Forensic science
From Library Wiki
using databases to find articles
Reference books (use in the library)
Guide to information sources in the forensic sciences. Reference HV8073.H63 2006.
Reference books for standards, data tables, analytical methods.
Annual book of ASTM standards. Volume 14:02 General test methods; forensic psychophysiology; terminology; conformity assessment; statistical methods. (note- contains sections on forensic science and forensic psychophysiology). Reference Q199. A6 2002.
Clarke's Analysis of drugs and poisons. 3rd edition. Reference RS189 .C52 2004.
GC-MS guide to ignitable liquids. Reference HV 8073.N47 1998.
Drugs: Synonyms and properties. Reference RS51.D776 2002.
Handbook of analytical separations: Volume 6. Forensic science. 2nd edition. (good for toxicology) Reference - QD63 .S4 H36
Handbook of basic tables for chemical analysis. Reference QD 78.B78 2003. Also available as an electronic book.
Handbook of chemistry and physics. 86th ed, 2005-6. Reference QD 65.43.
HPLC methods for pharmaceutical analysis. Reference RS 1895.5.H54 L77 1997
Instrumental data for drug analysis. ( Note - we have volume 1 only, of the 2nd edition. )Reference - RS 189 .M54 1993
NIOSH manual of analytical methods. (looseleaf binder updated through 2003). Reference QD75.2 .N15 1994. Current, up to date electronic version now available free on the web!
United States pharmacopeia. Reference RS141.2 .U48 2006. [Standards, assays & other infromation about medicines, supplements, etc.] Also available as an electronic book.
Other, more general,reference books
Advances in forensic applications of mass spectrometry. (Yinon). 2004. Stacks HV8073.5 .A38 2004. Also available as an electronic book.
Atlas of human hair: Microscopic characteristics. 2nd edition. CRC Press. 1998. Electronic book.
Color atlas and manual of microscopy for criminalists, chemists and conservators. Reference - QH205.2 .P486 2004.
Color atlas of forensic pathology. 2000. CRC Press. Electronic book.
Comprehensive toxicology (13 vol). Reference RA 1199.C648 1997.
Courtroom toxicology. Reference RA 1228.H68.
Criminal poisoning : investigational guide for law enforcement, toxicologists, forensic scientists, and attorneys. Stacks - RA 1228 .T74 2000. Also available as an electronic book.
Disposition of toxic drugs and chemicals in man. 7th edition. (Arranged in aphabetical order of the drug name). Reference RM301.55 .B37 2004.
Encyclopedia of DNA & the U.S. criminal justice system. Ref RA1057.55 P34 2004.
Encyclopedia of forensic and legal medicine. Reference RA1051.E54 2005.
Encyclopedia of forensic sciences. Siegel, Sakko & Knupfer. Ref HV 8073.E58 2000. Also available as an electronic book.
Forensic science handbook. Saferstein. (2002). 2nd edition. Reference HV 8073 .F585 2002 (volume 1 only – for volume 2 & 3 use first edition, same call number).
Forensic Service's directory. (Annual). Reference HV 8073. F62.
Handbook of autopsy practice. Reference RB57 .L8 2002.
Handbook of firearms and ballistics. Reference HV 8077. H 43 1997.
Pigment compendium: a dictionary of historical pigments. Reference TP 936. P575 2004.
Questioned documents: A lawyer's handbook. Reference HV 8074 .L48 2001.
Some books in the stacks (a little light reading) (can be borrowed for 3 weeks):
Benecke, M. (2005). Murderous methods : using forensic science to solve lethal crimes. Stacks - HV8079 .H6 B4613 2005
Gerber & Saferstein. (1997). More chemistry and crime : from marsh arsenic test to DNA profile. Stacks - HV 8073 .M763 1997
Lee, H. (2003). Blood evidence: how DNA is revolutionizing the way we solve crimes. Stacks - RA1057.55 .L44 2003
Ramsland, K. (2004). The science of Cold Case files. Stacks - HV8073 .R326 2004
Trace evidence analysis : more cases in mute witnesses. Stacks - HV8073 .T675 2004
Some books, but far from all, have been digitized and are available electronically. The library has bought access to collections including FORENSICnetBASE , ebrary and Netlibrary, as well as individual titles - all are listed in the catalog, CUNY+. If you are trying to access them from a computer that is NOT at John Jay, you will be asked for a password. Use your John Jay email ID and password. Our largest electronic book collection of interest to forensic scientists is ForensicNetBase.
FORENSICnetBASE 120 reference books in forensic science and related fields. All full text. Includes atlases. Includes many important reference books, inlcluding a few listed in the section above. Searchable.
Encyclopedia of Forensic Sciences Electronic equivalent of the 3-volume encyclopedia.
For more books, search CUNY+, the library catalog
Use the guided search screen for more control over your keyword searches.
Examples of CUNY+ searches:
DNA fingerprinting
DNA and forensic
(click here for how to find books and how to read a call number )
(click here for more info on how to search databases effectively, and here for a Boolean searching review)
Many PhD dissertations are shelved at LD 1. Master’s theses from JJ are shelved at LD 2602. J3
More dissertations from universities around the country are available electronically, in two databases
Dissertation Abstracts , and
Dissertations: Current Research (covers CUNY disserations only).
Thesis and forensic
thesis and fingerprint*
the asterisk * truncates – so this search looks for fingerprint, fingerprints, fingerprinting.
(click here for more info on how to search databases effectively, and here for a Boolean searching review)
What are scientific journals ?
Some forensic science journals:
Forensic science international. Periodicals RA1001.F6 (also available electronically from library home page, get access to it through the List of Full Text Electronic Journals )
Journal of forensic sciences. Periodicals RA1001.A57 (there's an Index on the web - click here then click on Journal of Forensic Sciences, but for the full text of the articles, you must come into the library and go to the shelves).
Journal of the Forensic Science Society. (UK publication). Periodicals RA 1001.F63 .Journal of forensic identification. Periodicals HV8073.I3Forensic science review. (very long articles reviewing technical topics). Periodicals HV 8073.F589
American Chemical Society Journals Not forensic science, but very useful! FULL-TEXT articles from the full runs of 25 of the American Chemical Society journals. Includes Analytical Chemistry.
Browsing through journals can be fascinating, but it is not an efficient way to find articles on a specific topic.
To do that, you should use a database to identify exactly which journal issues contain articles on your topic.
Databases for finding articles
Click here for a list in alphabetical order of all the science databases the libary subscribes to. (click here for more info on how to search databases effectively, and here for a Boolean searching review) Below are the most useful databases for forensic science:
Forensic Bibliographic Database (FORS) Multidisciplinary index to the literature of the forensic sciences, 1976- . This is the best place to start searching the forensic science literature. It is a multidisciplinary index, covering journal articles published from 1976 to the present. NOTE; we have access for only 4 simultaneous users. If you can’t get in, wait a while, then try again.An idiosyncrasy of this database is that each record provides only an abbreviation of the journal title – e.g. FORENSIC-SCI-INT; rather than Forensic Science International. You do need to know the full and correct title of the journals – get them from the “Database Information” button on the right hand side. This brings up a new window with a menu on the left hand side – scroll through this to the Full List of Journals with Abbreviations .
Note down the full journal titles for each of the citations you have found. And write down or emailed those citations! Then go to the library home page. Check both List of Full Text Electronic Journals, Magazines & Newspapers and CUNY+ Library Catalog to see if we own the journals. If we do not own it, get the article through interlibrary loan. Or use another library.
SCOPUS Huge new database from Elsevier. Offers access to 14,000 peer-reviewed journal titles from more than 4,000 international publishers in science, technology, social science and medicine; 1960's- While Scopus doesn’t provide full text of articles directly, there may be links to the article – find out by clicking the sfx button below each result.
Science Direct Full text of over 1500 journals in the sciences and social sciences, from 1997 to the present, all published by Elsevier. JJ users have access to 800 of them - those marked "subscribed." But SCOPUS database indexes ALL of these and has a better search interface. So probably better to use SCOPUS rather than ScienceDirect.
Web of Science Includes the Science Citation Index (1997- ) [ and also the Social Science Citation Index (1956- ), and Arts & Humanities Citation Index (1975- )]. Use it to find out who has cited a particular article (this can be a good way of finding related articles). Choose the "cited reference search " tab,
Databases from the National Library of Medicine:
ChemIDPlus, TOXNET, and more. ChemIDPlus is a chemical dictionary file - use it to get information about a compound including structure, synonyms, physical properties, toxicity and much more. TOXNET (TOXicology Data NETwork) is a cluster of databases covering information on toxicology, hazardous chemicals, environmental health and related areas, and includes access to the Household Products Database. TOXNET includes Toxline, which indexes toxicology articles.
Drug Information Portal from the National Library of Medicine gives users a gateway to selected drug information from the National Library of Medicine and other key government agencies. Includes physical, chemical, and physiological characteristics, toxicity, consumer information and references from scientific journals.
Medline (via PubMed) or Medline (via EBSCOhost) National Library of Medicine's database, an index to millions of articles published in thousands of biomedical journals. The Medline (via EBSCOhost) option links to full text of whatever articles are in journals subscribed to by JJ. [Note - we have few medical journals. Search CUNY+ to see if we own the journal - and consider requesting interlibrary loans]. Particularly useful for researching forensic biology, serology and toxicology topics. Very difficult to search effectively, but you will get better results if you use the specialized vocabulary of subject headings (called MeSH – Medical Subject Headings). You will see a link to the MeSH Database in the left (blue) frame of the main PubMed screen (or use the Thesaurus option if you are using the EBSCOhost interface). Use the MeSH database (or the EBSCOhost thesaurus) first to identify the terminology used by Medline to describe your topics, then search Medline using that terminology.
Other databases that may be useful:
General Science Abstracts Relatively small database, covering about 150 major general science journals. Covers Nature, Science, Scientific American and other general science journals. May be good place to identify a general article providing an overview of forensic science topics. Doesn’t provide full text! But we own most of these journals, which are shelved by call number in the periodical area. Get the call number of the journal from CUNY+. (the EBSCOhost Academic database also indexes Nature, Science and some other major journals).
Applied Science and Technology Index Another small database. Indexes articles in applied science journals and trade publications, including engineering, math, physics, and computer technology; 1983- . Good for certain types of forensic science research. Use when looking for info on methodology, or when individualizing products/brands – e.g. deodorants, cigarettes, cosmetics, etc. Most of the journals indexed are fairly obscure - Interlibrary Loan may be the best way of getting hold of the articles themselves.
Forensic Science Abstracts. Shelved near the reference desk (upper floor). Call number AI1 .F6. One of the best indexing sources for forensic science although the subject indexing is overly general. Covers most forensic science journals as well as a large number from other scientific disciplines. Highly scientific. (It is a subset of the Excerpta Medica dataset).
NOTE: Getting the article:
If you can identify the citation for an article, or a book or some other document, but it is not owned by John Jay, we can get it for you! Fill out a request form here . Takes a few days for articles – weeks for books. So plan ahead!
Lists and links to internet sites:
- From the Lloyd Sealy Library's site: Click on Selected Internet Links Browse to forensic science section. (Zeno’s Forensic Science page is particularly good).
CUNY students can use all CUNY libraries. Use CUNY+, the catalog, to find out which CUNY libraries have what you need, and where those libraries are located.
City College Science library is particularly good ( at 138th street and Convent Avenue, Manhattan). Both CIty College Science Library and the CUNY Graduate Center library may have access from within each library to Chem Abstracts - ask the reference librarians at either library. (note: you woudl have to be physically present at each libary to use Chem Abstracts on their computers - no access is available remotely for John Jay students and faculty).
New York Public Library, Science Industry and Business. Madison Avenue at 34th street. Open to all.
WorldCAT database. Use this to find out what libraries in the area have the book or journal you need. We can then give you a one time use pass to use that library, e.g. Columbia, NYU, etc.
