Hints for Searching the Worm Literature

Basic use:

Type the word or name you want to find in "Word(s) to search for", then click the Search button on the Worm picture. A list of matches will appear. If there are more than 100 matches the list will be cut off. Try using the "All words" or "Phrase" checkbox, or refining your search.

If your searches fail:

Check your spelling. The most common cause of search failures is spelling mistakes. If you're searching for a gene, make sure you have the right syntax for C elegans gene names: three letters, followed by a hyphen, followed by a number. "lin-11" is right. "lin11" is wrong and won't work.

Refining searches:

If your search was successful, you can "refine" it: that is, do an additional search and combine the results with the search you just did. The refine form is just like the basic search form except that there are three buttons: "And", "Or", and "Not". If you click "And", only abstracts that match your old search AND the new search will be listed. If you click "Or" abstracts that match the old search OR the new one will be listed. Finally, if you click Not, abstracts that match the old but NOT the new search are listed. This works properly even if the first search was cut off at 100: abstracts not in the first hundred can still be found.

Word(s) to search for:

The Worm Literature Index finds abstracts that contain words matching what you type in this field. All searches are case-insensitive. A word is any sequence of letters and digits. Hyphen and apostrophe are also considered part of a word if they are between letters or digits. (For instance, "unc-1" and "L'Hernault" are each one word.)

Partial word matches allowed:

If this is checked (the default), any word that begins with what you typed will match. For instance, "synap" will match "synapse" or "synaptic", but not "postsynaptic". There is an exception: a word ending in a digit must match exactly. Thus a search for "unc-1" will not find abstracts dealing with unc-11, unc-119, etc. "." tacked onto the end of a word will always force an exact match, and "*" at the end will always allow a partial match, regardless of the check box. (This is useful if you want to allow partial matches to some but not all words.)

Author, Title, and Text

Each abstract is divided into three parts for indexing: author, title, and text. By default you search all three, but you can search a subset by checking these boxes.

Find abstracts containing:

This option specifies what happens if you type more than one word. If "Any word" is checked (the default), the search will find abstracts that contain any of the words you typed. Thus a search for "unc-1 unc-7" would find any abstract that mentions either gene. If "All words" is checked, only abstracts that mention both genes will be found. Finally, if you check "Phrase", the exact phrase you type must match, e.g. "in situ hybridization".

You can use the words "and", "or", and "not" to specify more exactly what you want. For instance, an author search for "l'hernault not ward" would find all papers by L'Hernault in which Ward was not a coauthor. Quotes can be used to specify a phrase, e.g. 'in situ hybridization'.

Find abstracts from:

The Worm Literature Index is compiled from all electronic sources available to me: these are mainly the Worm Breeder's Gazette, Worm Meeting Abstracts, and the CGC Bibliography. The "Find abstracts from:" options allow you to restrict the sources to be searched. If you would like more options here, let me know: they're easy to add.

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