LibGuides: Mechanical Engineering &amp; Operations Research: Finding Research Papers, News Updates, and Journals

Find Articles & Journals

Here is a list of databases to help with finding information for mechanical engineering and for operations research. Coverage varies by product but most help you find research papers --- including journal articles and conference papers --- on topics of interest. See more products at the big list of Databases, where you may search by subject, type, and provider.

Which to select?

Compendex is the top choice for indexing of the journal and conference literature of engineering.
Inspec is the preferred index if you know that your topic is strongly physics oriented. Inspec may be searched with Compendex.
Academic Search Complete indexes engineering journals but usually not conference papers or preprints. The interdisciplinary coverage is good for engineering subjects.
ABI/Inform is our business librarian's recommendation over Business Source Complete (also a good choice). Operations research is covered well in the engineering literature but the business literature has additional material.
It depends. You may be working on a medical device or be interested in a user interface. There are special indexing products for the medical and psychological literatures, and for other subjects, too.

Compendex
Indexes the research literature of engineering. If a search of the engineering journal literature had to be limited to one database, this is the one to choose. Compendex and Inspec can be searched together as a combined database.
INSPEC
Indexes the research literature of electrical and computer engineering; it is the special index for the literature of physics and for the literature of control. Inspec and Compendex can be searched together as a combined database.
Academic Search Complete
Covers engineering and related subjects. Much full-text. A good place to start searching, especially because of the interdisciplinary coverage. Includes little indexing of conference papers.
ABI/INFORM Global
A top choice for business and management research, with good coverage of operations research.
Business Source Complete
Indexes the literature of business, including the business aspects of engineering topics.
Web of Science
Indexes the research literature of STEM, across fields. Not a top choice for engineering subject searching but is great for following citations.
ACM (Association for Computing Machinery) Digital Library
Be sure and select the "ACM Guide to Computing Literature." It searches ACM publications plus those from other publishers.
MEDLINE (EBSCO)
Also known as "PubMed" in a slightly different version. Indexes the medical literature --- often important to mechanical engineers. We have the database in multiple versions. "PubMed" has the freely available interface.
Embase
Indexes the research literature of medicine. Overlaps with Medline/PubMed and includes additional European and pharmaceutical literature.
SciFinder
Indexes the literature of chemistry.
Requires users to register with a utexas.edu email account.

For News Coverage

Nexis Uni
Full-text news and legal source. Expect few journals here.
Factiva
A full-text news source. This is for newspaper stories and other articles or transcriptions that are not research articles.

Collections of Papers from Societies

These databases are valuable sources and are satisfying for their full-text content but be aware that each indexes publications from one society or from a small group of societies. You will also want to search using an indexing tool with more comprehensive coverage:

ASME (American Society of Mechanical Engineers) Digital Library (Current)
Database of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers.
INFORMS PubsOnLine
INFORMS is the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences.
SAE Mobilus
Database of the Society of Automotive Engineers.

SAE Mobilus - Getting Started Guide
Tips for getting the most out of "SAE Mobilus."

If you don't see a PDF or HTML link, connecting you to the full article, click the Find it at UT button to see if the article is available in another database or in print in one of the UT Libraries.

If it's only available in print or you can't otherwise see how to get a copy, go to Get a Scan and complete a request form.

Find Journals

To see if we have access to a particular journal (for example, Wear, Transportation Science, or Applied Mechanics), use the J ournals link.
Collections by publisher, including by society, go to the Databases link and search by the name of the society or by the name of the publisher; this might be, for example, "ASME" or "Elsevier."