenges (Press Release, WebMD, May 7, 2020)
WebMD Health Services has integrated a weekly podcast on mental health issues – including those emerging during the COVID-19 pandemic – to provide employers with timely, evidence-based insights to support their employees' mental and emotional well-being.
Through a partnership with Beyond Well Solutions, WebMD Health Services will release new private custom podcasts weekly on mental health and COVID-19-related mental health topics including techniques for coping, creating balance, dealing with anxiety, insomnia, domestic violence, change in the workplace, caring for the caregiver, company downsizing and more. The series will be available exclusively to all WebMD Health Services clients as part of WebMD ONE, the WebMD Health Services well-being platform.
Gender and COVID-19 (Community Group Resource, Mendeley, May 5, 2020)
A collection of research, studies and other references covering the sex and gender dimensions of the COVID-19 pandemic, caused by the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus. The library is a public group, free for anyone in the world to join, access and add. References—articles, preprints, news articles, blog posts, magazine articles, reports, etc—include those compiled by Dr. Rosemary Morgan at Johns Hopkins University and colleagues from the Gender and COVID-19 Working Group, as well as those from other compilations and sources. The library on the Mendeley platform includes >500 references related to Gender and COVID-19, as well as gender and other infectious disease/epidemics, such that you can locate and find resources, include direct citations and references within your work, and add additional references & folders directly to the group. We invite the community to continue posting new references as they are published/become available, even if also being added to an existing compilation elsewhere.
Taylor and Francis Resume Distribution of Print Materials (Web Site Update, Taylor & Francis, May 4, 2020)
We’re delighted to announce that the print and distribution of our journals will be resumed from 11th May, with the first copies being dispatched by 18th May. We always wanted this to be the shortest pause possible, to avoid disruption to our customers and to support our print & distribution partners.
We appreciate your patience during this difficult time, and will keep you posted with latest news and updates.
To access additional COVID-19 support and resources, please visit here.
CAS Releases Special Report Highlighting COVID-19 Diagnostic Test Research (Press Release, CAS, May 4, 2020)
CAS, a division of the American Chemical Society specializing in scientific information solutions, has issued a special report in ACS Central Science titled “Assay Techniques and Test Development for COVID-19 Diagnosis.” Drawing from global scientific publications, this report provides a detailed overview of COVID-19 diagnostic tests, trends, and resources.
To assist with better understanding of the numerous diagnostic tests available, a group of CAS scientists, led by Dr. Cynthia Liu, summarized the basic principles of molecular and serological assays used for detection of the COVID-19 virus SARS-CoV-2. Their report highlights recent advancements in testing technologies and provides a high-level view of over 200 diagnostic tests currently available.
Pew Research Center: Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) (Web Based Resource, Pew Research Center, Updated May 1, 2020)
The Center’s latest survey research and analysis related to the coronavirus outbreak
From the President's Message (dated May 1): We are posting all of our COVID-19-related findings in one place on our website and including them in our weekly roundup newsletter to provide easy access to our data and analysis. In addition, because we sometimes only scratch the surface in our reports and analyses, our full datasets are available for download or interactive analysis in our online data tool so that citizens, journalists, scientists and policymakers can have full and easy access to everything we are collecting.
April 2020
York University Libraries Creates New, Globally Accessible COVID 19 Research Guide (Press Release, York University, April 30, 2020)
Responding with agility to the COVID-19 pandemic, York University’s Dean of Libraries, Joy Kirchner, has spearheaded the production of an innovative new resource that will be of tremendous use for researchers inside and outside of the University, including collaborators and partners across the globe.
This guide offers a number of recommendations on main sources to consider when conducting research on COVID-19. Importantly, it is co-authored by Librarians Peter Gorman, Walter Giesbrecht, Rosa Orlandini, John Dupuis and Minglu Wang, with contributions from Dany Savard and Anna St.Onge. It consolidates and draws on international resources compiled by many other librarians, archivists, scholars and others.
The guide is structured into various sections...
Biochemical Society & Portland Press Suspend Paywalls (Press Release, Portland Press, April 30, 2020)
...in support of the community, Portland Press is suspending paywalls on all content published across the Biochemical Society’s seven journals until further notice. This means access to articles will be freely available to all, whether working remotely or in a laboratory, across the globe.
Making all of our content freely available means that we are able to support the community in ensuring that everyone has access to the best research and review content, whether they are researching the pandemic itself, related conditions, underlying pathways and therapeutics, or continuing research in other fields. We want to ensure that all researchers are unhindered in their work given the current circumstances.
Pandemic Resources for Academic Libraries (LibGuide, Association of College and Research Libraries, Updated April 28, 2020)
This resource guide was created by ACRL to support the academic and research library community during global public health crises. The guide features resources for distance education and engagement, free professional development resources, best practices, and up-to-date information from public health officials.
Elsevier adds to its extensive free resources for biomedical and scientific researchers working on coronavirus with access to broad suite of tools (Press Release, Elsevier, April 28, 2020)
Elsevier, a global leader in information analytics specializing in science and health, is offering free access to a unique set of biomedical research tools and content to help researchers and life science companies accelerate efforts to address the current pandemic.
The new Elsevier Coronavirus Research Hub currently includes a biomedical database, scientific and clinical content, COVID-19-specific datasets, a biomedically-focused text mining solution and several research collaboration tools, with more tools coming soon.
The Elsevier Coronavirus Research Hub is freely available here.
Scholarly Publishers Are Working Together to Maximize Efficiency During COVID-19 Pandemic (Press Release, Open Access Scholarly Publishers Association, April 27, 2020)
The group of publishers and scholarly communications organizations — initially comprising eLife, Hindawi, PeerJ, PLOS, Royal Society, F1000 Research, FAIRsharing, Outbreak Science, and PREreview — is working on initiatives and standards to speed up the review process while ensuring rigor and reproducibility remain paramount. The group has issued an Open Letter of Intent and is launching an initiative to ensure a rapid, efficient, yet responsible review of COVID-19 content.
The initiative is asking for volunteer reviewers with suitable expertise relevant to COVID-19, from all career stages and disciplines, to add their names to a “rapid reviewer list“. By doing so, these reviewers will be committing to rapid reviewing times, and upfront agreement that their reviews and identity can be shared among participating publishers and journals if submissions get rerouted for any reason.
RDA COVID-19 Recommendations and guidelines 1st release - open for comments (Web Site Update, Research Data Alliance, April 24, 2020)
In response to a direct request from the European Commission, one of the RDA funding agencies, the RDA community answered a call to action at the end of March 2020 and set up an RDA Working group, with 5 sub-groups focusing on essential thematic areas: Clinical, Community Participation, Epidemiology, Omics, and Social Sciences. The initial work was divided into these 5 areas as a way to both focus the conversations and provide an initial set of guidelines within a tight timeframe. Additional themes and details will be added over time in iterative releases of this document.
In the spirit of the RDA community and its open process, we are seeking feedback from the COVID-19 WG members, as well as the whole community, early and often during this process. This feedback will inform the work and will be incorporated into the sub-group discussions, and the next set of writing sprints.
Recommendations: RDA COVID-19; recommendations and guidelines, 1st release 24 April 2020
COVID-19 Research Partnership to Inform Safe Handling of Collections, Reopening Practices for Libraries, Museums (Press Release, IMLS, April 22, 2020)
The Institute of Museum and Library Services, together with OCLC, Inc. and Battelle, announced a new collaboration to support the nation’s libraries and museums as they consider safe reopening practices in light of COVID-19...
IMLS, the primary source of federal funding for museums and libraries, OCLC, a global library technology and research organization, and Battelle, a not-for-profit global research and development organization, have come together to help identify and respond to the needs of collecting institutions. Other federal contributors include the Smithsonian, the Library of Congress, and the National Archives and Records Administration.
Coronaviruses, COVID-19 and SARS-CoV2 Collection (Web-based Resource, Science Open, April 2020)
The current global outbreak of a novel coronavirus COVID-19 has resulted in great volumes of research as the scientific and medical communities fight to understand this new threat and develop strategies control it. Scholarly publishers around the world have collected together relevant research and made it freely accessible to researchers and concerned citizens to support this work. On ScienceOpen we have begun to gather publisher collections of coronavirus literature together with a daily update of new preprints and articles in this super collection to highlight the carefully vetted publications produced by some of the world’s top academic publishers.
The ScienceOpen platform allows you to search within this growing resource, filter by preprint or open access, sort by date, citation number or Altmetric score. Researchers can share with one click, recommend or review articles to help us all improve this growing body of knowledge.
WIPO Launches New Search Facility For PATENTSCOPE Database to Support COVID-19 Innovation Efforts (Press Release, World Intellectual Property Organization, April 20, 2020)
The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) today launched a new search functionality for its global patent database, PATENTSCOPE, to facilitate the location and retrieval of information contained in published patent documents that may be useful for innovators developing new technologies to fight the COVID-19 pandemic.
The WIPO COVID-19 search facility of PATENTSCOPE will provide scientists, engineers, public health policymakers, industry actors and members of the general public with an easily accessible source of intelligence for improving the detection, prevention, and treatment of diseases such as the novel coronavirus.
At the time of release, the new PATENTSCOPE search facility provides dozens of search queries specially curated by patent information experts who have identified technological areas relevant to the detection, prevention and treatment of COVID-19.
NIH iSearch COVID-19 Portfolio (News & Notes, bioXiv, April 2020)
Preprints from bioRxiv and medRxiv are included in the iSearch COVID-19 portfolio created by the NIH Office of Portfolio Analysis. The portfolio is a daily-updated, expert-curated comprehensive collection of publications and preprints related to the SARS CoV 2 pandemic. It includes peer-reviewed articles from PubMed and preprints from medRxiv, bioRxiv, ChemRxiv, and arXiv, permitting users to explore and analyze advances in COVID-19 research as they accumulate in real time.
Contextualizing Pandemic (Web-based Resource Page, Project Muse, April 20, 2020)
“MUSE in Focus: Contextualizing Pandemic” is a small sampling of temporarily free scholarship from Project MUSE publishers on the broad topic of pandemic and its effects throughout history, in culture, and on humanity as a whole. We hope that bringing these pieces together will help to bring historical and cultural context to the current crisis, so that we may look to the knowledge of the past to guide us forward.
We envision this cross section as a place for scholars and generally interested readers alike to begin learning more. We also encourage readers to explore Project MUSE for additional relevant content.
NIH to Host Webinar on Sharing, Discovering and Citing COVID-19 Data and Code in Generalist Repositories on April 24, 2020 (Website Announcement, National Institutes of Health, April 2020)
The National Library of Medicine (NLM) at the National Institutes of Health is hosting a free webinar for researchers to learn how to share, discover, and cite COVID-19 data and code in generalist repositories on April 24 from 2-3:45 p.m. ET.
Researchers will have an opportunity to hear from multiple generalist repositories about the ways each repository is supporting discoverability and reusability of COVID-19 data and associated code. The NLM will also provide an overview of available COVID-19 literature.
The webinar will be available via NIH VideoCast. Instructions on submitting questions will be made available closer to the webinar.
Dimensions COVID-19 Publications, Datasets, and Clinical Trials (Uploaded to Figshare Platform, April 20, 2020)
This file contains all relevant publications, datasets and clinical trials from Dimensions that are related to COVID-19. The content has been exported from Dimensions using a query in the openly accessible Dimensions application, which you can access at https://covid-19.dimensions.ai/.
Dimensions is updated once every 24 hours, so the latest research can be viewed alongside existing information. With its range of research outputs including datasets and clinical trials, both of which are just as important as journal articles in the face of a potential pandemic, Dimensions is a one-stop shop for all COVID-19 related information.
World’s largest AI-powered, expert-curated platform launched to unify researchers across disciplines in their fight against COVID-19 (Press Release, Cactus Communications, April 16, 2020)
As of April 16, close to 2 million COVID-19 cases have been reported worldwide. With an exploding volume of research in different disciplines being added on a daily basis, the scientific community working on this global crisis is desperately in need of help in processing this information—and now they have an AI-powered solution that can process high volumes of research output every day and present insights in a manner that can be consumed by researchers across disciplines.
Cactus Communications, a global scientific communications and technology company, today announced the launch of covid19.researcher.life, a platform that leverages CACTUS’s AI and concept extraction capabilities, along with its large editorial team and network of subject specialists, to offer researchers a single—and the world’s largest—platform for all COVID-19-related research, insights, commentary, and expert recommendations. The site not only offers researchers access to the latest research and information on COVID-19 but also allows them to collaborate and share potential hypotheses and challenges with researchers from other disciplines.
NIST and OSTP Launch Effort to Improve Search Engines for COVID-19 Research (Press Release, National Institute of Standards and Technology, April 15, 2020)
The U.S. Department of Commerce’s National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) launched a joint effort to support the development of search engines for research that will help in the fight against COVID-19.
In this effort, NIST will work initially with the Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence, the National Library of Medicine, Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU), and the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UT Health). The team will apply the successful, long-running program of expert engagement and technology assessment called the Text Retrieval Conference, or TREC, to the COVID-19 Open Research Dataset (CORD-19), a resource of more than 44,000 research articles and related data about COVID-19 and the coronavirus family of viruses. The TREC-COVID program goals include creating datasets and using an independent assessment process that will help search engine developers to evaluate and optimize their systems in meeting the needs of the research and health-care communities.
IET Releases COVID-19 Related Research to Support Researchers in Fight Against Virus (Press Release, The IET, April 15, 2020)
The Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET) has released free access to research on areas relating to COVID-19, respiratory viruses, ventilators and ventilator components to help guide research efforts in the fight against the global pandemic.
By collating relevant content from across the IET’s journals collection and Inspec abstracts and index database, alongside relevant search terms and classification codes, researchers can now access a range of topics relating to technology solutions against the virus. Researchers can also find areas and topics related to their initial search, allowing them to access information that they may not have originally considered or found.
Free Public Data File of 112+ Million Crossref Records (Blog Post, Crossref, April 9, 2020)
A lot of people have been using our public, open APIs to collect data that might be related to COVID-19. This is great and we encourage it. We also want to make it easier. To that end we have made a free data file of the public elements from Crossref’s 112.5 million metadata records.
The file (65GB, in JSON format) is available via Academic Torrents here: https://doi.org/10.13003/83B2GP
It is important to note that Crossref metadata is always openly available. The difference here is that we’ve done the time-saving work of putting all of the records registered through March 2020 into one file for download.
MIT Press offers e-resources during the Covid-19 pandemic (Press Release, MIT News, April 9, 2020)
To address the increased need for digital content and distance learning during the Covid-19 pandemic, the MIT Press is rapidly expanding access to a variety of free content. From making select books freely available on their open-source platform to granting libraries complimentary access to its institutional e-book platform, the press will continue to bring content to readers in a variety of formats.
The following free e-resources have been made available to help those who are working and studying remotely.
Future Science Group's Response to COVID-19 (Press Release, Future Science Group, April 9, 2020)
As a publisher of trusted, leading scientific and clinical research, Future Science Group has made all content relating to COVID-19 free to access in a dedicated content hub, and joined with publishers across the globe to ensure the rapid publication and circulation of new research to support the worldwide effort to fight the novel coronavirus pandemic.
...you can discover the latest coronavirus news headlines and daily updates, and also read more in-depth articles on the pandemic collated from across the Future Science Group journals and eCommunities: all content is fully open-access and free to read, and will be updated daily.
(Special Note: Knowledgespeak news coverage of the above news release included the following information: "Future Science Group will be working with the STM Association to share journal articles via their resource page, and ScienceOpen via this collection. To further aid the dissemination of this important work, all relevant journal content, including back content, is being deposited with PubMed Central, with articles published in full on PMC under a CC BY 4.0 license to allow maximum re-use, sharing and data-mining.")
UC-Davis Researchers Launch New COVID-19 Tracking Application (News Release, University of California - Davis, April 7, 2020)
Researchers at the University of California, Davis, have developed a new web application that allows users to track COVID-19 cases and testing across the globe. The app offers a simple, intuitive way for users to track COVID-19 data at the country, state and county level.
The website app features interactive maps and graphs. It also includes a web address that tracks the user's current view so it can be bookmarked and shared with others. The COVID-19 U.S. map allows users to hover over states with their mouse or click on a specific state to find information on cases, testing, deaths and other COVID-19 information over time. The website uses open, publicly available data from the COVID Tracking Project, Johns Hopkins University and the New York Times.
Managing Your Library's ILL Services During the COVID-19 Crisis (Video, OCLC, April 8, 2020)
OCLC-hosted Webinar -- "Managing your library's ILL services during the COVID-19 crisis" initially broadcast on March 24, 2020; video of that broadcast now available on YouTube. Featured as speakers in the event are Meg Massey, Penn State Libraries, Meg Atwater-Singer, University of Evansville, Jenny Rosenfeld and Tony Melvyn, OCLC. If you haven't time for the full-length video (75 minutes), you can review the slides (PDF) from the event here.
Penn Press Offering Free Digital Access During the COVID-19 Pandemic (Press Release, University of Pennsylvania Press, April 7, 2020)
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, academic research is more important than ever, and the large-scale shift to distance learning at colleges and universities around the world means students need new forms of access to content. In response to these new and extensive demands, the University of Pennsylvania Press is pleased to announce that all content available through the Press’ digital publishing partners will be made accessible at no cost to consumers.
The decision to make digital content freely accessible reflects Penn Press’ key role in supporting the international academic community as it endeavors to perform the vital work of research, discovery and education under current global circumstances. The Press is able to provide this accessibility for scholars and readers with the support of its digital publishing partners worldwide: DeGruyter, EBSCO, MUSE and ProQuest. Members of the Penn community should access this material via Penn’s membership in these services.
Mendel Launches AI-powered Search Engine to Analyze More Than 50,000 Coronavirus Papers (Press Release, Mendel, April 7, 2020)
Mendel, the leader in clinical AI technologies, announced the launch of a new search engine using proprietary AI to absorb more than 50,000 coronavirus research papers and answer questions related to COVID-19. DCM, a global venture capital firm with $4 billion in assets under management, is co-sponsoring this initiative. The search engine is now available for researchers at covid19.mendel.ai.
The search engine parses scholarly articles on coronaviruses made publicly available by the White House. Researchers, epidemiologists and clinicians can now ask questions about COVID-19, gleaning relevant answers in seconds. This is a process that takes humans numerous hours, days, or even weeks to conduct when comparing medical literature. Mendel can answer key questions such as:
- What do we know about potential treatments?
- What do we know about COVID-19 risk factors?
- What has been published about asymptomatic transmission?
- What do we know about the different virus strains?
CRL Partners with EBSCO to Expand Access (Press Release, Council for Research Libraries, April 6, 2020)
On behalf of students, faculty, and staff at CRL member libraries, CRL reached out to EBSCO Information Services to negotiate expanded access to key primary source collections for the remainder of the academic year. After speaking with partners, EBSCO was able to gain rights to offer CRL members access to a number of collections from April 1, 2020, through June 30, 2020.
These resources include article indexes, magazine archives, and research databases. For a full list, please visit CRL’s eDesiderata page.
Links to Covid-19 Data Resources (Web Site Update, Copyright Clearance Center, Last Updated April 6, 2020)
CCC recognizes data creators and data aggregators for contributing to the common good by providing visualizations, dashboards, and access to datasets related to COVID-19 and the novel Coronavirus causing it. Our team is regularly updating this list.
Distribution of AIP Publishing Printed Journals Paused (Press Release, AIP, April 3, 2020)
Due to the impact of the coronavirus pandemic, AIP Publishing is pausing the distribution of printed journals from April 3, 2020 until further notice.
We have made this decision in response to increasing restrictions in global distribution networks, and to customer requests to hold delivery while they are working remotely.
Public Books Database (Web Site Notice, April 3, 2020)
With university classrooms and libraries shuttered because of the COVID-19 crisis, scholars are facing disruptions not only in their teaching lives but also in their ability to access research materials. In response, many academic presses have made hundreds of their titles freely accessible online. The Public Books Database aims to catalog such resources in a single location and to highlight titles of particular interest. We’ll be updating the list regularly as additional materials are made available.
Texas A&M's Joint Library Facility Providing Key Materials Amid COVID-19 Crisis (News Release, Texas A&M Today, April 2, 2020)
Leading research centers have made requests for medical resources, especially medical journals, from the Texas A&M University Joint Library Facility (JLF). The facility has stayed open to provide these resources to researchers amid the COVID-19 pandemic. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Veterans Administration in Salt Lake City and the Environmental Protection Agency are among the research centers that have requested resources from the JLF, which is considered to have the premier medical book collection in the state, and a leading collection in the U.S.
More than 50 medical schools and universities have contacted the JLF about various medical publications. They include the health science centers of the University of Washington, the University of Oklahoma, Columbia University, Yale University and the University of Maryland. Medical groups from the Netherlands and Canada’s University of Manitoba and the University of Alberta have also requested information.
March 2020
A Figshare COVID-19 Research Publishing Portal (Web Site Notice, Figshare, March 31, 2020)
The significance of sharing research is vitally important, now more than ever, which is why we want to help in any way we can. To allow researchers to publish any COVID-19 related research, we’re launching a free portal at https://COVID19.figshare.com/.
The Figshare COVID-19 Open Research Portal will be dedicated to storing and sharing all existing coronavirus research across Figshare as well as all new COVID-19/SARS-CoV-2 research that is submitted in the weeks and months ahead.
Researchers will need to create an account on Figshare and upload content with COVID-19 as one of the keywords on their metadata form and we’ll pull it into the COVID-19 Open Research Portal.
HathiTrust Response to COVID-19 (Web Site Notice - Updated, Hathi Trust, March 31, 2020)
Today HathiTrust makes available to our members the Emergency Temporary Access Service (ETAS), which will allow students, faculty, and staff from eligible member libraries to have online reading access to materials that are currently unavailable to them in their library collections. All users continue to have access to more than 6.7 million public domain and Creative Commons-licensed works. By offering this service, we intend to help continue to support teaching and research at institutions during the COVID-19 pandemic.
ETAS is available by request to all HathiTrust member libraries located in the U.S. that have experienced an unexpected or involuntary, temporary disruption to normal operations, requiring the library to be closed to the public, or otherwise to have restricted print collection access services. HathiTrust uses a request process to verify that the library meets these qualifications and to record information about the expected duration of need.
We have developed a careful and measured approach to this service, conforming to fair use under U.S. copyright law, in order to help students, teachers, and researchers continue to do their vital work.
Coronavirus Research Database Gives ProQuest Users No-Cost Access to Essential Coverage of COVID-19 and More (Press Release, ProQuest, March 31, 2020
In response to the rapidly growing need for authoritative content related to the novel coronavirus (COVID-19), ProQuest is launching a new Coronavirus Research Database, giving all ProQuest users no-cost access to full-text content covering all facets of COVID-19 and related infectious diseases.
The Coronavirus Research Database saves time and improves outcomes for researchers by aggregating authoritative content from ProQuest with content made available at no cost by members of the International Association of STM Publishers – including Springer Nature, Taylor & Francis and The BMJ. Journals, preprints, conference proceedings and dissertations provide comprehensive coverage of COVID-19 and other past coronavirus outbreaks, such as MERS and SARS, for context around the current global pandemic. Full-text content in the database is available either directly from ProQuest or via links to publisher sites.
The database is automatically enabled at no cost for all ProQuest platform customers, and can be accessed at search.proquest.com/coronavirus. Content will continue to evolve as new research and information emerges.
OCLC's COVID-19 page brings together resources to help libraries serve their communities during the pandemic (Press Release, OCLC, March 31, 2020)
OCLC’s COVID-19 page brings together timely information, valuable resources, and opportunities for online discussion and instruction to help library professionals continue to serve their communities during the pandemic.
The COVID-19 resource page offers options to provide remote access to library collections, optimize OCLC products and services, and connect and collaborate with other libraries.
Resources available on the page include:
- Information to guide library professionals through options available to modify OCLC services if necessary.
- A growing list of freely available content, including recommended options to access this content through OCLC services, made accessible by OCLC partners.
- A COVID-19 Discussion Board available on the OCLC Community Center to help OCLC customers share information, ideas, and best practices about how they are responding to the pandemic.
- An evolving list of resources from WebJunction, including examples of how libraries are managing the COVID-19 crisis, links to other library-specific resource compilations, and relevant events.
IEEE-USA Announces Full Catalog of E-Books Now Free for IEEE Members (Press Release, IEEE - USA, March 31, 2020)
IEEE-USA's e-books and audio books help IEEE members in the U.S. advance their careers, work on their soft skills, learn about public policy, even provide a fun distraction – and now, for the first time, the whole collection is available to members for free on the IEEE-USA Online Shop.
The now-free books include titles on careers, skill development and other topics from industry veterans like Caring for Your Project Team, by Harry T. Roman; and The In's and Out's of Mentoring, by Peggy Hutcheson. There are even some books for fun, such as IEEE-USA's first comic book about engineering superheroes, The Slate Twins: Caught in the Currents Vol. 1, by cartoonist Jeff Knurek.
Wolters Kluwer Helps Health Organizations Empower and Educate Health Consumers with Free COVID-19 Video by Emmi (Press Release, Wolters Kluwer Health, March 31, 2020)
Wolters Kluwer, Health is helping health consumers stay healthy and informed about COVID-19 with trustworthy information through an easy-to-understand video, Understanding COVID-19 and How to Stay Safe. The video makes Emmi’s® proven behavioral design and multimedia patient engagement expertise available to any organization globally using current, evidence-based information about coronavirus from UpToDate®.
Open Access to ACM Digital Library (Article, ACM Bulletin, March 30, 2020)
As the coronavirus/COVID-19 pandemic continues, we at ACM would like to do what we can to help support the computing community. Many computing researchers and practitioners are now working remotely. In addition, teaching and learning have also moved online as more and more campuses close.
We believe that ACM can help support research, discovery and learning during this time of crisis by opening the ACM Digital Library to all. For the next three months, there will be no fees assessed for accessing or downloading work published by ACM. We hope this will help researchers, practitioners and students maintain access to our publications as well as increasing visibility and awareness of ACM’s journals, proceedings and magazines. Please be sure to inform your colleagues that the ACM DL is now open, and will continue that way through June 30, 2020.
COVID-19: New Initiatives to Support the ExLibris Community (Blog Post, ExLbris, March 30, 2020)
Today, Ex Libris is launching a series of initiatives to help institutions affected by COVID-19 maintain their relationships and connections. Bar Veinstein, Ex Libris President, hopes that these initiatives can play a part in helping institutions adapt to some of the challenges these extraordinary times present.
Free STEM Education Resources for Young People (Press Release, The IET, March 27, 2020)
The Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET) has released a variety of Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths (STEM) resources for children to support parents in light of the current Coronavirus outbreak.
The IET’s resources provide free home-learning teaching resources and activities for both primary and secondary school children including lesson plans, handouts and videos. They aim to ensure children can be engaged and kept busy learning while their school is closed.
EBSCO Creates COVID-19 Resources Site (Blog post, EBSCO Information Services, March 27, 2020)
EBSCO has worked with its content partners to help expand access to resources during the length of this crisis and has opened up some of its own content during the pandemic as well. These resources are designed to help librarians and library staff support distance learning and remote work and manage stress; they include expanded access offers, open resources and a webinar series. Librarians can use the new EBSCO COVID-19 Resources site to view the offerings and sign up for webinars.
The offers available range from unlimited e-book user access (UU) from a growing list of more than 300 publishers and an easy way to request UU access from Harvard Business Review. EBSCO has also made a version of its Open Educational Resource and DRM-free EBSCO eBooks™ resource, Faculty Select™, available to libraries working to help their faculty create rich course materials.
Wolters Kluwer Arms Coronavirus Efforts with New Global Interactive Map Using UpToDate (Press Release, March 26, 2020)
Wolters Kluwer, Health is supporting clinicians on the front lines fighting the COVID-19 pandemic with additional evidence-based resources in UpToDate® and a new interactive COVID-19 search intensity map. The map helps clinicians and public health agencies track the virus and may support clinicians in gaining predictive insights on reported cases based on clinical search activity from 1.9 million clinicians at the point of care.
CORD-19: A New Machine Readable COVID-19 Literature Dataset (Blog Post, NCBI Insights, March 26, 2020)
CORD-19 is a collection of more than 13,000 full text articles that focus on COVID-19 and coronaviruses and that were assembled from PMC, the WHO, bioRxiv, and medRxiv. To produce this dataset, the National Library of Medicine partnered with colleagues from the Allen Institute for AI, the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (CZI), Georgetown University’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology (CSET), Kaggle, Microsoft, and the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP).
CORD-19 is available from the Allen Institute and will be updated weekly as new articles become available. The article data are formatted in JSON, making the collection ideal for computational methods such as data mining, machine learning, and natural language processing.
Yale University Press Makes Online Resources Available for Free (News Coverage, Yale News, March 26, 2020)
As college students nationwide transition to online classes, Yale University Press (YUP) is providing them free access to its ebooks, including digital textbooks, through the end of the semester.
YUP has arranged with digital content providers EBSCO, ProQuest, UPSO (Oxford), and De Gruyter to make a wide selection of ebooks — typically available for purchase — accessible to students at no cost through their institutions’ libraries. It also has agreements with popular online textbook rental stores VitalSource and Chegg to provide students electronic versions of textbooks that they had purchased but cannot access due to the unfolding pandemic.
YUP also has extended the free trial period for libraries to subscribe to its digital art and architecture platform, the A&AePortal, which it publishes in partnership with top academic publishers and museums, including the Yale Center for British Art (YCBA) and the Yale University Art Gallery (YUAG). Visitors can search and digitally access scholarship and images concerning art and architectural history. Instructors can use the resource to create course packs that their students can access online.
COVID-19 Data Exchange to Curb the Virus' Propagation and Limit Its Economic Impact (Press Release, Dawex, March 26, 2020)
Under the impulsion of the World Health Organization and the European Union stressing the importance of data sharing, Dawex, the leading data exchange technology company, today announced launching a COVID-19 Data Exchange initiative. The platform will be available pro bono to a large community of companies and organizations looking to contribute to the resolution of this crisis. The technology enables the exchange of vital non-personal data to hinder COVID-19’s dissemination and restrain its economic impact.
Scientific communities, hospitals and healthcare operations, pharmaceutical organizations, retailers, transport & logistics companies, specialized equipment manufacturers and distributors, consulting organizations, technology companies and health tech startups, banks, insurance, global and regional health organizations, governmental agencies, municipalities and other public services will be able to securely and easily access, publish, and exchange multiple sources of non-personal data worldwide, therefore acquiring more capabilities to answer crisis-related complex questions, faster.
The National Library of Medicine Expands Access to Coronavirus Literature Through PubMed Central (Press Release, NLM, March 25, 2020)
The National Library of Medicine (NLM), part of the National Institutes of Health, is working on multiple fronts to aid in the COVID-19 response through new initiatives with the global publishing community and artificial intelligence researchers. NLM is expanding access to scientific papers on coronavirus for researchers, care providers, and the public, and for text-mining research. This work makes use of NLM’s PubMed Central® (PMC), a digital archive of peer-reviewed biomedical and life sciences literature. PMC currently provides access to nearly 6 million full-text journal articles.
Following on a statement issued by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) and science policy leaders from almost a dozen other nations, NLM has stepped up its collaboration with publishers and scholarly societies to increase the number of coronavirus-related journal articles in PMC, along with available data supporting them. Submitted publications will be made available in PMC as quickly as possible after publication, in formats and with needed permissions to support text mining.
To support this initiative, NLM is adapting its standard procedures for depositing articles into PMC to provide greater flexibility that will ensure coronavirus research is readily available. NLM is also engaging with journals and publishers that do not currently participate in PMC but are in-scope for the NLM Collection. Interested publishers should contact pmc-phe@ncbi.nlm.nih.gov for information on participating in this initiative. Additional information, including a list of participating publishers and journals, is available at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/about/covid-19.
EBSCO Portal, COVID-19 Updates and Information (Portal Web Site, EBSCO, March 24, 2020)
This Information Portal has been created to support the immediate need for trusted information. It is comprised of news feeds and resources from trusted bodies of authority and the index is in its infancy. Your contributions are needed. This portal will continue to evolve over the days and weeks to come, along with our emerging needs as a professional community. The goal: to provide relevant and reliable information when, where, and how people need it.
Announcing a National Emergency Library to Provide Digitized Books to Students and the Public (Blog Post, Internet Archive, March 24, 2020)
To address our unprecedented global and immediate need for access to reading and research materials, as of today, March 24, 2020, the Internet Archive will suspend waitlists for the 1.4 million (and growing) books in our lending library by creating a National Emergency Library to serve the nation’s displaced learners. This suspension will run through June 30, 2020, or the end of the US national emergency, whichever is later.
During the waitlist suspension, users will be able to borrow books from the National Emergency Library without joining a waitlist, ensuring that students will have access to assigned readings and library materials that the Internet Archive has digitized for the remainder of the US academic calendar, and that people who cannot physically access their local libraries because of closure or self-quarantine can continue to read and thrive during this time of crisis, keeping themselves and others safe.
AIP Publishing Enables Free Access to Content on Scitation (Web Site Update, American Institute of Physics, March 20, 2020)
To support global research during the COVID-19 pandemic, AIP Publishing is making our content freely available to scientists who are impacted.
Scientists and students in affected regions can now register on Scitation.org to activate free full-text access to content during this period. After enabling this access to researchers in China several weeks ago, we are extending this solution to scientists in other regions where academic and research institutions have been closed. This will ensure that researchers have access to the latest content without disruption.
Free Access to the Publication Manual and Other Resources During the Coronavirus Pandemic (Web Site Update, American Psychological Association, March 20, 2020)
To support academic libraries and their many patrons, we are providing temporary free access to the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (6th and 7th editions), the Concise Guide to APA Style, and more than 160 other books published by APA Books through VitalSource and RedShelf.
These will be available for free to instructors and students at participating nonprofit academic institutions affected by campus closures until May 25, 2020.
Coronavirus Research Data Support (Web Site Update, Springer Nature, March 20, 2020)
To support the rapid and wide dissemination of research during the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak, Springer Nature authors can use our Research Data Support service for COVID-19 data at no cost.
Follow the link below to get started, entering code: COVID-19-RDSSPRN on submission.
AMS Response to COVID-19 and Campus Closures (Web Site Update, American Mathematical Society, March 19, 2020)
In response to current challenges that colleges and universities face as a result of the spread of COVID-19, the American Mathematical Society is working to offer libraries and institutions additional support, in line with recommendations in the ICOLC Statement on the Global COVID-19 Pandemic and Its Impact on Library Services and Resources.
We are extending grace access for content hosted on our platforms (including MathSciNet) through the end of May for our existing customers. We will re-evaluate this timing as needed.
Gain Unlimited User E-Book Access from Participating Publishers (Web Site Update, EBSCO, March 19, 2020
A growing number of publishers are automatically upgrading all 1U, 3U and Concurrent Access models to a UU model until June 30, 2020, at no cost*. The publishers offering upgrades are indicated in the list shown on this page. The complimentary upgrade for existing e-books has already occurred from the noted publishers below.
COVID-19 News & Resource Pages (Web Site Update, Association of Research Libraries, March 19, 2020)
ARL has compiled Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) news and resource pages from our member libraries and their parent institutions. These lists are updated daily by ARL staff.
ARL member representatives may access additional information on their Member Resources site (login required) to assist with managing the impact of the COVID-19 outbreak within their organizations and communities.
Peer-Reviewed Research to Inform the Coronavirus Crisis (Web Site Update, BioOne, March 19, 2020)
Peer-reviewed scholarly research and research libraries are trusted guides during times of scientific uncertainty. As the world navigates the COVID-19 pandemic, BioOne is proud to share the wealth of relevant content from our publishing partners to provide support for those working on solutions for this global crisis.
Free student e-textbook programme to give university students and staff access to learning resources (Press Release, Jisc, March 18, 2020)
With the unprecedented impact on higher education (HE) from the coronavirus outbreak, Kortext, the UK’s leading digital textbook platform, in conjunction with Jisc, is launching a nationwide programme to ensure all 2.4 million university students and 217,000 academic staff have access to their key learning resources during this crucial revision and exam period.
Kortext has partnered with the leading textbook publishers Pearson, Cengage, Sage, Elsevier, the university presses of Oxford and Cambridge and others to facilitate this sector-wide support for students during this period of campus closures and the shifting to online delivery of teaching and learning, just ahead of the most important time for many students in the academic year.
Free Resources on MUSE During COVID-19 (Web Site Update, Project MUSE, March 18, 2020)
In response to the challenges created by the global public health crisis of COVID-19, Project MUSE is pleased to support its participating publishers in making scholarly content temporarily available for free on our platform. With many higher education institutions moving into an exclusively online learning environment for the foreseeable future, we hope that easy access to vetted research in the humanities and social sciences, from a variety of distinguished university presses, societies, and related not-for-profit publishers, will help to support teaching, learning, and knowledge discovery for users worldwide.
Read the full announcement about free access to MUSE content. Please contact MUSE Customer Support with any questions.
Oxford University Press Supporting Communities Through COVID-19, (Web Site Update, OUP, March 17, 2020)
We have made access to our resources on coronavirus freely accessible in order to assist researchers, medical professionals, policy makers, and others who are working to address the pandemic. Our Academic Journals website has launched a new free hub of over 2,500 research articles and online chapters relevant to coronavirus and related topics, and we have also been added to the Google Scholar homepage which will help to facilitate searches for coronavirus research and articles. We have also signed a Wellcome Trust statement pledging to make relevant research available for the duration of the outbreak and joined efforts from the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy to make research and data immediately accessible via PubMed Central and other public repositories.
Cambridge University Press Increases Coronavirus Support for Academic Customers (Press release, Cambridge University Press, March 17, 2020)
Cambridge University Press is offering free, online access to higher education textbooks and coronavirus research during the COVID-19 outbreak.
In addition, existing customers are being offered free access to key reference works on request to help them overcome the disruption caused by the global response to the pandemic.
All 700 textbooks published and currently available in HTML format on Cambridge Core – the online home of academic books and journals - are available regardless of whether textbooks were previously purchased.
UPDATED March 19th:
Due to performance issues caused by both unprecedented demand and reported misuse, Cambridge University Press has temporarily removed free access to textbooks. n They apologize for the inconvenience caused, and are working to address these issues so they can reinstate free access as soon as possible.
COVID-19 Resources for Higher Education and Academic Libraries (Resource Page, Ithaka, March 16, 2020)
This web page gathers together resources based on Ithaka S+R’s research and from the wider community. We plan to update this page as new resources become available.
Emerald Publishing launches a fund of £20,000 to cover article processing charges, supporting Social Scientists in making their research on health emergencies such as Coronavirus (Covid-19) rapidly available (Press Release, Emerald Publishing, March 16, 2020)
Emerald Publishing has today announced that it has launched a publishing fund of £20,000 to cover the article publishing charges (APCs) for any research that relates to societal impacts as a result of the outbreak of Coronavirus (Covid-19) and similar health emergencies.
As the Coronavirus (Covid-19) outbreak continues to spread, Emerald Publishing wants to help researchers disseminate timely and relevant findings which will benefit all of society. The company is striving to help researchers in related topics to make their research freely accessible across the globe using Emerald Open Research an innovative open access research platform which supports rapid publication, an open data policy and open peer review process.
Schema for Coronavirus special announcements, Covid-19 Testing Facilities and more (Blog Posting, Schema.org, March 16)
From the Blog Post: [Schema has] published Schema.org 7.0, which includes fast-tracked new vocabulary to assist the global response to the Coronavirus outbreak.
It includes a "SpecialAnnouncement" type that provides for simple date-stamped textual updates, as well as markup to associate the announcement with a situation (such as the Coronavirus pandemic), and to indicate URLs for various kinds of update such a school closures, public transport closures, quarantine guidelines, travel bans, and information about getting tested.
Many new testing facilities are being rapidly established worldwide, to test for COVID-19. Schema.org now has a CovidTestingFacility type to represent these, regardless of whether they are part of long-established medical facilities or temporary adaptations to the emergency.
Publishers Make Coronavirus (COVID-19) content freely available and reusable (Press Release, The Wellcome Foundation, March 16, 2020).
From the Press Release: More than 30 leading publishers have committed to making all of their COVID-19 and coronavirus-related publications, and the available data supporting them, immediately accessible in PubMed Central (PMC) and other public repositories. This will help to support the ongoing public health emergency response efforts.
NISO member organizations who are doing so include:
- Cambridge University Press
- eLife
- Elsevier
- Emerald Publishing
- IOP Publishing
- Oxford University Press
- PLOS
- Taylor & Francis
- Wiley
Covid-19 and OCLC Services (PDF File)
From the Introduction: As the global community continues to monitor the impact of COVID-19, many libraries may be facing closures or other reductions in service. Your library may already be reviewing its plans and procedures. Many of you have reached out to your peers or to OCLC. We are here to help. OCLC has created a list of possible actions for libraries to consider. Each library’s situation is different, so please take advantage of this information to create, enhance, or revise your local plan. You may also want to bookmark this page as we will continue to update it with additional information. If your library already has a plan in place, consider sharing the details in the discussion forums in the Community Center. As always, please contact OCLC if you need any assistance or guidance.
Coronavirus-Impacted Libraries Get Unlimited Access to Ebook Central Holdings (Blog Posting, Proquest, March 13, 2020)
From the Blog Post: ProQuest has partnered with more than 50 publishers to support libraries in providing unlimited access to Ebook Central holdings for all patrons – at no extra charge.
Starting next week, ProQuest Ebook Central customers impacted by COVID-19 will get unlimited access to all owned titles from these publishers through mid-June. This means that all licenses – including single-user and three-user models – will automatically convert to unlimited access during that period, helping librarians bridge the gap for their patrons in this rapidly changing environment. The unlimited access also applies to additional titles purchased through mid-June.
No action is required by librarians to switch on unlimited access – this will be done automatically, and the transition will be seamless for users.
Annual Reviews removes access control in response to COVID-19 pandemic (Blog Post, Annual Reviews, March 13, 2020)
To assist the many students, faculty, and researchers who are working and studying remotely during the COVID-19 pandemic, effective today, we have made our journals available to all (without access control) through Thursday April 30, 2020. On that date, we will assess the need to extend this policy.
Special report highlights potential therapeutic agents, vaccines for COVID-19 (News Release, American Chemical Society, March 12, 2020)
Since the first reports of a new coronavirus disease in Wuhan, China, in December 2019, COVID-19 has spread rapidly across the globe, threatening a pandemic. Now, researchers from CAS, a division of the American Chemical Society specializing in scientific information solutions, have issued a special report in ACS Central Science. In the report, they provide an overview of published scientific information on potential therapeutic agents and vaccines for the virus, with an emphasis on patents.
Free, Real-Time Feed of the Latest Novel Coronavirus Research & News from Across the Web (Press Release, Atypon, March 11, 2020)
From the Press Release: Atypon has created a website with a free, real-time feed that delivers the latest peer-reviewed research, preprints and news on the novel coronavirus outbreak as soon as it is published.
The Novel Coronavirus Outbreak Special Edition feed aggregates content from over 30,000 authoritative sources across the web to make the discovery of related, trusted information faster and more comprehensive for researchers, medical practitioners, and the general public. It includes research that the Wellcome Trust and publishers worldwide are making freely available in the wake of the outbreak...The Novel Coronavirus Outbreak Special Edition feed is publicly available at https://www.scitrus.com/special/novel%20coronavirus%20outbreak.
The social media-like feed of research papers, preprints, news, and tweets related to the virus is driven by Scitrus, Atypon’s AI-based discovery technology.
Hypothesis for Instructional Continuity During COVID-19 (Blog Post, Hypothesis, March 9, 2020)
Collaborative annotation can help connect students and teachers while they keep their distance to safeguard their health during the current crisis. Reading alongside and interacting with each other using Hypothesis is about as close to a seminar-style experience as they can have online.
To support the role that collaborative annotation can play in facilitating expanded online classes, Hypothesis is waiving all fees to educational institutions for the remainder of 2020, and will evaluate whether to extend this as the current situation develops. Existing partners can request a refund or apply any fees that they have already paid towards future costs.