University of Virginia Library

Information
System Aids
In Research

The Science-Technology
Information Center of Alderman Library
announced yesterday a new service which
enables a researcher to locate a journal or
technical report which he could not
previously locate.

This service, which is available free
of charge, is offered to the faculty,
research staff, and graduate students of
the science departments and the
Engineering School.

The student researcher fills out a
request form with the necessary
information about the journal or article.
He then leaves this form at his
departmental library. These forms are
picked up daily and processed at the
Science-Technology Information Centers.

The Intra-Library Science
Information Service identified and locates
the item requested, either on or off the
grounds, has it photocopied or borrowed,
and delivers it back to the requester's
departmental library.

The average elapsed time from
pick-up to delivery is 13 days. However,
this time lapse includes the time needed
to track down items that were not
journals or those journals which were
cited incorrectly.

Journal articles are requested from
other libraries and institutions across the
country, usually by teletype. Most items
can be located and delivered the next day
after the request is received.

This unique service is believed to be
the only one of it's type on a permanent
basis. Didi Pancake, the service's
co-founder along with John Austin, the
Director of the Science-Technology
Information Center, estimates the annual
costs of this service to be between $4000
and $5,000.

According to Miss Pancake, this is
only one of the many services offered by
the Science-Technology Information
Center in its continuing investigations
into non-conventional library information
services to be offered at the University.