CABI News

2 March 2017 – The CAB Direct platform, a single point of access to all of CABI’s databases, has been rated as “highly recommended” for undergraduates, researchers, faculty members, technical programme students, professionals and practitioners in the March 2017 issue of CHOICE magazine.

“The newly updated CAB Direct platform provides access to a pair of the world’s most extensive research databases for the applied life sciences and public health: CAB Abstracts and Global Health. Currently CAB Direct contains nearly 12 million bibliographic references (including more than 340,000 full-text articles), plus conference papers and reports published in 120 countries. New material is uploaded within days of publication,” states CHOICE magazine.

CABI launched CAB Direct in July 2016, working with development partners across academia and industry to design a platform around the way researchers work. New features help users get the most out of available literature. CHOICE magazine notes how this enormous collection of scientific research and policy studies has more than doubled in size since its last review of CAB Abstracts almost a decade ago, and details its substantial number of references.

“The interface features bar graphs displaying results by year – a handy visual revealing changing research interests over time. Searching is intuitive and documents load quickly. The online CAB Thesaurus provides a controlled vocabulary of almost 2.5 million descriptive terms in English and all major European languages.”

The review also praises the “well-developed help guide” and draws attention to additional training, the CAB Direct user group and functionality that allows researchers to “organize their search activities in project files and highlight, annotate, and share them with others.”

CABI’s CIO, Andrea Powell, says, “As a science-based organization with a mission to solve problems in world agriculture, CABI understands the need to transform research information into actionable knowledge, using appropriate technology and content management skills. The new CAB Direct platform is a key building block in our plan to offer combined subject depth and workflow solutions to our subscribers worldwide. We built the CAB Direct platform in-house to enable greater flexibility and agility in our product development and respond more effectively to customer needs. We are thrilled to receive this recognition from CHOICE and we can guarantee an ongoing programme of platform and content enhancements.”

The review was conducted by J. C. Stachacz, Wilkes University, CHOICE.

To find out more about CAB Direct and view the case studies visit: www.cabi.org/cab-direct

To request a free trial of CAB Abstracts or Global Health on the CAB Direct platform, please contact sales@cabi.org

CHOICE review of CAB Direct 

The newly updated CAB Direct platform provides access to a pair of the world’s most extensive research databases for the applied life sciences and public health: CAB Abstracts and Global Health. Produced by the nonprofit CABI (Centre for Agriculture and Biosciences International), an international organization based in the UK, it integrates the full archives of bibliographic records dating back to the early 1900s in subjects ranging across agricultural engineering, animal sciences, and the environmental sciences, with a focus on food safety, biofuels, ecoterrorism, climate change effects on crops, ecotourism, plant protection, invasive species, soil sciences, farm management, aquaculture, and forestry. The Global Health database covers biomedical/health science fields internationally, including chronic disease diagnosis and therapy, pharmacology, physiology, toxicology, occupational health, gerontology, nutrition, sanitation and waste disposal, health policy and economics, and tropical health. This enormous collection of scientific research and policy studies has more than doubled in size since CAB Abstracts was last reviewed almost a decade ago (CH, Apr’08, 45-4130); currently CAB Direct contains nearly 12 million bibliographic references (including more than 340,000 full-text articles), plus conference papers and reports published in 120 countries. New material is uploaded within days of publication.

An example of the interdisciplinary nature of the resource can be seen in a search on the Olympic games recently hosted in Brazil. Retrieved results range from the consequences of poor sanitation control, the Zika virus and public health, the effects of infectious diseases on tourism, the politics of Brazilian development, and gender justice in sports, to the social impact of large-scale sporting events on local populations. The interface features bar graphs displaying results by year—a handy visual revealing changing research interests over time.

Searching is intuitive and documents load quickly. The online CAB Thesaurus provides a controlled vocabulary of almost 2.5 million descriptive terms in English and all major European languages. A significant update entailed revising terms for flowering plants (monocots) to conform to the APG III (Angiosperm Phylogeny Group, version 3) classification system. Additionally, over 2,000 taxonomic names of invasive plants have been added. A well-developed help guide enables researches to enhance their skills in constructing search strategies. Additional training is available through tools that include training videos, webinars, FAQs, and a users group to which registered individuals can submit questions by email. Researchers can organize their search activities in project files and highlight, annotate, and share them with others. Libraries supporting programs in the life sciences and public health have the flexibility of licensing CAB Direct from CABI or through US vendors including EBSCO, Ovid, STN International, and Thomson Reuters, among others. Academic subscription pricing is based on institutional size and research level, and the archives are available as a one-time purchase.

Reprinted with permission from CHOICE www.choicereviews.org, copyright by the American Library Association

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