Explore: Finding books, journals and more

You can browse Explore for print and online resources in a number of ways. In this page you will find how to:

• Use the Browse search option on the Explore main page. This option has its own dedicated interface.
• Browse from within the Details section.
• Use the Virtual browse to view books on the shelves in the physical library.

Use the dedicated 'Browse' search interface to browse indexes of materials:

• Click the ellipsis '...' (Show more, three dots icon) at the top right of the Explore home page. 

• Select 'Browse' and choose an index from the drop-down menu.

Options you can browse by include:

• Author: last name, first name format e.g. dostoyevsky, fyodor; british broadcasting corporation.
• Title: e.g. tale of two cities (omit initial articles: a, the, le, etc.). Note that subsequent articles should be included in a browse search i.e 'Cat in the hat', not 'Cat in hat'.
• Subject: (Library of Congress Subject Headings - LCSH) e.g. stars; russia history.
• Medical subject: (Medical Subject Headings - MeSH) e.g. Lymphatic System.
• Shelfmark: (UCL shelf location) e.g. ANTHROPOLOGY A 2.
• NLM call numbers: (National Library of Medicine) e.g. WY 101

The list of results will display brief information, which varies and depends on the Browse option you select. For example: if you browse by Title the brief record will show the title details, while if you browse by Shelfmark the brief record will show title, author and sometimes date of publication of the item.

You can also browse from within the Details section of an item.

• Click on the linked text in a record to browse for materials with the same subject headings, for authors or for books series, e.g. in the example below you can click on a number of subject headings, the book series or more publications by the author.

On Explore you can also virtually browse the library bookshelves. If you find a print book that is relevant to your research and you want to check which other books are next to it on the library shelves, then from an item's full details, click on the Virtual browse link or navigate to the bottom of the display window.

To view books to either side of the one you have selected click on the navigation arrows.