Find a Collaborator: Making Research Connections at Boston University
To support faculty in finding potential collaborators, Boston University offers a suite of resources to help identify collaborators for research. In this virtual workshop, Joe Farmer, Program Manager and Data Analyst in the Office of Research, provided an overview of available tools. View the Video.
A brief summary of the tools highlighted to identify collaborators within BU
- BU Profiles – an internal database managed by BU CTSI; uses NIH taxonomy; mainly MED campus faculty using MeSH keyword system; addition of CRC faculty is in progress
[ https://www.bu.edu/ctsi/support-for-research/networking/bu-profiles/ ]
- Centers and Institutes – a searchable web site hosted by BU Office of Research
[ https://www.bu.edu/research/our-research/institutes-centers/ ]
- SciVal – this database offers two ways to identify potential collaborators: filtering by Topics/Topic centers or by using Custom Searches; SciVal allows using your own sets of keywords and filters; large searches have a maximum of 100,000 results and any searches with more than 5,000 results require additional computing time
[ https://www.bu.edu/researchsupport/tools-services/scival/ ]
- Dimensions – a larger record than SciVal with different capabilities; Dimensions uses set keywords and filters; if searching for citations within the last 30 years, a better search can be done using SciVal as it is not as expansive; Dimensions can expand results within BU by combining keywords and discipline/topic filters; it is possible to identify citation networks using Dimensions
[ https://www.bu.edu/researchsupport/tools-services/dimensions/ ]
- BU Experts database – this is a public relations tool and is publicly available, such as to media; only about 600-700 faculty have been included in this searchable database so far, others may request to be added using an online form
[ https://forms.office.com/r/Nnb4ScZenF ]