Discover existing publications

When you begin your literature review, VU Amsterdam offers both tools and an infrastructure to help you discover relevant journals and other research outputs. You can access VU Amsterdam publications and international journals through various abstract and citation databases.

For some fields you can make use of systematic reviews, which provide a summary and analysis of the evidence of all scientific studies investigating a predefined research question. Researchers can use systematic reviews to both identify and evaluate extant evidence on a topic.

Get to know your peers

When you begin your research and have developed a good idea, it is advisable to find out who else is working on the same topic. Perhaps there are colleagues at VU Amsterdam who are also studying similar subjects.

You will always find peers, both nationally and internationally, who are conducting interesting and related research.

It is also important to ensure that you can also be found by others in the field. After all, national and international visibility is a prerequisite for participating in academic debates.

Get to know the networks of VU Amsterdam

When working at VU Amsterdam you have the opportunity to collaborate with and join a broad range of networks provided by the University. On this page we provide some examples of websites that may be of interest to you.

Discover existing data and software

Depending on your particular field of research, there may be datasets and research software available that can help you develop your research.

These datasets from either individuals or organisations are available in a variety of formats. Data can be found through both generic and discipline-specific repositories. Some are listed in the VU Amsterdam LibGuide.

Open-source software allows you to use and build upon existing software available in a variety of programming languages and domains. Research software can be found through both generic and discipline-specific registries or catalogues.

Make sure to check with your faculty data steward if there are more discipline-specific datasets or research software that may be of interest to you. Also ensure to check the terms and conditions of data reuse.