Biological Abstracts

The Libraries’ collections have been dramatically impacted by the budget crisis, and over the coming fiscal years (2011-2013), the Libraries are planning for a reduction of up to 17% of the overall appropriated budget. These cuts will be distributed across both the Libraries’ collections and  operating budgets.  More information can be found at: https://lib.colostate.edu/help/faq_budgetnov2009.pdf

In order to reach the cuts have required the libraries to cancel or cease updating $100,000 of databases in 2009.  One of the databases that will no longer be updated is Biological Abstracts.  The CSU libraries will retain access to Biological Abstracts from 1969-2009, but after 2009, new material will not be added to our version of the databases.  This decision came after lengthy discussions amongst all of the science librarians.  Decisions were based on the following criteria:

•  Duplication of database content in other library resources
  Overlap studies were run for high-cost databases to see if the database content was available elsewhere in the library’s collection.  Biological Abstracts was compared with the following databases: Agricola, CAB, CINAHL, Compendex, Medline, SciFinder, Web of Science, Zoological Record.  Only 9.26% of the resources in Biological Abstracts were not indexed in one of the other databases. View titles that are unique to Biological Abstracts.

• Cost per use
  At $5.25 per search, Biological Abstracts had one of the highest costs per search of all the library’s databases.

• Number of searches
  5,198 searches were run in Biological Abstracts in 2008, down from 6,379 searches in 2007.  This represents an 18% reduction in the number of searches that were run.  This is problematic since the subscription price for this database increased by 7% for 2008.

• Budgetary goals
  Since subscriptions to library databases are renewed on a yearly basis, we need to prepare cancellations well in advance of when the funds are needed.   In order to meet anticipated university-mandated budget reduction goals, the CSU Libraries had to cancel $100,000 worth of databases and serials in 2009.  $30,000 of this goal had to come from science databases. 

Is CSU losing access to any other databases?

Yes. CSU Librarians were instructed to cancel $100,000 worth of databases. Decisions were made based on overall use, cost per use, and duplication of content. Many of the databases were cancelled outright, but our contract for Biological Abstracts allows us to maintain access to the years for which we have already paid, so we will essentially have an archive of Biological Abstracts from 1969-2009.

 The databases that were cancelled in 2009 crossed many subject areas, and the final cancellation list for 2009 included Biological Abstracts, as well as the following databases: