houston voices

University of Houston: New open index of scholarly articles helps researchers connect

Go and get connected to this global research system. Graphic byMiguel Tovar/University of Houston

We have all needed scholarly articles to cite in our academic careers. Now, there is a place where researchers can get millions of them, all on one site.

Named after the Library of Alexandria, OpenAlex is an index of over 200 million scientific documents including publication sources, author information and research topics that can be used to conduct studies and build research tools. According to its founders, the goal of this index is to “create a comprehensive, interlinked database of the global research system.”

So, how can researchers use this database and why is it beneficial?

More data

After Microsoft announced the closure of the Microsoft Academic Graph, a non-profit scholarly service firm, OurResearch, created OpenAlex.

OpenAlex gets its information from MAG and other sources. It also integrates with Unpaywall, which has over 30 million articles. This allows for access to much more information.

There are not just free articles to read, but OpenAlex will also tell you the license and the version of the articles.

OpenAlex updates every two weeks and brings in even more data from its other sources. With all this extra information, researchers have everything they need to conduct studies using scholarly articles by their peers.

Free and easy to use

Who doesn’t like free stuff? Everyone does! OpenAlex is 100% free to use. You don’t have to register for anything or sign in every time. You just go to the website and look for what you need.

According to one researcher, “for somebody who is more computer savvy, MAG might be easier… For researchers who want to try small projects on their own, OpenAlex will be way easier to start with.”

While it can take several days to a week to get started on MAG, it only takes a few hours on OpenAlex.

What's the big idea?

If you’re a researcher looking for an open index of millions of scholarly articles, you should try OpenAlex. A more user-friendly search engine will be added in February, making it that much easier to use the site. OpenAlex’s goal is to make connections between an expansive database of scholarly articles. Go and get connected to this global research system.

------

This article originally appeared on the University of Houston's The Big Idea. Cory Thaxton, the author of this piece, is the communications coordinator for The Division of Research.

Trending News

Building Houston

 
 

Baylor College of Medicine's Lillie and Roy Cullen Tower is set to open in 2026. Rendering courtesy of BCM

Baylor College of Medicine has collected $100 million toward its $150 million fundraising goal for the college’s planned Lillie and Roy Cullen Tower.

The $100 million in gifts include:

  • A total of $30 million from The Cullen Foundation, The Cullen Trust for Health Care, and The Cullen Trust for Higher Education.
  • $12 million from the DeBakey Medical Foundation
  • $10 million from the Huffington Foundation
  • More than $45 million from members of Baylor’s Board of Trustees and other community donors, including the M.D. Anderson Foundation, the Albert and Margaret Alkek Foundation, and The Elkins Foundation.

“The Cullen Trust for Health Care is very honored to support this building along with The Cullen Foundation and The Cullen Trust for Higher Education,” Cullen Geiselman Muse, chair of The Cullen Trust for Health Care, says in a news release. “We cannot wait to see what new beginnings will come from inside the Lillie and Roy Cullen Tower.”

The Baylor campus is next to Texas Medical Center’s Helix Park, a 37-acre project. Rendering courtesy of BCM

The Lillie and Roy Cullen Tower is set to open in 2026. The 503,000-square-foot tower is the first phase of Baylor’s planned Health Sciences Park, an 800,000-square-foot project that will feature medical education and research adjacent to patient care at Baylor Medicine and Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center on the McNair Campus.

The Baylor campus is next to Texas Medical Center’s Helix Park, a 37-acre project that will support healthcare, life sciences, and business ventures. Baylor is the anchor tenant in the first building being constructed at Helix Park.

“To really change the future of health, we need a space that facilitates the future,” says Dr. Paul Klotman, president, CEO, and executive dean of Baylor. “We need to have a great building to recruit great talent. Having a place where our clinical programs are located, where our data scientists are, next to a biotech development center, and having our medical students all integrated into that environment will allow them to be ready in the future for where healthcare is going.”

In the 1940s, Lillie and Roy Cullen and the M.D. Anderson Foundation were instrumental in establishing the Texas Medical Center, which is now the world’s largest medical complex.

“Baylor is the place it is today because of philanthropy,” Klotman says. “The Cullen family, the M.D. Anderson Foundation, and the Albert and Margaret Alkek Foundation have been some of Baylor’s most devoted champions, which has enabled Baylor to mold generations of exceptional health sciences professionals. It is fitting that history is repeating itself with support for this state-of-the-art education building.”

The Cullen Foundation donated $30 million to the project. Rendering courtesy of BCM

Trending News