Contact: Kent Mulliner, 614/593-2707, or Tim Smith, 614/593-2634

ATHENS, Ohio -- The Ohio University Libraries have designated April 7-11 as E-Journal Week on the Athens campus in an effort to increase student and faculty awareness of electronic journals.

During the week, displays will alert students and faculty to the availability of the electronic journals, and Alden Library staff will assist anyone seeking more information.

Electronic journals range from recent issues of specialized scientific publications to 100 years of history journals to current popular magazines and newspapers.

University libraries subscribe to nearly 200 electronic journals and provide free access to several hundred more journals. Through statewide cooperation, the number of paid subscriptions is likely to exceed 1,400 by fall quarter.

The statewide OhioLINK system makes available all 179 journals -- primarily in the sciences -- published by the Academic Press. On the Athens campus, users also may access the JSTOR (Journal Storage) collection, which converts entire runs of major journals published by learned societies. The collection includes electronic versions of ecology journals since 1920, economics journals since 1886, history journals since 1892, political science journals since 1906, and population studies journals from 1963 to 1992. A number of other academic and commercial publishers provide journals in electronic format.

Nearly all e-journals are available through the World Wide Web, but many have additional software requirements to use or print them. The e-journals can be accessed through the libraries' home page (http://www.library.ohiou.edu/) by selecting "electronic resources" followed by the "electronic publications." The services can be accessed directly at: http://www.library.ohiou.edu/ElectRes/ElectPub.htm. Access to the subscription journals is available by using only the campus network or DialNet, which carry an address that the "publisher" uses to identify who has legal access.