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Dragonfly
Fall 2003 -- Volume 34, Number 4 |
by Linda Milgrom, Outreach Coordinator
National Network of Libraries of Medicine Pacific Northwest
Region
What do Hot Springs, Rivers, and Soy Milk have in common? They are all liquids, and they are all new 2004 MeSH headings! As you are adjusting to the sound and feel of "2004," remember also that the New Year always brings changes to NLM systems and MeSH vocabulary. Recent NLM Technical Bulletin articles about this year's changes have been conveniently gathered at http://www.nlm.nih.gov/pubs/techbull/nd03/nd03_med_data_changes.html.
The 2004 version of MeSH is already in use for MEDLINE and is the default in the MeSH database, available from the PubMed sidebar. This year 666 new descriptors were added, 109 were replaced with more up-to-date terminology, 20 were deleted, and 484 see references were added! While some changes may seem trivial, others reorganize ("re-tree") large sections. Did you realize that the MeSH Trees were expanded from nine to eleven levels to accommodate increasing complexity and detail? This depth enabled MeSH developers to make major changes, notably to the B Category for Animals. The check tag Animal was changed to a new Animals descriptor/check tag, at the head of the rearranged Animals (B1) Tree. Vertebrates and Invertebrates lead major subdivisions under the new Animals term. The singular Animal term will map to the new plural, so searches can be inclusive or focused to specific animal groups. This change is more fully explained in the article at http://www.nlm.nih.gov/pubs/techbull/so03/so03_animals.html. The Bacteria (B3) tree has 310 new descriptors, in part to reflect changes in taxonomy as described in the second edition of Bergey's Manual of Systematic Bacteriology. Other new developments include: several changes in terminology for Ethnic Groups and Geographic Origins (Categories I and M); the toxicity subheading has a new definition, and Anti-Bacterial Agents is the new preferred heading for Antibiotics.
Some of my other "favorite" new MeSH headings: Complex Mixtures, F-Box Motifs, Holliday Junction Resolvases, Matrix Attachment Regions, Microbubbles, Quantum Dots, Refusal to Participate, and Trans Fatty Acids. A few of the new headings are strikingly close to non-scientific terms: Nitella (not Nutella), Volvox (not Volvo), and Sargassum (not Sarcasm). Don't forget Wigglesworthia. According to the scope note, without Wigglesworthia, Tsetse flies are infertile!
You may have also noticed changes in PubMed in recent weeks. If you truncate a term with an asterisk, PubMed will now process up to 600 variations (increased from 150). Since OLDMEDLINE citations are now part of PubMed, the system covers 50 years of bibliographic data! The ability to email results directly from PubMed was introduced last summer. About the same time, icons indicating free full-text appeared on the summary display. To keep up with changes, read the NLM Technical Bulletin and check PubMed's New and Noteworthy links. Trust and Friends were new headings last year, no kidding.
Dragonfly, Fall 2003 -- Volume 34 Issue 4
This publication is funded in whole with Federal funds from the National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health, under Contract No. N01-LM-1-3516.
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