Subject guides: Science: Biological Sciences

Other useful guides

Resources

Key Databases

Web of science -- all databases
Web of Science All Databases enables cross searching of leading scholarly journals, books, and proceedings in the sciences, social sciences including Biological abstracts and BIOSIS previews.
PubMed
Contains biomedical and life sciences literature, including behavioural sciences, chemical sciences, and bioengineering. PubMed was developed and is maintained by the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI), at the U.S. National Library of Medicine (NLM). MEDLINE is the largest subset of PubMed.
Scopus (Elsevier)
Contains peer-reviewed scientific, technical, medical and social sciences literature including journals, books, conference proceedings, trade publications, patent records and quality web sources. It also features smart tools to track, analyse and visualize research.

Other resources

Agriculture and natural resources research (Informit)
ANR-I, an Australian government initiative containing information on agriculture and natural resources including sustainable Australian agriculture, food, forestry and fisheries industries and the promotion of conservation and sustainable use of Australia's environment, water and natural resources. Search in conjunction with ANR-I archive for a comprehensive search.
Birds of the world
Scholarly content from four significant works of ornithology: Birds of North America and Neotropical Birds, Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive, and Bird Families of the World, into one comprehensive hub where you can find information, images, videos and audio content.
Crop protection compendium
Encyclopaedic resource that brings together a wide range of different types of science-based information on all aspects of crop protection including pests, diseases, weeds, host crops and natural enemies. Includes data from specialist organizations, images, maps, citations and articles.
CAB abstracts
Contains global applied life sciences literature including agriculture, environment, and veterinary sciences, Includes Environmental Abstracts database with a focus on the biosphere, including pollution, deforestation, desertification and habitat loss, and climate change.
Environmental abstracts (Informit)
Subject coverage includes air pollution and quality, sustainable development, salinity, environmental protection and management, hazardous wastes, recycling, waste management and disposal, water pollution, environmental assessment, and pollution control.
JSTOR global plants
Access to botanical resources from dozens of herbaria, libraries, museums and other research institutions. Works date back hundreds of years, and include full-text books and reference works on botany.
JSTOR sustainability collection
The collection looks at sustainability and resilience through a broad lens, spanning over more than 30 disciplines.
Great Barrier Reef marine park province database (Informit)
Developed by the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority in association with CSIRO, is a database that indexes articles from published and unpublished material about the Great Barrier Reef.
TAIR, the Arabidopsis information resource
Provides a comprehensive resource for the scientific community working with Arabidopsis thaliana, a widely used model plant.

Browsing the shelves

Monash University Library has a large collection of books, many of which are available as e-books. To search for relevant books held in the collection, use Monash Library Search.

For tips on:

using Search, refer to the Library Search Guide.
accessing ebooks, refer to the eBooks Guide.

The call numbers below may be useful when browsing the print books in the Library.

Subject	Call number
Agriculture	634
Biodiversity	333.9
Botanical sciences	580
Conservation	333.9 / 577.3
Ecology	577.8 / 576.8
Environment	363.7
General Life Sciences	570
Genetics and Evolution	576
Invertebrates	592
Molecular Genetics	572.8 / 574.87 / 576.5
Plant Identification	581.994 / 581.6
Zoological Sciences	590

General reference

Encyclopedia of life sciences
Articles in the fields of biochemistry and physiology, cell biology, developmental biology, ecology, evolution, genetics, immunology, molecular biology, neuroscience, microbiology and virology, plant science, structural biology, science and society.
Encyclopedia of the World's Biomes
5-volume reference providing a global synthesis of biomes. Thematic order spans biodiversity importance, principal anthropogenic stressors and trends, changing climatic conditions and biome conservation strategies.
Henderson's dictionary of biology
Reference for the biological sciences.

Botany (Plant sciences)

JSTOR global plants
Covers plant type specimens, scientific research articles, historial correspondence, and full-text books and reference works on botany. Content sourced from herbaria, libraries, museums and other research institutions.

A dictionary of plant sciences
covers all aspects in the field of plant sciences including biochemistry, plant physiology, cytology, ecology, genetics, evolution, biogeography, earth history, and earth sciences.
Encyclopedia of Applied Plant Sciences
Covers the application of current advances in the biological sciences, through which scientists can now better produce sustainable, safe food, feed and food
Encyclopedia of Mycology
Provides a broad overview of mycology and its links to botany, microbiology, biotechnology and medicine.

Ecology, conservation and environment

Comprehensive Nuclear Materials
7-volume reference covering key topics and developments in nuclear material research for fission and fusion reactor systems
Encyclopedia of ecology
Contains ecological data analysis and modeling, ecological processes and ecosystems. Volume 3 covers evolutionary and general ecology; Volume 4 covers global change ecology, human ecology and sustainability, terrestrial and landscape ecology.
Encyclopedia of Nuclear Energy
4-volume reference for nuclear energy and its deployment as an alternative energy source.

Food Science

Comprehensive Foodomics
Topics covered include transcriptomics, proteomics, metabolomics, genomics, green foodomics, epigenetics and noncoding RNA, food safety, food bioactivity and health, food quality and traceability, data treatment and systems biology.
Encyclopedia of Dairy Sciences
Information on the possible impact of genetic modification of dairy animals, safety concerns of raw milk and raw milk products, peptides in milk, dairy-based allergies, packaging and shelf-life and other topics of importance and interest to those in dairy research and industry
Innovative Food Processing Technologies
Covers advances in innovative and nonthermal processing, such as high pressure, pulsed electric fields, radiofrequency, high intensity pulsed light, ultrasound, irradiation and new hurdle technology

Genetics and evolution

Brenner's encyclopedia of genetics
Covers genetics, from Abortive Transduction to Zygotes.
Encyclopedia of evolutionary biology
Covers the history of evolutionary biology, population genetics, quantitative genetics; speciation, life history evolution, evolution of sex and mating systems, evolutionary biogeography, evolutionary developmental biology, molecular and genome evolution, coevolution, phylogenetic methods, microbial evolution, diversification of plants and fungi, diversification of animals, and applied evolution.
Wiley-blackwell student dictionary of human evolution
Covers ameloblast, Coopers Cave, daily secretion rate, the effect hypothesis, homeobox genes, insolation, phylogenetically independent contrasts, quantitative trait locus, semicircular canals, and tephrostratigraphy.

Marine and freshwater biology

Encyclopedia of Coastal Science
Covers biology, ecology and oceanography, including information on habitats, research and observation.
Encyclopedia of Lakes and Reservoirs
Covers physical, chemical and ecological characteristics of lakes and reservoirs. Topics include acidification, artificialisation, biology, canals, climate change effects, chemicals, dams, dew ponds, drainage, ecological, eutrophication, evaporation, fisheries, geographical, geological, hydrological, hydro-electric power, nutrients, organic pollution, paleolimnology, reservoir capacities and depths, sedimentation, water resources.
Encyclopedia of marine mammals
Covers the ecology, behavior, conservation, evolution, form and function of whales, dolphins, seals, sea lions, manatees, dugongs, otters and polar bears as well as anthropogenic concerns, emerging threats such as ocean noise, and impacts of climate change.
Encyclopedia of ocean sciences
Covers microbial ecology, high latitude systems and the cryosphere, climate and climate change, hydrothermal and cold seep systems, emphasising chemical, physical and biological oceanography.

Zoology (Animal biology)

Birds of the world
Comprehensive hub containing authoritative information on birds. Includes photographs, videos and audio recordings.

Encyclopedia of Animal Behavior
Builds upon the solid foundation established in the first edition. Updated sections include Host-parasite interactions, Vertebrate social behaviour, and the introduction of 'overview essays' that boost the book's comprehensive detail. The structure for the work is modified to accommodate a better grouping of subjects.
Oxford Dictionary of Zoology
Covers the taxonomy of arthropods, other invertebrates, fish, reptiles, amphibians, birds, and mammals. Includes terms from ecology, animal behaviour, evolution, earth history, zoogeography, genetics and physiology.

Websites

Atlas of living Australia
A repository of biodiversity data that can search and find information and occurrence records of different species. Type the scientific species or common name into the search box.
Biodiversity Heritage Library
BHL operates as a worldwide consortium of natural history, botanical, research, and national libraries working together to digitize the natural history literature held in their collections and make it freely available for open access as part of a global 'biodiversity community'.

Australian faunal directory
A catalogue of taxonomic and biological information on all animal species known to occur within Australia and its territories. The AFD can provide information on: nomenclature and taxonomy of species (including valid names e.g. what a species is currently called, synonyms, and changes to names over time); type data information; bibliographic information for species; and distribution of species.
Australian wetlands database
Provides access to information on Australia's Ramsar wetlands – Australia's internationally important wetlands, and sites listed in the Directory of Important Wetlands of Australia (DIWA) - wetlands identified as nationally important.
Bibliography of fossil vertebrates
The BFV online database provides searchable access to various compilations and annual volumes, all considered part of the Bibliography of fossil vertebrates series with an unbroken record of the entire published literature on vertebrate fossils from 1509 to1958 and 1981 to 1993.
Encyclopedia of life : EOL.
Identifies sources of biodiversity knowledge that are legally and practically shareable, enriches their structure using modern data tools, aggregates them into a combined knowledge base and provides access to the knowledge at a granular level using faceted search tools and data services. Its objective is to provide an online database for all 2.16 million species now known to live on Earth.
Flora of Australia
A synthesis of present taxonomic knowledge of the country's flora. It has been designed for use by anyone wanting authoritative information on the names, characteristics, distribution and habitat of Australian plants. This platform integrates a wide range of botanical information from many sources, such as nomenclature, distribution maps, images, biodiversity data, and identification keys.
Invasive species compendium (via CABI)
An encyclopaedic resource that brings together a wide range of different types of science-based information to support decision-making in invasive species management worldwide. It comprises detailed datasheets that have been written by experts, edited by an independent scientific organization, peer reviewed, and enhanced with data from specialist organizations, images, and maps, a bibliographic database and full text articles.