AETG visit to the Science Museum Library Wroughton, 5th September 2008

Some 21 brave souls ignored the inclement weather to visit this wonderful new library, intriguingly based on an old WW2 airfield just outside Swindon. This is because the site is owned by the Science Museum and it also contains the large object store in large former aircraft hangars.

We were welcomed by Nick Wyatt, the Site Librarian and the team. The library is open by appointment 10 -5, free to access. It has an impressive 26 kilometres of shelving devoted to the development of science and technology. The oldest journals date to 1665 and the earliest book was published in 1486.

In the library reception there was a display of three books illustrating great moments in science and discovery: a 1st edition of Isaac Newton’s Principia Mathematica from 1687, outlining laws of gravitational theory and planetary motion; a 1917 signed work by Albert Einstein on the theory of relativity; and the 1969 Apollo 11 flight plan acquired by ITN, signed by Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong of the moon landing.

Nick pointed out that the Science Museum’s London library still has the collection of 80.000 volumes of biographies of scientists and engineers, the rest of the historic material moved to this new facility between 2006 and 2007.

Cecilia Cassington, the Archivist described the approval procedure for acquiring stock which is catalogued onto the Science Museum Unicorn catalogue; onto Archon and made available as printed lists. There are 180 archive collections including the astronomer Herschel’s notebooks and the letters written between Isambard Kingdom Brunel and his father, Marc Brunel. Of more recent interest there’s the ICL company archive and the Hooper collection which covers coach building. .

We had a tour around the collection, Nick showed us an eclectic mix of material – to mention just a few here – coloured illustrations of the 1851 Great Exhibition; drawings from the building of the Eddystone lighthouse; the earliest drawing of diving helmet in use; and the huge volumes produced by the Napoleonic expedition to Egypt. Nick pulled from the stacks Galileo’s Siderius Nuncius (the Starry messenger, 1610) and a beautifully hand-coloured and annotated university text book, Reisch’s Margarita Philosophica (The Philosophical Pearl, 1535).

John Underwood showed us around the reading room with a large display of books laid out including the 1842 report of the Children’s Employment Commission examining the working conditions in the mines and containing the words of the children as young as six; wonderful coloured images of Volcanoes; Babbage’s notebooks; reports by Barnes Wallis of World War 2 bouncing bomb fame; and photos of Donald Campbell in the Bluebird.

Doug Stimson showed us the scanning operation used to satisfy document requests.

It was a very informative afternoon and well worth a visit - see the website on
http://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/about_us/about_the_museum/science_library.aspx


The visit rounded off by Nick outlining future plans to digitise more of the collection and make more full text available on the web.

Thanks to Rupert Williams Head of Science Museum Libraries for agreeing to have us, Nick Wyatt and his team

[Visit write-up by Sarah Groombridge, AETG Committee.]

Physics journals initiative - SCOAP3

An important opportunity has arisen to achieve greater stability in the cost of high energy physics publication and other benefits by transferring library subscription payments into gold open access publication payments for all authors in the core journals. This is a world-wide initiative called SCOAP3, the Sponsoring Consortium for Open Access Publishing in Particle Physics https://mail.cds.cranfield.ac.uk/exchweb/bin/redir.asp?URL=http://www.scoap3.org . This initiative has the support of the CURL/SCONUL Scholarly Communication Group. Libraries with high energy physics journal subscriptions are invited to express a willingness to join SCOAP3 by completing the web form set up by JISC Collections, who will be managing the UK participation in SCOAP3.

The url is http://survey.jisc.ac.uk/scoap3

No funds will be transferred until negotiations have been completed successfully, but an expression of interest from libraries is vital at this stage to let publishers know that UK libraries are willing to participate in the initiative, which already has support from research institutions and libraries in thirteen countries. Please address any questions to Fred Friend: f.friend@ucl.ac.uk.

Fred Friend, JISC Scholarly Communication Consultant, Honorary Director Scholarly Communication UCL, Land-line +44 1494 563168

Royal Society selects Highwire to host its online publications

HighWire Press and the Royal Society have announced a new partnership in the provision of the independent scientific academy's publications online. All content of the Society's eight periodicals, some dating back as early as 1665, will be live on HighWire's premiere Publishing platform beginning in 2009 as the Royal Society joins HighWire's respected community of scholarly publishers.

More information can be found at:

http://royalsociety.org/

http://highwire.stanford.edu

SBAC to manage aerospace and defence KTN

The Society of British Aerospace Companies (SBAC) has recently announced that it is has been chosen by the Technology Strategy Board to manage an Aerospace and Defence Knowledge Transfer Network (KTN). The KTN will help promote innovation and collaboration across industry, Government and academia, helping to improve industrial performance and implement the National Aerospace Technology Strategy (NATS).

The priorities for the new Aerospace and Defence KTN will be to deliver improved industrial performance through innovation and new collaboration, to make the UK a more globally competitive environment for investment in aerospace and defence research and technology, to facilitate innovation and knowledge transfer across the civil and defence sectors and closer collaboration between academia, industry and the Ministry of Defence, and to improve coherency and effectiveness of industry in science, technology and innovation.

http://www.sbac.co.uk/pages/99769228.asp

Student Award - entries now invited

The Engineering Subject Centre is offering a £250 prize to the UK undergraduate engineering student who writes the best essay (around 1000 words) telling them 'what makes a good Engineering lecturer.' The deadline for entries is 28 March 2008.

The aim of this competition is to highlight good practice in this area and to motivate students to think about how they learn. Once they have written their essay all they have to do is submit their entry via email to enquiries@engsc.ac.uk. All shortlisted entries will be published on the ESC website and the winner will be presented with their prize of £250 at the Higher Education Academy's national conference in July 2008.

Publicity material in the form of posters and postcards will be sent out to Departmental Contacts shortly but in the meantime you can visit the web page for more information and advice on promoting the scheme to your students at:

http://www.engsc.ac.uk/us/fundopps/student_awards_tutor.asp