Boolean Operators

Note: the AND operator is applied even when you do not enter it between your keywords:

• badgers AND tuberculosis is the same as badgers tuberculosis

When you use multiple operators, the database applies them in this order:

1. NOT 
2. AND (also + or &)
3. OR

When your search query includes multiple Boolean operators, use brackets "( )" to help the search engine group them in a way that is relevant for your research:

"badgers" OR "meles meles" AND tuberculosis finds all documents in which the phrase "meles meles" AND the word tuberculosis are both present as well as all documents in which the word badgers  is present.

 (badgers OR "meles meles") AND tuberculosis will only find documents that include the word tuberculosis in addition to either the word badgers  or the phrase "meles meles".

Phrase Searching

Wrap keywords in quotation marks to search for them as an exact phrase:

• "mycobacterium bovis" finds articles with the words mycobacterium and bovis together and in that order.

Wildcard Searching

Use a question mark (?) in a search term to match any one character, and use an asterisk (*) in a search term to match any set of zero or more characters.

• wom?n finds woman or the word women.
• behavi*r finds behaviour and  behavior.

Wildcards cannot be used at the beginning of a search query or when searching for a phrase.

Special characters

• you can use unicode characters in search queries
• subscript and superscript characters can also be searched.
• To search for the name Fürst, enter Fürst or Furst.