Sciences Library News

Sep 08 2021

Tree Tour & Talk at the Sciences Library

Posted on September 8, 2021September 8, 2021 by Laurie Neuerburg

Join Arborist Andy Dahl for a tree talk and tour at the Sciences Library! This program will be held on Friday, October 1, 2021. The tree talk will begin at 2:00 PM on the 3rd floor of the Sciences Library. There will be a short break at 2:45 PM for light refreshments. The walking tour of campus trees will begin at 3:00 PM at the Sciences Library. This program is free and open to the public. The Sciences Library is located at 120 Iowa Ave.

Tree Talk & Tour at the Sciences Library
120 Iowa Ave, Iowa City
Friday, October 1, 2021
• 2:00 PM: Tree talk located on the 3rd floor of the Sciences Library
• 2:45 PM: Break for light refreshments
• 3:00 PM: Walking tour of campus trees starting at the Sciences Library

The Arbor Day Foundation has designated the University of Iowa as a Tree Campus Higher Education institution, and the University of Iowa campus grounds are recognized as an arboretum by ArbNet, a professional network of arboreta and tree professionals. The University of Iowa campus showcases over 8,000 trees representing over 330 species.

Individuals with disabilities are encouraged to attend all University of Iowa–sponsored events. If you are a person with a disability who requires a reasonable accommodation in order to participate in this program, please contact Laurie Neuerburg at 319-467-0216 or laurie-neuerburg@uiowa.edu.

Aug 23 2021

Welcome to the Fall 2021 semester, Hawkeyes!

Posted on August 23, 2021August 23, 2021 by Laurie Neuerburg

Welcome to the fall 2021 semester, Hawkeyes! We are happy to have you back on campus in-person this fall! You can find the Sciences Library located between Phillips Hall and the Biology Building on Iowa Ave.

Open Hours

Monday through Thursday: 8:30 AM to 9:00 PM
Friday: 8:30 AM to 5:00 PM
Sunday: 1:00 PM to 5:00 PM

Study Spaces

Computer stations
Study carrels for individual use
Booths with USB and outlets for phones and computers
Large tables and large mobile monitors for group work

Find Books, Articles, and More

Meet with a sciences librarian in a one-on-one research consultation
Search InfoHawk+ to find books, articles, and other resources the UI Libraries has that you can use online or check out & take home
You can request that the Sciences Library purchase something that we don’t have
Request a book or article that we don’t have at the UI Libraries through Interlibrary Loan
Ask Sciences Library staff for help

COVID-19 Safety

Use our hygiene stations stocked with disinfectant wipes and hand sanitizer
You are encouraged to wear a face mask and get your free covid-19 vaccination, if you haven’t yet, to help keep our campus safe
Our book stacks are open so feel free to peruse the shelves!

Lord of the Rings

Check out our display of swords and other replicas from the Lord of the Rings movies to celebrate their 20 year anniversary!

Have a great semester! We’re glad to have you at the Sciences Library!

Image of Lord of the Rings swords, banner, and plaque

Jul 26 2021

Lord of the Rings Films: 20 Years On

Posted on July 26, 2021July 26, 2021 by Laurie Neuerburg

Visit the Sciences Library to see our display of Lord of the Rings movie replicas and enter our Trivia Contest. The display will be up through September. Get all 10 questions right in the Trivia Contest to win a small prize. Winners will be entered into a drawing for a larger prize. The contest is open to all through Fri, Aug 20, 2021. The Sciences Library is located at 120 Iowa Ave in Iowa City and open Monday through Friday from 8:30 AM – 5:00 PM.

The following Lord of the Rings books and DVDs are available for check out at the UI Libraries!

Jul 15 2021

Explore Iowa’s Biodiversity with Bur Oak Guides & Books

Posted on July 15, 2021July 15, 2021 by Laurie Neuerburg

Guest Author: Kai Weatherman

Summer naturally finds us spending more time outdoors, which provides a multitude of opportunities to observe the diversity of plant and animal species that inhabit Iowa. Unless you are already a professional naturalist, you may occasionally wonder about the identity of some species you encounter. If you’d like to satisfy that curiosity without lugging around a bulky field guide, consider checking out one of the many Bur Oak Guides available at the Sciences Library.

Most Bur Oak Guides are easy to carry laminated foldout guides (roughly the size of a folded roadmap) published by the University of Iowa Press. They offer a handy way to identify the most likely species of plant or animal you will encounter in a variety of Iowa habitats. There are guides for birds, butterflies, fish, frogs, grasses, mushrooms, orchids, and trees, to mention just a few.

Unlike the laminated foldout guides mentioned above, there are some titles in this series published as full-length reference books that offer more detailed treatment of their subjects. Among them is a trio of beautifully illustrated books co-authored by Sylvan Runkel that describe the wildflowers and plants of Iowa’s wetlands, woodlands, and tallgrass prairie.

Since the month of July finds so many wildflower species of the tallgrass prairie in bloom, I would be remiss if I did not mention An Illustrated Guide to Iowa Prairie Plants by Paul Christiansen and Mark Müller, which was published in the Bur Oak Books series, a companion series to Bur Oak Guides.

Whereas Runkel’s books on Iowa’s wildflowers offer full color close-up views of each species with narrative that includes brief natural history, this black-and-white illustrated guide places greater emphasis on plant morphology and provides detailed line drawings that provide a fuller picture of various plant parts critical to properly identify particular species. This title has the added benefit of being available in a free online version created through a partnership between the University of Iowa Press and the UI Libraries.

Full descriptions of individual titles in both series can be found at Bur Oak Guides and Bur Oak Books at the University of Iowa Press website.

Featured Titles

Butterflies of Iowa

The Elemental Prairie

Forest and Shade Trees of Iowa

The Guide to Iowa’s State Preserves

The Raptors of Iowa

May 21 2021

Transformative Agreement with ACS for Open Access Publishing

Posted on May 21, 2021 by Laurie Neuerburg

UI corresponding authors can now publish their journal articles Open Access and free of cost to them in any American Chemical Society (ACS) journal. The University of Iowa Libraries has entered into an agreement with ACS to bundle the cost of journal subscriptions and Open Access (OA) publishing. Under this three-year contract, UI authors can publish a significant number of articles OA with ACS. These articles can then be immediately read by anyone, anywhere, without the paywalls that traditionally accompany academic journals. For more information, contact Conrad Bendixen, or Leo Clougherty from the Sciences Library.

This arrangement is part of a larger effort by UI Libraries to reduce the cost of OA for individual researchers. Unfortunately, publishers often charge authors directly to pay for the cost of publishing OA journal articles. (For instance, ACS normally charges authors $4,500 per article for OA.) For faculty who don’t have grant or departmental funding, this can be prohibitively expensive. These costs have soared in recent years and are a significant barrier to making research open and freely accessible.

May 11 2021

Finals Week Study Spots & Stress Relief

Posted on May 11, 2021May 11, 2021 by Laurie Neuerburg

Are you looking for a quiet place to study on the north side of campus? The Sciences Library is open Monday through Friday from 8:30 AM to 5 PM, and we have study booths, study carrels, and large tables that you can use for group or individual study. We have Legos, K’NEX, and coloring on hand for you in case you find that you need a study break. We have streaming music and feature films if you would like a different kind of escape. You can also check out our Finals Week Stress Relief Guide to find web comics, animal live cams, virtual nature tours, online puzzles, and more!

Web comic about cybersecurity final exam — Image credit: https://xkcd.com/

Mar 15 2021

Discover Iowa’s Birds: Intro to Birding

Posted on March 15, 2021March 15, 2021 by Laurie Neuerburg

Join Iowa birder Linda Rudolph to learn how to get started with birding on campus and beyond! This is a free online program that will be held on Thursday, April 8, 2021, 2:00 PM – 3:00 PM CDT. All are welcome! To attend, go to https://tinyurl.com/IAbirds or https://uiowa.zoom.us/j/99752137081

Linda Rudolph is a Coralville resident. She is a transplanted New Yorker, who retired from the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics as an inpatient clinical pharmacist. Since retirement she has become an active local birder. Linda currently serves in the Iowa Ornithologists’ Union as the Iowa Birds List Serve Co-Administrator. When she isn’t hiking local areas, she enjoys international travel for birdwatching. Linda has currently seen over 3,400 bird species.

Find the Sciences Library’s Kent Ornithology Collection, Birds of the World, Sibley Field Guides, and more birding books and resources on our birding guide.

Feb 04 2021

Groundhog Day 2021: Anticipating a beautiful & bright spring!

Posted on February 4, 2021 by Laurie Neuerburg

While there is no consensus among groundhogs this week about exactly when spring will arrive, there is the reminder that spring will come, and as Punxsutawney Phil would like us to know, “you’re looking forward to one of the most beautiful and brightest springs you’ve ever seen.” Check out the table below to see how groundhogs all over North America have faced (or not faced) their darkest shadows to bring us their prediction! Under the column “2021 Prediction,” you can find a link to an article or video of these famous whistle pigs and other prophetic creatures making their most recent forecast!

Name	Location	2021 Prediction
Punxsutawney Phil	Punxsutawney, PA	6 more weeks of winter
Bay Beach Bobbie	Green Bay, WI	Early spring
Staten Island Chuck	Staten Island, NY	Early spring
Holtsville Hal	Long Island, NY	Early spring
Malverne Mel	Long Island, NY	Early spring
Dunkirk Dave	Dunkirk, NY	Early spring
Milltown Mel	Milltown, NJ	Early spring
Phoebe the Hedgehog	Manchester, CT	6 more weeks of winter
Buckeye Chuck	Marion, OH	Early spring
Woodstock Willie	Woodstock, IL	Early spring
Murray the Groundhog	Alton, IL	Took the day off?
Unadilla Bill	Unadilla, NE	Final prediction of early spring before retirement
Shubenacadie Sam	Nova Scotia, Canada	Early spring
Fred La Marmotte	Val d’Espoir, Quebec, Canada	Early spring
Wiarton Willie	Wiarton, Ontario, Canada	His prediction was replaced by a fur hat toss this year
Greta the Groundhog	Chimney Rock, NC	6 more weeks of winter
Queen Charlotte	Charlotte, NC	6 more weeks of winter
Sir Walter Wally	Raleigh, NC	Early spring
‘Stumptown Phil’ aka Filbert the beaver	Portland, OR	6 more weeks of winter
Mojave Maxine the tortoise	Palm Desert, CA	Early spring

The 1993 film Groundhog Day starring Bill Murray is on DVD for checkout at the UI Libraries!

Image of Darwin inside the shape of Iowa

Jan 28 2021

Iowa City Darwin Day 2021

Posted on January 28, 2021February 2, 2021 by Laurie Neuerburg

Iowa City Darwin Day celebrates the benefits of science for humanity, and all are invited to celebrate this year by attending virtual talks by prestigious scientists! All Iowa City Darwin Day events are free and open to the public.

Erich Jarvis’ talk “Evolution of Brain Pathways for Vocal Learning and Spoken Language” will be on Friday, February 12 at 12 PM CST. Erich Jarvis is a professor and head of the Laboratory of Neurogenetics of Language at the Rockefeller University. He uses song-learning birds and other species as models to study the molecular and genetic mechanisms that underlie vocal learning, including how humans learn spoken language. He chairs the international Vertebrate Genomes Project which studies how species are genetically related and how unique characteristics evolve. Jarvis also collaborates on a project to generate a new human pangenome reference that will represent over 90% of genetic diversity.

Dr. Jarvis is the 2002 recipient of the National Science Foundation Alan T. Waterman Award and was awarded the Director’s Pioneer Award by the National Institutes of Health in 2008. He received the NIH Director’s Transformative Research Award in 2019

Charmaine Royal’s talk “Race, Genetics, and Health” followed by a panel discussion will be on Friday, February 19 at 4 PM CST.

Charmaine Royal is a 2020 Ida Cordelia Beam Distinguished Visiting Professor. She is Associate Professor of African & African American Studies, Biology, Global Health, and Family Medicine & Community Health at Duke University. She is also core faculty in the Duke Initiative for Science & Society, senior fellow in Kenan Institute for Ethics, and faculty in the Social Science Research Institute where she directs the Center on Genomics, Race, Identity, Difference and the Center for Truth, Racial Healing & Transformation. Dr. Royal’s research, scholarship, and teaching focus on ethical, legal, and social issues in genetics and genomics, particularly the intersection of race and genetics and its policy implications and practical interventions.

Panelists:
UI Professor of History Mariola Espinosa
UI Visiting Professor of Law Phoebe Jean-Pierre
Dr. Brian Donovan , BSCS
Moderator: UI Associate Professor of Law Anya Prince

Jan 25 2021

Welcome Back, Hawkeyes!

Posted on January 25, 2021August 10, 2021 by Laurie Neuerburg

You are invited to the Sciences Library for a comfortable, quiet place to study! There are computer stations, study carrels, and booths with USB and outlets for phones and computers. If you have group work to do, there are tables and large mobile monitors to use for sharing your computer screen. The Sciences Library is located between Phillips Hall and the Biology Building on Iowa Ave. The building is open Monday through Friday from 8:30 AM to 5 PM for the Spring 2021 semester. Due to the coronavirus pandemic, we have hygiene stations available with disinfectant wipes and hand sanitizer. A face covering is required, and yellow stickers mark off seats that are to remain unoccupied. The book stacks are open so feel free to peruse the shelves!

If you need help with your research, then you can meet with a librarian in a one-on-one research consultation to help you find books and articles that you need for a paper or project. You can search InfoHawk+ to find out what the UI Libraries has that you can use online or check out & take home, which includes print books, ebooks, newspapers, journals, and magazines (both print and online), DVDs and streaming videos. You can request that the library purchase something that we don’t have, or request to borrow something that we don’t have through Interlibrary Loan. You can access all of our ebooks, electronic journal articles, streaming videos, and online resources from off-campus by logging in with your HawkID.

You can ask librarians for help about research and using the library whenever you need it through chat, email, in-person, or by phone. Have a great semester! We’re glad to have you at the Sciences Library!