All in One View
Content from Intro to SciX and FAIR principles
Last updated on 2026-09-18 | Edit this page
Estimated time: 20 minutes
Overview
Questions
- What is Open Science?
- What is FAIR?
- What is do open science and FAIR mean to me?
Objectives
- Define the Open Science
- Define FAIR principles and explain what each component (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable) means in the context of scientific data.
- Explain how SciX supports making research artifacts Findable and Accessilbe
- Identify your role with respect to open science and FAIR practices at your institution
This episode has multiple discussion elements. Pick those that you think will be most meaningful and thought provoking to your audience. Skip the rest. Also, gauge the tenor of the discussions to balance not disrupting a productive conversation with keeping the class on time. On the other hand, if conversations are stalled, cutting the time short and moving forward is preferrable to letting the group get distracted by other things. The prompts are phrased as “discuss with a friend” but in small cohesive groups, you may just want to have a single discussion. In some circumstances, you may want to insist that learners switch partners between questions.
Open Science
Open science has become a buzz word today. We are all supposed to be in favor of open science.
Define Open Science
What comes to mind when you hear “open science”? How would you define open science?
Discuss with a friend. Note any areas of disagreement or any difficulties in defining the concept.
Ask for one or two volunteers to share their definitions of open science or to explain the difficulties they experienced in defining the concept.
You may want to ask learners to read the NASA and UNESCO definitions themselves. They can vote by show of hands for one or the other or for both.
NASA proposes that
“Open science is a collaborative culture enabled by technology that empowers the open sharing of data, information, and knowledge within the scientific community and the wider public to accelerate scientific research and understanding.” – NASA Open Science
Furthermore,
- “Data, tools, software, documentation, and publications should be available to all (FAIR).”
- “Scientific processes and results should be open such that they are reproducible by members of the community.”
- “Processes and participants should welcome participation and collaboration by other researchers and organizations.”
see their NASA Open Science site. They also offer online training. FAIR here and in this lesson stands for Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable.
UNESCO has a similar definition.
“Open science is a set of principles and practices that aim to make scientific research from all fields accessible to everyone for the benefits of scientists and society as a whole. Open science is about making sure not only that scientific knowledge is accessible but also that the production of that knowledge itself is inclusive, equitable and sustainable.”
Furthermore,
“Open science: - increases scientific collaborations and sharing of information for the benefits of science and society; - makes multilingual scientific knowledge openly available, accessible and reusable for everyone; and - opens the processes of scientific knowledge creation, evaluation and communication to societal actors beyond the traditional scientific community.”
see the introduction to their recommendations for open science.
Open Science in Real World
Identify an open science practice that does or could benefit your community and the associated benefit(s).
Identify either one unintended consequence of open science practices in your community or one aspect of open science practice that makes members of your community uncomfortable.
Discuss your experiences with a friend. Brainstorm solutions to the unintended consequences or the areas of reluctance.
Ask for one or two volunteers to share their positive or negative experiences. If they share a negative experience, ask what solutions they proposed. Then, ask the other learners if they had similar experiences and if they had other solutions to propose.
The Science Explorer (SciX) is a NASA-funded digital library that is designed to promote open science practices and support research broadly in the science fields in which NASA is interested.
FAIR Principles
The NASA definition calls for FAIR “data, tools, software, documentation, and publications.” Originally defined in a highly technical manner for data, we now apply FAIR to most research artifacts.
Define FAIR
What comes to mind when you hear “FAIR”? How would you identify or measure whether an item was FAIR?
Discuss with a friend. Note any areas of disagreement or any difficulties in defining the concept.
Ask for one or two volunteers to share their definitions of open science or to explain the difficulties they experienced in defining the concept.
You may want to ask learners to read the NASA and UNESCO definitions themselves. They can vote by show of hands for one or the other or for both.
Again, FAIR stands for Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable.
Scientific credibility is built on transparency, which includes reproducibility. For one group of scientists to reproduce the results of another, those results must be findable and accessible. Of course, findable and accessible does not automatically equal reproducible but they are the first steps.
Traditionally, data supporting scientific research have been difficult to find in many fields. Papers often describe data collection and methods, but rarely included the actual data alongside the manuscript. As articles moved online, publishers were still not typically equipped to store and distribute datasets.
In response, standards were needed to guide data infrastructure. Consequently, participants at a 2014 Lorentz Center workshop developed the FAIR Principles for Scientific Data, which were first published by Wilkenson et al. in 2016 (DOI: 10.1038/sdata.2016.18 SciX bibcode: 2016NatSD…360018W/abstract). Each term has been expanded into guiding principles for developing resource platforms like SciX.
Have groups of students take one set of principles. They should review the principles along with the criteria by which SciX claims to be FAIR and consider an additional system with which they are familiar (another search engine, a repository, a vocabulary, a tool kit, a workflow or process. Do they think these systems are FAIR? Do they think these systems are open? If a group does not have an alternative system for comparison, the UAT is considered a FAIR vocabulary. The UAT community handbook describes its practices.
Findable Principles
The focus is on making data easy to locate by both humans and computers. This is achieved by creating machine-readable metadata that is essential for automated discovery:
- F1: Data and metadata are assigned a globally unique and persistent identifier.
- F2: Data are described with rich metadata (as defined further in R1).
- F3: Metadata clearly and explicitly include the identifier of the data they describe.
- F4: Data and metadata are registered or indexed in a searchable resource.
As fundamentally an indexing service, the data and metadata SciX provides are highly searchable. (F4)
SciX assigns each item a unique, persistent identifier, a bibcode that not only retrieves the article but also connects related papers via citations. When data, software, or other materials are available, they are either linked as external resources or indexed with their own identifiers internally. For interoperability, SciX also retains and displays the unique identifiers that other systems have assigned the same work. (F1)
SciX enriches the records it maintains with metadata from multiple sources, including information it develops. For instance, to make papers more findable, SciX is testing assigning keywords from the Unified Astronomy Thesaurus (UAT) to all papers in its astronomy collection. Doing so provides a consistent set of keywords across time and journals. (F2)
Accessible Principles
These principles help users understand how to retrieve data:
-
A1: Data and metadata are retrievable by their
identifier using a standardised communications protocol.
- A1.1: The protocol is open, free, and universally implementable.
- A1.2: The protocol supports authentication and authorisation, where necessary.
- A2: Metadata remain accessible even when the data are no longer available.
SciX provides a free API for standardized, programmatic retrieval of records. API users, however, must register for a token. (A1)
Applying accessibly to papers and research artifacts more broadly. SciX always links to the publisher’s version of record, even if it has a paywall. It also matches the available open access versions providing the user with multiple options. In addition, it links to data, software, and proposals to help the user understand how the reported results were achieved, reproduce them or reuse them as appropripiate.
Interoperable Principles
Data often needs to be integrated with other data, used in workflows, or transformed for processing:
- I1: Data and metadata use a formal, accessible, shared, and broadly applicable language for knowledge representation.
- I2: Data and metadata use vocabularies that follow FAIR principles.
- I3: Data and metadata include qualified references to other data and metadata.
SciX uses the UAT as its preferred vocabulary for describing all research artifacts in the space sciences in part because of its community acceptance and in part because the UAT is itself a FAIR vocabulary. (I2)
When an article cites supporting references, the SciX includes the citation information as part of the metadata. SciX maintains cross-references to multiple other systems. (I3)
Reusable Principles
The goal is to ensure data can be reused in various contexts:
-
R1: Data and metadata are richly described with a
variety of accurate and relevant attributes.
- R1.1: Data and metadata are released with a clear and accessible data usage license.
- R1.2: Data and metadata are associated with detailed provenance.
- R1.3: Data and metadata meet domain-relevant community standards.
SciX follows established publication and community standards and associates metadata with its provenance to ensures that data and other research artifacts are reusable in the appropriate context. (R1)
When SciX is successful in connecting researchers with existing datasets and software that is relevant to their projects, it is encouraging the re-use of scientific assets, which increases the return on investment for funders and increases the citations and recognition of the initial work.
Although SciX exemplifies all four FAIR principles, its primary focus is on being a discovery platform–making data Findable.
Ask one or two learners to comment on what they thought about the FAIRness of the systems they considered.
We have spent some time defining both open science and FAIR. How do they relate?
Open Science vs. FAIR
Are open science and FAIR the same? Is FAIR sufficient for open science? Is FAIR necessary for open science?
Discuss with a friend.
Ask one or two learners to share what they concluded about the relationship between Open Science and FAIR.
As part of its open science practice, SciX commits to
- developing open source code
- releasing open source models
- publishing its work open access
Reflection and Discussion
- How does SciX make research more discoverable?
- In what ways do open science and FAIR principles benefit your community and society?
- Do you think investing in open science or FAIR best practices if worthwhile for your program?
- What do you see your role in the growing open science ecosystem?
Please share your thoughts with a friend.
Challenge
Bonus Challenge
If you have not already taken NASA Open Science Essentials or NASA Open Science 101, browse the static version for some additional thought-provoking topics. You could also take the online version,, but it is not always offered.
- Open science is a collaborative culture that shares research artifacts and knowledges to accelerate scientific knowledge development.
- The FAIR principles provide a framework for making scientific artifacts, especially data, more discoverable and usable.
- SciX makes data Findable by assigning unique, persistent identifiers and indexing rich metadata.
- SciX ensures Accessibility through standardized retrieval protocols and a robust API.
FAIR - Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable; a set of principles for open data published by Wilkenson et al. in 2016 (DOI: [10.1038/sdata.2016.18] now colloquially generalized to most research artifacts.
NASA - National Aeronautics and Space Administration
OPEN Science - “Open science is a collaborative culture enabled by technology that empowers the open sharing of data, information, and knowledge within the scientific community and the wider public to accelerate scientific research and understanding.” – NASA Open Science
UAT - Unified Astronomy Thesaurus, a open, interoperable and community-supported thesaurus for astronomy, planetary science, and heliophysics concepts adopted by SciX and other programs as a FAIR vocabulary
UNESCO - United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization
Content from Basic Searches in SciX
Last updated on 2026-09-18 | Edit this page
Estimated time: 25 minutes
Overview
Questions
- How do you find an article by a specific author?
- How do you find articles about a specific topic?
- What other types of resources can you discover besides articles?
Objectives
- Execute a basic author search
- Execute a basic keyword search
- Refine a search using facets
- Identify useful metadata and resources through the abstract view
- Follow links from the abstract page to access resources such as the open access version of the article, related software, and associated datasets
Basic Searches in SciX
Once you’ve accessed the SciX main page, you’re ready to explore its search capabilities. In this episode, we’ll cover both author and keyword searches, then show you how to refine your results.
You might mention the kinds of searches you commonly perform in SciX (e.g., finding articles in your specialty or checking citation metrics). The guided examples will be more meaningful if you modify them for your discpline or facility. - Who is an author your learners would know? - What is a topic in which your learners would be interested?
Setting Up Your Environment
When you navigate to SciX, ensure you can see the homepage. The SciX address is scixplorer.org
Ask learners: “Can everyone see the SciX homepage on their browser?”
Selecting Your Discipline
On your first visit, select your preferred discipline from the dropdown menu in the upper left.
Note: This step customizes your search tools but does not limit your overall search.
Quick Help & Navigation
SciX offers a help carousel on the main search page. Click the left/right arrows to view introductory resources, including a quick start guide and search examples.
When you visit a page for the first, SciX offers a quick tour of the page’s features. You can quit that at any time by clicking the x in the upper right of the current tour dialog box. At any time, you can restart the tour by clicking the blue Tour button in the upper right of the SciX header. Tours are available on the main search page, the results listing, and abstract view.
For more detailed assistance, click the “Help” button in the upper right.
Starting a Search
As an open science search engine, SciX is primarily concerned with ensuring that literature, data, and software are findable or discoverable. So, let’s find some relevant papers. Author searches are among the most common performed in SciX.
Author Search
If you select author from either the quick fields or the dropdown menu, SciX will add the field to the search bar.
- In the search field, select author from the quick fields or dropdown.
- Type
"shoemaker"(for example, for Gene Shoemaker) and click the blue magnifying glass.
Learners can just type names and phrases into the search bar. However, they will have greater control over their results if they build structured queries using fields than if they use simple unfielded searches.
author:”shoemaker” returned 2,560 results when this example was run as you can see in the upper left; because SciX adds new material on daily and weekly cycles you may see a different count.
The results are sorted by relevance and are in descending order. You can change the sorting criterion by using the dropdown menu to select: date, author count, citation count, entry date, first author, normalized citation count, or read count. Click the button next to the dropdown menu to switch between descending and ascending order.
For each article returned, you see the title, author list, date of publication, journal, and citation count. Looking at the three icons on the right, you can tell whether SciX links to the full-text, references or citations, and data.
As an open science digital library, SciX is also concerned with ensuring you can access the papers, data, and software that you want.
Looking at the list of results as a whole, I see some interesting articles with an author named “Shoemaker” but perhaps not immediately, Gene Shoemaker, planetary scientist. The author box on the left allows me to narrow my results. It lists variants of the name “Shoemaker” at the top followed by the names of co-authors.
The most common variants and co-authors are listed first.
Clicking a name variant opens additional options:
- Limit to preferred name(s), showing only papers by that variant
- Exclude unlikely variants to remove unrelated results
This helps narrow your results to the specific individual you’re interested in.
Refine by Institutional Affiliation
You can further narrow your search results using the Institutions facet.
For example, if your target author worked at Lowell Observatory, you can:
- Limit to papers with authors from that institution
- Exclude results from other affiliations
This is especially useful when multiple authors share similar names but work at different institutions.
SciX also has an affiliation (aff:) field search that searches the exact affiliation text provided by the author or publisher. The Institution facet uses a SciX standardized abbreviation and is similar to the institution (inst) field search. Some institutions listed in the facet can be opened to identify authors with individual departments. Learners asking detailed questions about this feature should be encouraged to read the SciX blog post about it.
Refine by Date
You can also adjust the date range of your results using the slider in the left sidebar.
- Drag the endpoints of the slider to limit results by year
- Click the expand icon (four arrows) to see a larger or more precise timeline
Use this if you’re researching a specific publication window or want to filter out older or newer results.
Keyword Search
Return to the SciX main search page. Use the “all search terms”
dropdown menu to start a keyword search for ‘crater.’ 
keyword:”crater” returned 8,901 results when this example was run as you can see in the upper left; because SciX adds new material on daily and weekly cycles you may see a different count.
Understanding SciX Synonym Expansion
SciX automatically expands keyword searches with discipline-specific
synonyms, related terms, and even common misspellings or alternate
forms. For example, a search for crater might automatically
include terms like:
- craters, cratering, cratered
- craterlets, craterlike, crateris
- craterform, subcrater, craterization
- krater, cratori, noncrater, etc.
This expansion improves discoverability across disciplines that might use different terminology for the same concept.
If you only want the exact term you type (no
expansion), add an equals sign: =crater.
This exact-match feature is helpful when you’re targeting highly specific terms or avoiding irrelevant results.
Keyword Search
Return to the SciX main search page. Execute an exact keyword search for ‘crater’.
=keyword:”crater” returned 2,329 results when this example was run as you can see in the upper left; because SciX adds new material on daily and weekly cycles you may see a different count.
With synonym expansaion disabled, fewer results are returned. However, those precise results may be just what you need.
Keyword Search
Experiment with an author or keyword search, both with and without the equal sign. What differences do you observe? Discuss your experiences with a partner
As time allows, encourage learners to share their expectations and experiences with expanded and exact searches.
Narrowing Results Using Keyword Facet
After running a keyword search, you can refine your results using the Keywords facet in the sidebar. Authors or publishers provided these keywords, which are listed in order of frequency within your results.
You can:
- Choose to limit to preferred keywords or exclude undesired ones
- Click the upward arrow in the lower right corner of the facet to browse the full list of keywords
- Sort keywords by frequency or alphabetically
- Search for a specific keyword or partial match
- Download keywords for use outside of SciX
{alt=‘SciX
Keywords facet search panel with results of search for keywords begining
with ’sh’ sorted by frequency’}
This is especially useful when you’re trying to focus on a specific subtopic or filter out irrelevant results.
Keyword searches are complicated because publishers use different keyword systems, which can also change over time. The keyword_schema field identifies the system where known. Authors who want their papers to be discovered (and cited) might want to give some additional attention to the keywords they suggest for their papers.
Powering Up Your Keyword Search
You can expand the places SciX looks for your keyword by using an abs search. Using the abs prefix will search
- title
- keywords, provided by author or publisher
- abstract
The presence of your keyword in the abstract is a better indicator of its significance within the paper as a whole than a passing mention in the full text. This “balanced” search is the most common topical search in SciX.
‘abs’ is short for “abstract’ but an ‘abstract’ only is also possible as is a full-text search. Both of these are mentioned briefly later in the module.
Challenge
Return to the main menu. Use the ‘all search terms’ dropdown menu to start an ‘abs’ search for ‘crater’.
abs:”crater” returned 53,647 results when this example was run as you can see in the upper left; because SciX adds new material on daily and weekly cycles you may see a different count.
By searching more fields, an abs search will produce more results than just searching the keywords field alone.
Filtering by Refereed Status
SciX allows you to filter your search results based on whether a paper is refereed (peer-reviewed) or non-refereed (everything else).
You can find this option in the Refereed facet in the sidebar. It’s useful if you’re looking only for peer-reviewed journal articles or want to ensure you see other materials like conference proceedings or technical reports.
Note: SciX considers dissertations to be refereed. Most, but not all, conference abstracts and proceedings are categorized as non-refereed.
- “Refereed” includes only peer-reviewed works
- “Not Refereed” includes the grey literature, preprints, or white papers
If you want only “Refereed” papers, you can either - Limit to “Refereed” papers - Exclude “Not Refereed” items
SciX welcomes submission of missing gray literature and disserations. Learners can use the Missing/Incorrect option on the Feedback dropdown menu to submit articles. SciX considers the dissertation defense a reviewing process. Not everyone would agree on this characterization. SciX evaluates conferences individually to determine whether their abstracts and proceedings should be considered refereed or non-refereed.
Filtering by Publication Type
You can also filter your results by Publication Type, helping you focus on specific formats such as:
- Journal articles
- Book chapters
- Dissertations
- Conference papers
- Technical reports
- Datasets
- Software
- Proposals
Use the Publication Type facet in the sidebar to:
- Limit results to your preferred document types
- Exclude formats that aren’t relevant to your research
Within the facet, Publication Types are grouped by article (journal article, proceedings article, book chapter ….) or non-article (PhD thesis, editorial, book…)
Like the Keywords facet, clicking the upper arrow at the lower right of a long list in the Publication Type facet opens window where you can
- Sort keywords by types by frequency or alphabetically
- Search for a specific type or partial match
This is particularly helpful when your search returns a mix of source types and you’re only interested in peer-reviewed articles or long-form research. It can also help you identify specialized resources like data and software.
Publication Type refers to the type of document. SciX has a separate field and facet to search and filter by journal or publisher. By now, learners should be comfortable using the main search page ‘all search terms’ dropdown menu to locate the ‘Publication Full Name’ search or used the Publications facet.
Searching Text
You can target your search to specific parts of an article by using the corresponding field search. These are especially useful when you’re looking for a term in just one section (e.g., the title) or want to exclude it from another (e.g., the body).
Common text field searches in SciX include:
-
abstract:— abstract text only -
title:— title only -
body:— article body only -
ack:— acknowledgments only -
full:— full text of the article
in addition, to our old friends
-
keyword:— author- or publisher-provided keywords -
abs:— title, abstract, and keywords
You can also use Boolean operators (AND,
OR, NOT) to combine or exclude terms.
For example:
abs:(crater AND mars) NOT body:jezeroThis finds articles that mention crater and Mars in the title, abstract, or keywords, but exclude any that mention Jezero in the body text.
{alt=‘SciX
results from complex search shwon in bar as ’abs:(crater AND mars) NOT
body:jezero’}
Challenge
Return to the SciX main search page. Construct a query that either includes or excludes text from the acknowledgements section. Share your results with a neighbor.
If time permits, encourage the learners to share their searches with the class. Ask why they might search other text fields.
Exploring the Abstract View
From any list of results, click an article title of interest to open the abstract view. When you first open the abstract view, you will see in the center
- Detailed bibliographic information (title, authors, publication details, DOIs)
- Abstract
- Author- or publisher-provided keywords
Along the left side, you will see
- Links to full-text sources
- Data repositories
- Related materials, including software
SciX matches preprints to the publisher’s version of record and provides a single consolidated view of these versions.
Clicking the links on the left side for citations, references, or similar, produces the list of corresponding papers with all of their details. Those lists can be converted to search results for further investigation.
Clicking the links on the left side for metrics produces a graphical display of the citations to the paper over time. The citataion data can be downloaded.
Clicking the links on the left side for export citation provides access to a variety of citation formats that can be downloaded to a file or copied to the clipboard.
Most publisher formats for SciX supported disciplines are supported. If we are missing one, custom formats are possible. However, SciX encourages learners to recommend missing formats for inclusion. Zotoro uses RIS format, which is avialable. Mendolay uses RIS, BibteX, and EndNote, which are all available.
Challenge
Select an article and review its abstract view thoroughly. - What extra details can you find that weren’t in the results view? - What features would be most useful to you personally? Share your findings with a neighbor.
If time permits, enourage learners to share their experiences with the class.
Reflection and Discussion
Take a few minutes to perform a search on a topic relevant to your work using both author and keyword searches. Then, discuss with a partner:
- What did you search for?
- Did you find relevant materials?
- What aspects of the process were straightforward or challenging?
Bonus Challenge
Try exporting a citation from one of your articles. Explore the export options and compare different formats.
- SciX enables effective author and keyword searches with powerful synonym expansion.
- Facet filters help narrow down results by author variants, institutional affiliation, and publication date.
- The abstract view provides in-depth details and links to additional resources.
Content from Literature Exploration in SciX
Last updated on 2026-09-18 | Edit this page
Estimated time: 40 minutes
Overview
Questions
- What papers are useful to researchers working on (example topic)?
- How could I narrow (example topic) appropriately?
- What are the top collaborations in (example topic)?
Objectives
- Expand a search using SciX second-order operators, including useful and review
- Explore connections among authors and papers using SciX visualizations
Literature Exploration in SciX
In this lesson, we will be focusing on different ways to explore your search results in SciX.
Setting Up Your Environment
When you go to SciX, ensure you can see the homepage.
Ask learners: “Can everyone see the SciX homepage on their browser?”
Research Trends
First we will focus on second-order operators, which are search operations that are performed on the results of a previous query. The second order operators available in SciX are: similar, useful, reviews, and trending,. Each of these second-order operators benefit from taking different things into consideration for the initial query, so we will discuss individually the three we highlight in this lesson.
You might mention the kinds of topical searches you commonly perform in SciX (e.g., finding articles for your domain or checking citation metrics). The guided examples will be more meaningful if you modify them for your discipline or facility.
To get started, let’s run an example search query on SciX. You can search for any topic you are interested in, but for my demonstration, I am going to look for papers about volcanoes.
Start by entering your terms into the main search bar and executing the search.
Next, click on the Explore button menu to see all of the options, which are categorized under two headings: Visualizations and Operations. The options under “operations” are the second order operators.
Similar
First, let’s look at the Similar() operator.
Results from this second-operator query exclude the results from the
original query, so it is best to focus on creating a narrow set of
results, or even a single relevant paper, to build off in the
Similar() search, so look through the results and select
the one to three papers most relevant for your topic. I’ll select just
the first article using the checkbox and click on Similar
under the Explore menu.
It may take a little while for the results from the second-order operator to load. In the background, Science Explorer is combining the abstracts from articles in the original selection and then ranking all abstracts in SciX based on their textual similarity to the combined abstracts. The articles returned are the most similar to those from the original selection as determined by text analysis.
Similar() acting on the most relevant paper returned by an
unfielded search for ‘volcanoes’In addition to lists of papers, Similar() accepts any
text as input. The format is
similar("any text for comparison goes here",input)For instance, I could take text from U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Volcano Notification Service report
and feed it into Similar().
similar("Yellowstone Caldera activity remains at background levels, with 61 located earthquakes in August (largest = M2.0). Deformation measurements indicate no significant uplift of the north caldera rim since January 2026 and only minor uplift of the caldera since the beginning of the year.",input)
to get over 68,000 results.
Michael Kurtz et
al. 2020 and the SciX
Similar() help provide examples of sophisticated
queries using Similar()
Useful
The second-order operator Useful() examines the
references included in papers identified by the original query. It
combines them into a list sorted by how often a given paper is
referenced in the original set. The documents returned are the ones
cited the most often, by the authors of the chosen papers on the topic,
which can include foundational papers, datasets, and software. This
query can also expose papers in different, but related fields, such as
papers that describe software that other researchers found useful when
exploring the topic.
Challenge
Submit a query to determine what papers are useful to volcanologists.
Using an unfielded search for volcanoes as input, Useful()
returned over 4,00 results when this example was run as you can see in
the upper left; because SciX adds new material on daily and weekly
cycles you may see a different count.
The top three papers shown contain significant data sets and fundamental software functions.
Reviews
The last second-order operator we will cover today is
Reviews(). This operator collects the list of papers that
cite the papers in the original query and sorts them by how frequently
each paper appears. It does not necessarily return articles from review
journals, such as Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences,
Annual Review of Astronomy and Astrophysics, or Annual Review
of Information Science and Technology. You can think of the results
from a Reviews() search as a higher-level view of your
topic or taking a step back from the details. These results will be the
most relevant papers on your topic when viewed from this broader
perspective within its field.
Challenge
Submit a query to take a higher-level look at volcanoes, perhaps
place it within physical geology more broadly using
Reviews().
Using an unfielded search for volcanoes as input, Reviews()
returned over 127,00 results when this example was run as you can see in
the upper left; because SciX adds new material on daily and weekly
cycles you may see a different count.
The top three papers shown appear be about tectonic systems.
If you were looking for a more traditional review journal covering a field with which you were less familiar, you could consult the SciX Journals database. It is available at https://scixplorer.org/journalsdb. You can type a word or two into the search bar to identify journals with titles containing those words.
If I try typing “Review”, I find a lot of choices. However, scrolling through them, I do not find a volcanology specific review journal. My best option is probably Earth Science Reviews (ESRv). If I click on the abbreviation, I will get all of the papers published in that journal.
Alternatively, if I click on the full name of the journal, I will get more technical information about the SciX holdings for this journal.
Reflection and Discussion
Spend 2-3 minutes working with second-order operators looking for research trends in a topic of your choice. Then, discuss what you did and what you learned with a friend. Was something difficult for you? Did something surprise you?
Which operator are you most likely to use: similar, useful, reviews?
if time permits, ask one or two learners to describe their experience. If they ran into problems with the operations, be prepared to provide basic support and suggestions.
Summary of Second-Order Operators
To review, SciX second-order operators can provide deeper insights and more information about the topic you are researching. Each of them accept sets of papers, or the results of a previous query, as their input. The graphic below to can help describe the similarities and differences among these operations.
For more information, we recommend - SciX help page on second-order queries - Second Order Operators in SciX - 2020 paper by Michael Kurtz et al on second-order operations
Connections & Collaborations
Now, let’s turn to examining SciX visualizations, and we are going to focus on the paper network and the author network because these two visualizations offer new ways to explore search results. More traditional graphs of metrics and results are also available as is a concept cloud.
Paper Network
This visualization creates groups of papers by looking at the references from each paper and grouping them based on how many are shared. Because the papers in these groups cite a similar set of other papers, we can expect the papers in the group to be about the same topics. By default, this visualization only uses data from the first 400 papers in your search results, but you can adjust that; the maximum papers analysized are 1000 papers.
Each group is named by extracting shared, unique words from the titles of the set of articles in the group. These title words can help provide a general overview of the main topics of your original search results. Clicking on any specific group will display a list of the most cited papers from that group.
You can download a text file in comma-separated-value format (csv) of the data that underlies the graphic. The cvs file will provide identifiers for each paper and indicate which other papers are in its same group, along with some other metadata such as citation counts and downloads.
Reviewing a paper network can help you drill down into a topic or help you expand your literature search by identifying papers you may have otherwise missed.
Author Network
This visualization is created by looking at authors that frequently appear together and creating groups based on the frequencies of those collaborations. Each of these groups contain authors that often work with each other, though not every author in each group will have worked with every other author in their group. You may find it helpful when looking for new opportunities, when trying to eliminate possible conflicts of interest, or when surveying the research landscape.
Challenge
Visualize an Author Network
Create a visualization of the Author Network using your search results. Like the Paper Network, this visualization will default to the first 400 papers but you can chance the number used.
Using the top 400 documents returned by unfielded search for volcanoes for input, the visualization algorithm identified seven main groups when when this example; because SciX adds new material on daily and weekly cycles you may see a different distribution.
Clicking into the section group, the inside edge of the donut, will bring up the list of papers in that group. Clicking on a specific name, or their specific section of the donut, will instead show all papers by that particular author.
Clicking on the “View link overlay?” will show connections among individuals in different groups.
Like the Paper Network, the Author Network also has an option to download the underlying data as a csv file.
Reflection and Discussion
Spend 2-3 minutes individually looking at these visualizations for a topic of your choice. Then, discuss what you did and what you learned with a friend. Was anything difficult? Did anything surprise you? How could you use either the paper network or author network in your own work?
if time permits, ask one or two learners to describe their experience. If they ran into problems with the visualizations, be prepared to provide basic support and suggestions.
Summary of Visualizations
SciX visualizations provide additional ways of analyzing your search results. Each takes the results of a query and highlights connections among the documents: topics through references for the Paper Network, collaborations through authors for the Author Network, influence through citations for metrics and results, and relative frequency of concepts through abstract text for the Concept Cloud. These tools are helpful in building a substantive literature review and in positioning your work to your best advantage.
For more details about these two graphs and information about the other SciX graphics, we recommend - SciX Help page on Visualizations - Exploring SciX Visualizations handout - 2020 paper by Michael Kurtz et al on second-order operations (Paper Network only)
Bonus Challenge
Using search results from a query of interest to you, try one of the Explore menu options that we were not able to cover today. Consult the SciX Help documentation for anything that is unclear.
- SciX offers powerful tools that operate on sets of documents to
assist you analyzing the literature.
-
Similar()identifies items that are textually similar: find more like ….
-
Useful()analyzes reference lists: what will help me with ….
-
Reviews()analyzes citations lists: what has this contributed to …
- The Paper Network groups papers topically through their references:
how could I narrow my topic? what am I missing?
- The Author Network identifies groups through co-authorship: what
collaborations are working in this field? what is that lab
producing?
Author Network - SciX visualization that groups authors by co-author frequency; surveys the research landscape for a topic
bibstem - SciX abbreviation used for journal names and some other publication categories; it can be used as as search field
Concept Cloud - SciX visualization that compares frequency or uniqueness of title and abstract words against entire corpus; can be used to characterize work or to identify search terms
Paper Network SciX visualization that groups papers by topic through their references; can focus help narrow research questions or ensure completeness of literature review
Review colloquial term for an article giving a broad overview of a field and summarizing its current state, some journals focus exclusively on soliciting such contributions
Reviews() - SciX second-order
operator that analyzes citation lists; takes a higher-level view of
a topic by asking what has this contributed to
second-order operator - query that takes as input the output of a previous query; in SciX, these frequently operate on sets of documents
Similar() - SciX second-order
operator that analyzes the textual similarity of documents,
returning results that are similar to the input text provided whether
from single or multiple papers or directly typed sample
Useful() - SciX second-order
operator that analyzes the reference lists; takes a nitty-gritty
approach to topic by asking what are researchers actually using
visualization - use of graphs and other graphical elements to convey information; can be an effective way of communicating complex relationships, such as SciX Paper and Author Networks
Content from SciX and ORCiD
Last updated on 2026-09-18 | Edit this page
Estimated time: 20 minutes
Overview
Questions
- How do I ensure that all my papers are attached to my ORCiD?
Objectives
- Claim an article using an Open Researcher and Contributor Identification (ORCiD), a unique persistent digital identifier for researchers
SciX and ORCiD
In this lesson, we are going to be talking about how SciX integrates ORCiD. Hopefully, you already have an ORCiD for yourself, and an understanding of ORCiD. If not, please review the Library Carpentries Lesson “Open Research and Contributor IDs (ORCID) for Librarians” before beginning this module.
Setting Up Your Environment
When you navigate to SciX, ensure you can see the homepage.
Ask learners: “Can everyone see the SciX homepage on their browser?”
ORCiD & SciX
ORCiD stands for Open Researcher and Contributor ID Many researchers and authors today are claiming ORCiDs to help disambiguate themselves from others who share their name. SciX lets you search for published content using an ORCiD, just write “orcid:” before the ID in the query field. For example:
orcid:0000-0002-6949-0090
The ORCiD identifiers attached to a paper can come from the publisher, if that information is provided by the authors when submitting the paper.
ORCiD Use
How do researchers at your institution use ORCiDs? What are the expectations of researchers, publishers, funders, and administers regarding these identifiers? What are the barriers to ORCiD use? Discuss with a friend.
If time permits, ask one or two learners to share how ORCiDs are being used at their institution?
If any of them mention barriers to adoption, be prepared to discuss briefly further as class. Would their situation be helped by encouraging additional claims through SciX?
However, SciX also lets you claim papers for your ORCiD, which is especially useful if the papers pre-date the ORCiD system or if you know that the publisher did not collect that information when you originally submitted the paper. SciX shares these claimed papers back to ORCiD so that they can show up on your profile there.
In order to claim a paper for your ORCiD in SciX, you need to connect to your ORCiD account using the ORCiD menu option at the top of the screen. It will bring up the ORCiD logon screen. Then, you can sign in with your usual ORCiD credentials.
For your information: Learners transitioning from ADS or who have had some previous SciX experience may have ADS or SciX accounts; the two are interchangeable. If so, they may have enterend ORCiD information into their ADS or SciX account. They may also have been encouraged to log into both their ADS or SciX account and their ORCiD account. While that procedure is not wrong, it is also not necessary. In the interest of simplicity, the module only demonstrates loging into the ORCiD account, which is sufficient for all ORCiD-related tasks. If a learner asks about ORCiD and SciX accounts, you can find out more about using them together on the SciX “Claiming papers in ORCID” Help page https://scixplorer.org/scixhelp/orcid-scix/claiming-papers.
You will first see “My ORCiD Page” listing all of the papers in SciX currently associated with your ORCiD.
To search for additional papers, click the SciX logo in the upper left of the menu bar to return to the main search page. Once there, click on the ORCiD menu item to verify that ORCiD mode is “On”.
Then, search through SciX for your papers and click the “Claim” button to the right of each article that is yours. If any are erroneously marked, you can click the “Delete Claim” button to remove your claim on the article.
Visiting “My ORCiD Page” will bring back to the dashboard of all of your claimed articles, where you can push them to sync with ORCiD and make other edits.
Reflection and Discussion
If you have published papers in SciX, spend a few minutes ensuring your ORCiD is associated with each of them.
If you do not have published papers in SciX, do one of the following - Assist a friend who is working on claiming their papers. - Search for the papers of someone at your institution and identify which of their papers they should be encouraged to claim soon.
Working with a friend, address any areas of difficulty or confusion.
Ask by show of hands whether learners will be able to assist others at their institutions with claiming papers in the future.
Summary
ORCiDs provide a prowerful tool for uniquely identifying individual authors, many of whom may have similar names. SciX provides tools to search for papers using ORCiDs, where those are known, as well as assistance to authors in ensuring all their papers are properly ORCiD tagged.
For more information about using ORCiD in SciX, we recommend - Searching for papers in ORCID SciX help page - Claiming papers in ORCID SciX Help page - ORCiD in SciX handout
Bonus Challenge
For a few well-established researchers in your field, compare the effectiveness and efficiency of traditional name searches to ORCiD searches. Which works best now?
SciX encourages authors to identify themselves and claim their work
with ORCiDs.
Users can search SciX for people using ORCiDs.
Users can use SciX search tools to find their papers without ORCiDS and
claim them.
SciX will communicate users’ claims to ORCiD.
ISNI - International Standard Name
Identifier, a unique, persistent identifier for people and
organizations of which ORCiDs are a subset
ORCiD - Open Researcher and Contributor
ID, a unique, persistent identifier for researchers
claiming a paper - process by which a researcher identifies themselves
as one of the authors so that their ORCiD can be attached to a document
that did not previously have that information