Research Guides: Natural Resources Agency Government Documents and Technical Reports: Government Technical Reports

Agency Indexes and Bibliographies

U.S. Department of Defense
- DTIC Online (Defense Technical Information Center) Includes all unclassified, unlimited technical report citations from 1974 to the present. Fulltext of reports are linked from 1998 to the present. The scope of the collection includes areas normally associated with Defense research; however, since DoD's interests are widespread, the collection also contains information relating to hard sciences such as biological and medical sciences; environmental pollution and control; and the behavioral and social sciences.
U.S. Department of Energy
- Energy Citations Database (Office of Scientific and Technical Information) Contains bibliographic records from 1948 to the present for energy and energy-related scientific and technical information from the Department of Energy (DOE) and its predecessor agencies--the Energy Research & Development Administration (ERDA) and the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC). The scope of the index includes disciplines of interest to DOE such as chemistry, physics, materials science, environmental science, geology, engineering, mathematics, climatology, oceanography, computer science and related disciplines. It includes citations to technical report literature, conference papers, journal articles, books, dissertations, and patents. Links to recent fulltext, if available, are made.
- Information Bridge: DOE Scientific and Technical Information (Office of Scientific and Technical Information) Searchable database of DOE fulltext research report literature from 1994 to the present.
- Science Accelerator (Office of Scientific and Technical Information) Search across the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE's) collections of scientific and technical information. Searches the "deep Web" content of DOE-generated research and related resources containing pertinent information on energy, science, and technology.
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency

EPA Publications Bibliography (print copies available in Docs EP 1.21/7-2) In three cumulations 1970-1976, 1977-1983, 1984-1990, and annual 1990-2000.
National Publications Catalog (annual print copy available in Docs EP 1.2: P9615) Lists over 7,000 currently available publications.
National Service Center for Environmental Publications (Environmental Protection Agency) Includes over 7,000 print and 26,000 fulltext documents.

U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
(Two major federal aid programs--the Federal Aid in Wildlife Restoration Program (Pittman-Robertson Program) which began in 1937 and the Federal Aid in Sport Fish Restoration Program (Dingell-Johnson and Wallop-Breau amendment) which began in 1951 have funded basic and applied research in wildlife and fisheries. While some of this research has been formally published in journals most has remained in technical report format.)
- Wildlife and Ecology Studies Worldwide (HSU users only) and Fish, Fisheries and Aquatic Biodiversity Worldwide (HSU users only) both include the Fish and Wildlife Reference Service (FWRS) Bibliographic Database that indexes technical reports resulting from the wildlife and fisheries federal aid programs.
- Pittman-Robertson Quarterly (Per SK1 P5) Includes list of funded projects, bief summaries of preliminary findings and progress reports, and formal publications resulting from projects. Covers 1941-1954.
- Survey of Pittman-Robertson Activities (Docs C55.13 NMFS-CIRS 38, 47, 42, 56, 82) Annual continuation of the above. Covers 1955-1959.
- Dingell-Johnson Quarterly (Docs I 49.29/2) Includes list of funded projects, brief summaries of preliminary findings and progress reports, and formal publications resulting from projects. Covers 1953-1958
- Federal Aid in Fish & Wildlife Restoration (Docs I 49.29/3) Annual statistical summary and state-by-state listing of funded projects. Covers 1945 to the present.
- Index to Federal Aid Publications in Sport Fish & Wildlife Restoration and Selected Cooperative Research Project Reports (Docs I 22.9:F52) Comprehensive index to 5,600 formally published federal aid reports which have appeared as journal articles, conference papers, monographic serials or government documents. Covers 1951-1968.
U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration
- NASA Technical Reports Server Provides 1) access to scientific and technical literature sponsored or created by NASA and its predecessor, the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, that is available on NASA technical report servers; and 2) selected aerospace literature on non-NASA servers. Includes over 250,00 full-text documents, and links to more than a 500,000 images and video clips. Literature dates from 1917 to the present.
U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
- National Sea Grant Library Database Indexes 40,000 Sea Grant funded publications, with links to 15,000 in fulltext format.

Location and Availability

Availability of technical reports in the HSU Library is limited. Of those available:

Some have been selectively purchased, cataloged as books, and are listed in the HSU Library Catalog.
Some are received on "government depository" and are part of the Government Documents Collection. Use the Government Document General Indexes and Web Directories or Agency Indexes and Bibliographieslisted above.
Some are available on the web in fulltext format. Listed below are sites that provide access to online fulltext of federal and other technical report literature.
- Virtual Technical Reports Center: EPrints, Preprints, & Technical Reports on the Web (University of Maryland University Library) Contains an alphabetical list of institutions that provide either full-text reports, or searchable extended abstracts of their technical reports on the web.
- Information Bridge: DOE Scientific and Technical Information (U.S. Department of Energy) Provides access to the fulltext of research and development reports that are produced and made available by the Department of Energy National Laboratories and DOE contractors from 1995 forward. Additional legacy documents are also included as they become available in electronic format. Subjects covered include physics, chemistry, materials, biology, environmental sciences, energy technologies, engineering, computer and information science, renewable energy, and other topics.
- National Service Center for Environmental Publications (Environmental Protection Agency) Includes over 26,000 fulltext EPA documents.
- TRAIL: Technical Report Archive and Image Library (Greater Western Library Alliance and the Center for Research Libraries) Collaborative project to digitize, archive, and provide access to federal technical reports issued prior to 1975.
Some are treated as "Monographic Series". The "literature section" of natural resources research guidesinclude a section on how to search for monographic series..

Government technical reports not available locally can be requested through the Library's Interlibrary Loan Service.

General Indexes

NTIS Database (National Technical Information Service) Indexes 3 million federal technical reports issued from 1964 to the present.
Science.gov (USA.gov) Gateway to science information provided by 14 federal scientific agencies. The site provides access to federal science web sites and databases containing technical reports, journal articles, conference proceedings, and other published materials on science topics. Browse web sites by broad subject area; or search websites and databases by keyword.
DTIC MultiSearch (Defense Technical Information Center) Searches DOD and other federal government databases, including those from the Departments of Agriculture, Energy, and Defense; EPA; FDA; NASA; NIH; and USGS.

Introduction

Governement technical reports typically publish the results of research projects conducted for government agencies. They are usually produced in response to specific information needs with research either 1) conducted "in-house" by state or federal research labs, or 2) contracted out to universities, consulting firms, research institutes, or private industry.

Progress and final reports typically are used directly by the sponsoring agency with limited distribution beyond the organization. As a result technical report literature is sometimes called "gray literature" because of its difficulty to identify and acquire.

The format of technical reports is more flexible in organization and tends to contain more of the scientific data collected. Research first reported in a technical report may be reworked and published in other "primary" literature formats.