As the need for digital content increases almost daily, preserving this content for university libraries, especially in the least developed and developing nations, becomes a challenge, resulting in the loss of this data. Even though most of these libraries are automated and adopt one digital preservation strategy or the other, library users need…

With this issue of "Research Library Issues" ("RLI"), the Association of Research Libraries (ARL) (re)turns its collective attention to research data management (RDM), a topic consistently identified as a top priority by ARL library directors, and a topic of several recent ARL publications. This is a pivotal moment for the…

This study was carried out to ascertain the attitudes of academics concerning the utilization of institutional repositories (IRs) in Nigerian universities. The study took the form of a descriptive survey, gathering data from the five Nigerian universities with IRs. The result showed that the universities developed IRs to create a forum for their…

"Terra Cognita" surveys the current landscape of archival research and the experiences of emerging scholars seeking to navigate it. Drawing on data from the Council on Library and Information Resources' (CLIR's) Mellon Fellowships for Dissertation Research in Original Sources, the report takes an in-depth look at how the conditions and…

Special collections libraries collect and preserve materials of intellectual and cultural heritage, providing access to unique research resources. As their holdings continue to expand, special collections in research libraries confront increased space pressures. Off-site storage facilities, used frequently by research libraries for general…

Charles E. Bracker was a professor of botany and plant pathology at Purdue University from 1964 to 1999. His late wife, Anri, was an orchid enthusiast who began collecting and housing orchids in the 1980s. In 2009, Bracker's 30,000 digital orchid photographs were donated to Ball State University Libraries, where both of this article's authors…

This article establishes the level of skills and experience in preservation and conservation management using a case study methodological approach conducted in the 3 university libraries at the University of Zambia. The findings revealed that 20 (57%) of the library staff had not received formal training in preservation and conservation of library…

The purpose of this article is to describe the scope and depth of the historic corporate annual report collections in twelve academic/research libraries in North America. For many decades, a few major academic business libraries have been collecting and preserving corporate Annual Reports (ARS), the reports sent to shareholders documenting the…

Storing and curating authentic academic literature and making it accessible for the long term has been a time-honoured task of national libraries. By guarding existing knowledge and facilitating its use to produce new insights, national and university libraries have formed an integral part of the research environment, complementing the roles of…

Over the past several decades, millions of digital objects of significant scientific, economic, cultural, and historic value have been published and distributed to libraries and archives on removable media. Providing long-term access to these documents, media files, and software executables is an increasingly complex task because of dependencies…

Research libraries are urged to take part in a National Preservation Program for their most important library materials. Techniques of conservation of past and current materials, including microfilming and storage at low temperatures, are discussed, while a national preservation center which would store materials is also proposed. Development of…

Reviews efforts by academic research institutions to capture and preserve archival records of American labor institutions, focusing on a recent project to assess the state of labor archives efforts and the challenges facing union officials and labor archivists. Describes the Labor Archives Project (LAP), including the research methodology and…

Description of the History Computerization Project, which is being developed for the exchange of information between researchers, librarians, archivists, museum curators, preservation groups, and historical societies, focuses on workshops that teach the use of computer database management for historical cataloging and research. (LRW)

ARL is the bimonthly report on research library issues and actions from ARL (Association of Research Libraries), CNI (Coalition of Networked Information), and SPARC (Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition). ARL reports on current issues of interest to academic and research library administrators, staff, and users; higher education…

Profiles National Archives established by Congress in 1934 to collect and organize federal documents of permanent historic value. Types of materials included in archives, the Washington building and regional centers, the "Declaration of Independence," arrangement and preservation of materials, declassification of documents, and archives…