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How to use ScienceDirect

Use this database to explore scientific, technical, and medical research. There is full-text for more than 1,000 peer-reviewed health science, life sciences, physical sciences, and engineering journals.

  1. Start at the PCC Library home page.
  2. Click on Databases.
  3. Click “All Databases” then click on “S.” 
  4. Click on the database title, ScienceDirect.

Quick Search

The first search box is for a quick search. Enter your keywords: in this case, potato enzyme browning. There are also boxes for author name, journal title, volume, issue and page (you don’t have to use them to search). Then click the “Search” button with the magnifying glass, or hit enter on your keyboard to start the search.

In this example the results page shows there are over 25,000 articles that contain the keywords potato enzyme browning. They are listed by relevance. The keywords used for the search are highlighted in yellow.

Using the options on the left side of the screen under “Refine by:” you can narrow your results by year or article type.

Under each article listing you will find a few options. Click the View? PDF link for the full text. Abstract gives a summary of the article’s contents, including research question, methods, and conclusion.?

Note: Although you can access and download both the Journal Articles and Open Access Articles found in ScienceDirect you cannot email them directly from ScienceDirect. The url in the browser is stable, so you can copy and paste it for future use. 

Science Direct does not generate pre-formatted citations. 

Advanced Search

There is a link to the advanced search page next to the quick search box. After clicking this link, click the link “Show all fields.” This displays more ways to narrow your search:

  • Article Types narrows the search to type of publication. This includes article, review article, and short survey.
  • Use Years to?narrow your search to a range of dates.
  • Use other fields to specify a specific journal, author, or other information.

Using this search method for our potato enzyme browning example, we have narrowed the search research and data articles published between 2020-2024 and published in the journal Food Bioscience which narrowed the search to just over 100 results.

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