NDLTD ETD Awards Powered by Scirus - 2008 Winners

Elsevier Announces Winners of the NDLTD-ETD Awards Powered by Scirus: Awards Recognize Excellence in Grey Literature and Highlight Elsevier’s Dedication to the Future Scientific Leaders

AMSTERDAM, 2 June 2008 - Elsevier, world-leading publisher of scientific, technical and medical information products and services, is proud to announce the winners of the first awards for Electronic Theses and Dissertations (ETD) with the NDLTD-ETD Awards Powered by Scirus. Elsevier Journals Publishing and Scirus, the most comprehensive science-specific search engine, conducted the awards competition in partnership with the NDLTD (Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations), the international organization dedicated to promoting the dissemination and preservation of electronic theses and dissertations, to sponsor this year's first-ever NDLTD-ETD Awards, which seek to recognize outstanding contributions to the body of electronically available ETD research.

With the advent of the ETDs and optimized subject-specific search tools like Scirus, it is now easier than ever to access materials that have not been available through traditional publishing alternatives. Once difficult to discover because they consist largely of masters theses and doctoral dissertations stored in print versions at university libraries, vertical search platforms like Scirus have revolutionized access to these valuable, often overlooked materials.

"Elsevier is proud to be working with the NDLTD and recognizing these important additions to the body of scientific knowledge," said Stephen Cawley, Product Marketing Solutions Manager, Elsevier. "With tools like Scirus, we can now easily access ETDs and other important but often neglected research materials that are hastening the speed of discovery in science and the humanities."

This year's winners of the NDLTD-ETD Awards: Powered by Scirus are:

Physical & Life Sciences

• Lawretta Chineze Leaticia Ononye, University of Tennessee, Knowville, U.S.A., The Effect of Implantation Temperature and Ionizing Radiation on the Microstructure of Ion Implanted Sapphire
• Mohan N. Thakare, Virginia Tech, U.S.A., Pharmacological Screening of Some Medicinal Plants as Antimicrobial and Feed Additives
• Benedikt T. Huber, University of Victoria, Canada, Microprocessor Systems Data Transfer Interface Design: An Expert System Approach Using Signal Timing Behavior Patterns
• Anders Ek, Linköping University, Sweden, Ultrasonic Treatment of Sewage Sludge in order to Increase Biogas Yields
• Louis Lesage, l'université Laval, Canada, Écologie Estivale Du Cerf De Virginie A La Limite Nord De Son Aire De Distribution : De La Étapopulation A L'individu
• Nathan Crane McClintock, North Carolina State University, U.S.A., Production and Use of Compost and Vermicompost in Sustainable Farming Systems
• Danny J.Y.S. Pagé, Royal Military College of Canada, Canada, Neutron And Gamma Radiation Effects On The Viscoelastic Behaviour Of Poly
• Gerald W. Ferris, University of Manitoba, Canada, An Elastic Plastic Approach: Modeling Deformation Of Dense Sand

Business, Social Sciences & Humanities

• Simon A. Nuttgens, University of Alberta, Canada, Bereavement Following Suicide: A Narrative Study
• Mmakgomo Roseline Laka-Mathebula, University of Pretoria, South Africa, Modeling the Relationship Between Organizational Commitment, Leadership Style, Human Resources Management Practices and Organizational Trust

The 10 winning ETDs were selected through a rigorous selection process which combined a shortlisting of the most downloaded ETDs per subject area through Scirus, and adjudication by scientific editors from Elsevier Journals Publishing unit.

"Elsevier's recognition of the scientific minds of the future further enhances their position as a forward-thinking company," said John Hagen, Awards Committee Chair of the NDLTD. "The NDLTD congratulates all of the winners, who are most certainly going to be the drivers of scientific discovery in the years to come."

"We're happy to participate in these awards and play a key role in helping to recognize the future published researchers," said Rose Olthof, Business Development Manager, Elsevier Journals Publishing. "The ETDs that were chosen were of the highest quality and we're delighted to see such a high caliber of research at the graduate-level."

The awards will be presented at the ETD 2008 Symposium, to be held June 4-7 at Robert Gordon University in Aberdeen, Scotland. Award winners will each receive a $500 cash prize, an NDLTD-ETD Awards: Powered by Scirus medallion and honorary recognition on the Scirus homepage.

About Scirus

Scirus is the most comprehensive science-focused search engine available on the Internet, supporting over one million researchers, scientists and students worldwide. Scirus offers users a unique combination of free Web information and journal content, clearly branding search results from proprietary sources, assuring users the validity of the content. Web sources searched by Scirus include research institutes, governments, scientific organizations, conferences, scientists' homepages and company homepages worldwide. Optimized for science-related queries, Scirus uses a dictionary with over 1.6 million scientific terms, unique pattern recognition tools and linguistic analysis, to classify the content type and recognize the 300 million scientifically relevant pages. Scirus offers users unique search functionalities such as the ability to search on bibliographical information and specific content types. Scirus is the recipient of numerous International awards, including the Search Engine Watch award for Best Specialty Search Engine and the WebAward for Best Search Engine or Directory. http://www.scirus.com

About The Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations (NDLTD)

The Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations (NDLTD) is an international organization dedicated to promoting the adoption, creation, use, dissemination and preservation of electronic analogues to the traditional paper-based theses and dissertations.

About Elsevier

Elsevier is a world-leading publisher of scientific, technical and medical information products and services. Working in partnership with the global science and health communities, Elsevier's 7,000 employees in over 70 offices worldwide publish more than 2,000 journals and 1,900 new books per year, in addition to offering a suite of innovative electronic products, such as ScienceDirect (http://www.sciencedirect.com/), MD Consult (http://www.mdconsult.com/), Scopus (http://www.info.scopus.com/), bibliographic databases, and online reference works.

Elsevier (http://www.elsevier.com/) is a global business headquartered in Amsterdam, The Netherlands and has offices worldwide. Elsevier is part of Reed Elsevier Group plc (http://www.reedelsevier.com/), a world-leading publisher and information provider. Operating in the science and medical, legal, education and business-to-business sectors, Reed Elsevier provides high-quality and flexible information solutions to users, with increasing emphasis on the Internet as a means of delivery. Reed Elsevier's ticker symbols are REN (Euronext Amsterdam), REL (London Stock Exchange), RUK and ENL (New York Stock Exchange).