Search Help Topics
- Basic Search
- Advanced Search
- Search Results
- Selecting, Exporting and Printing Results
- Summary of All Results
- Spelling Suggestion
- Search Tips
- Need more Science Information?
See Alerts Help for Information on the Alerts Service
Try our Basic Search
- Just type in your key word(s), like "global warming", and select .
- You'll get results ranked by relevance. The higher the number of stars, the more relevant the document is to your query.
- You will also see Clusters of results on the left side of the screen. On the right, you will see the related Wikipedia term, as well as related EurekAlert! news items.
- Unlike many search engines, our results are retrieved in real time. So as results start to come in, you may want to select "Add Results" to update. You may work with your results while Science.gov continues searching.
- Don't miss our Featured Search: Located at the top right of our home page, these are relevant science topics, updated regularly.
You want a more Targeted Search? Try our Advanced Search
- You can customize your search by checking selected databases and websites.
- You can search Full Record, Title, Author, and Date Range.
- Full Record will search the entire content of a document,
when available.
- You may . This allows you to decide how the search operates between fields.
- ALL is the default, and finds results with terms occurring in all fields where you have entered a search term.
- ANY finds results with terms occurring in any of the fields where you have entered a search term.
- Date Range allows you to search one or more years in the ‘From’ and ‘To’ drop-down boxes.
- Leaving the boxes blank is the default, and will not use a date in the search.
- Selecting different ‘From’ and ‘To’ years will search the specified range; you must select a 'To' date. Only selecting a 'From' date will generate an error message.
- Selecting the same ‘From’ and ‘To’ years will search a single year.
- Selecting only the ‘To’ year will search any year including and prior to the year selected
- Categories or individual sources can be selected for a specific search.
Select the to
view individual sources for selection.
- runs
the search.
- clears the search terms in all fields and reverts
to default settings.
Search Results
Your results will appear, in order of relevance, in the middle section of your screen.
You will also see results grouped under these headings:
- Clusters
- Under the heading Clusters, at the left of your results page, your results have been grouped into topics related to your search term.
- Clustering can help guide you to needed results by grouping result documents into meaningful sets.
- Just select one of the topics or years, and you will see those results, also relevancy-ranked.
- Clusters are also offered by year of publication.
- If Wikipedia contains an exact match for your term, it will be provided on the right of your results page, along with a link to the complete Wikipedia entry.
- Wikipedia is a multilingual, Web-based, free content encyclopedia project.
- More information is available on the Wikipedia website.
- EurekAlert news items related to your search term will be provided on the results page in the right column under the Wikipedia result.
- EurekAlert! is an online, global news service operated by AAAS, the science society.
- More information is available on the EurekAlert website.
- You may
Wikipedia
EurekAlert!
- You may set Session Preferences on the navigation bar after
performing your first search.
- Once you initiate your search, you may see this dialogue
box. You may choose Include to get more results or Do not include to return
to your original search list.
- You can narrow the search by searching within the results of your original query. Enter a term in the box for Refine Results and select the Refine Results button.
- You can also initate a new search from the results page. Enter your search in the box for new search and select .
Selecting, Exporting and Printing Results
These links, directly above your results, allow you to view and edit your selected results, email results to friends and colleagues, and print your results.
Your Selections and Clear Selections
Checking the box next to any result will add it to Your Selections. These will be available for viewing on Your Selections page during your entire browser session, unless you deselect them, or choose Clear Selections. From the Your Selections page, select to return to your original result list.
Exporting Results
Available result export options include emailing results, citations export and printing. If you use a bibliographic reader such as EndNote, RefWorks or Bib Tex, you may download the selected results into your citation manager via an RIS formatted download. Your citation manager should automatically display the results downloaded.
Email Results
- The Email Results link allows you to email a set of results to yourself, friends, or colleagues.
- Select Email Results, and enter the required information, indicated by red asterisk:
- You may select the number and format of the emailed results.
- This function is also available from the "Your Selections" page, where you can email specific, selected results.
- If you do not receive your email results in a few minutes, check your spam filter.
Citations - Export results into a citation manager
- The Citations link only appears on the Your Selections page.
- If you use a bibliographic reader such as EndNote, RefWorks or Bib Tex, you may download the selected results into your citation manager via an RIS formatted download.
- Your citation manager should automatically display the results downloaded.
Print Results
The Print Page option allows you to print directly from your main results, or from Your Selections. Only the main result list will be printed.
Summary of All Results
The Summary of All Results link will present a dialog log showing the responsiveness of each separate source. The indicates that the search at that particular source completed successfully; the indicates that the source was unresponsive. The number in the Ranked column indicates the number of results returned for Science.gov. The Available column shows how many additional results are available from that source.
Spelling Suggestion
Science.gov will suggest words and phrases when a misspelling is detected. You'll see this in the upper left corner of the results page. Simply select the suggested term and a new search will be performed with the corrected query information.
Search Tips
Queries can include:
- Multiple terms (AND is the default)
- Expressions using logical operators AND, OR or NOT
- Phrases, contained in double quotation marks
- Parentheses, requiring
the expression within to be evaluated first
- Wildcards
- Use * to search for the term with 0 or more additional characters
- Use ? to search for the term with only 1 additional character (characters include numbers, letters and punctuation)
- Searches are not case-sensitive
-
Example: A search on frogs toads will return results on both frogs and toads
-
Example: A search
on frogs AND toads will return results where both frogs
and toads appear; frogs OR toads will return results where
either frogs or toads appear; frogs NOT toads will return
results with frogs and without toads.
-
Example: a search
on “nitrate cycling” will
return results where the term nitrate is immediately
followed by the term cycling.
-
Example: nucle* will return results
with the terms nuclear, nucleus, nucleoprotein, etc.
-
Example: DO? will
return results with the terms DOE, DOI, DOT, DOG, etc.
-
Example: RAIN, Rain and rain will produce the same results
Need more Science Information?
Check out our Explore Selected Science Websites by Topic, beginning on the home page: Although portions of these websites and databases are automatically searched with your keywords, you may want to explore by selecting a specific topic. We can send you directly to your website of interest. Simply select the back button to re-enter Science.gov. Or, browse through the tree by subject, narrowing your topic as you select.
Don’t miss our Featured Websites: Located at the bottom
of our home page, these are popular science sites, and rotated
regularly.
Our searches are powered by Distributed Explorit from Deep Web Technologies. Our results may include full text, bibliographic citations, and other types of material from federal agencies.