Scirus partners with The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology
Amsterdam, June 15, 2006 – Elsevier today announced that Scirus, its free science-specific search engine, is further developing its repository search service in Asia-Pacific by partnering with The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) to index its repository, called the HKUST Institutional Repository. With over 250 million scientifically relevant pages to date, the addition of the new content is reflective of Scirus' mission to remain the most comprehensive source of science-focused content on the Web. Scirus is also helping to power the search capability on the HKUST repository site, which contains over 2,300 records including theses, preprints, technical reports, working and conference papers, journal articles and presentations.
"Having recognized the need for preservation and dissemination of our scholarly information, HKUST was one of the first institutions in the world to establish an openly accessible repository to support the needs of our students and faculty as well as researchers around the globe," said K.T. Lam, Head of Library Systems, HKUST Library. "Using Scirus's search solution we hope to increase the accessibility of our content for the HKUST community and remote users."
Partners using Scirus as the search solution on their repository's site benefit from Scirus' specialized capabilities including the comprehensive indexing of both the full-text and the bibliographical information of the repository's content. This combined with Scirus' expert classification of content offers users fielded search capabilities and delivers more powerful and relevant search results. Scirus also offers elements of customization including a cross-repository search feature, facilitating the collaboration between Scirus Repository Search partners.
"When we partnered with the HKUST Library, we knew that it was important to help make the content of their repository more visible on their own site, as well as to maximize its visibility worldwide by making it available on Scirus.com," says Sharon Mombrú, Director of Scirus. "We will work with HKUST to help increase the visibility of its services on campus. Working with such diverse repositories has become a critical component in our success with repository search partners around the globe."
As Scirus increases its involvement with premier Asian-Pacific partners, it continues to be the search engine of choice when institutes are looking to make their institutional repositories and content more visible on the Web.
The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology is an internationally recognized research university with a unique blend of education and research programs in science, engineering, business, humanities and social science. Founded in 1991, it has rapidly evolved into a world-class institution, ranked number 43 in the world by The Times of the UK in 2005.
About the HKUST Institutional Repository
The HKUST Institutional Repository at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology collects, makes available, and preserves the scholarly output created by the HKUST community in digital format. It contains journal articles (published, post-refereed and pre-refereed versions), conference papers, pre-prints, theses and dissertations, research and technical reports, working papers, and presentations.
The HKUST Institutional Repository runs on DSpace software enhanced by HKUST Library staff. It is OAI harvestable at http://repository.ust.hk/dspace-oai/request.
About Scirus
Scirus is the most comprehensive science-focused search engine available on the Internet, supporting over one million researchers, scientists and students worldwide. Scirus offers users a unique combination of free Web information and journal content, clearly branding search results from proprietary sources, assuring users the validity of the content. Web sources searched by Scirus include research institutes, governments, scientific organizations, conferences, scientists' homepages and company homepages worldwide. Optimized for science-related queries, Scirus uses a dictionary with over 1.6 million scientific terms, unique pattern recognition tools and linguistic analysis, to classify the content type and recognize the relevance 250 million scientifically relevant pages, Scirus offers users unique search functionalities such as the ability to search on bibliographical information and specific content types. Scirus is the recipient of numerous International awards, including the Search Engine Watch award for Best Specialty Search Engine and the WebAward for Best Search Engine or Directory.
Lisa Barr,
Fusion PR
Email: lisa.barr@fusionpr.com