QU Library strengthens its institutional repository functionality through Elsevier's ScienceDirect APIs

Qatar University Library (QUL) and Elsevier, a world-leading provider of scientific, technical and medical information products and services, recently established collaboration to maximize visibility, impact and dissemination of articles published by QU faculty and researchers.

Through Elsevier’s ScienceDirect APIs, QUL’s institutional repository (QSpace IR) now receives an automated feed of metadata and abstracts for all articles published by QU authors in Elsevier journals. Embargo-end dates indicating when an article can be made available to the public are also provided to facilitate funding body compliance. Published versions of the ScienceDirect articles are embedded within QSpace, which means that usage is added to aggregated usage statistics of the articles, which is helpful for authors, QU and Elsevier. It would not be possible to aggregate this usage if different versions of the article existed across multiple platforms.

The embedded ScienceDirect articles are available in full text to all users of QSpace that have access to ScienceDirect, not only those affiliated with QU. Users affiliated with institutions subscribing to ScienceDirect are linked to the full text based on IP recognition by the APIs. In instances where users are not are not affiliated with a subscribing institution, they see a first page preview of the article and full text articles can be accessed via document delivery services (DDS). The automated population of the repository is applicable for both open access and subscription articles.

In addition, QSpace is the first institutional repository to use DSpace plug-ins which have been developed by Atmire. These plug-ins facilitate easy integration of ScienceDirect APIs within a repository. Commenting on the collaboration, QUL director Dr Imad Bachir said: “The project addresses several of our library needs, including more easily showcasing research published by our faculty and researchers, facilitating a simplified workflow for users and measuring readership statistics through consistency in use of article metadata. ScienceDirect APIs also facilitate our compliance with funding body policies by providing automatic updates of article embargo data in our repository.”

Elsevier director of Access & Policy Dr Alicia Wise said: “It’s terrific that libraries and publishers are able to work together to expand discoverability of published research, and in ways that reduce duplication of cost and effort for both. Qatar’s international leadership is so welcome, and their use of the DSpace plug-ins demonstrates that any institutional repository running a recent version of DSpace can easily integrate with our ScienceDirect API services. We are very pleased to be a part of these strategic collaborations.”