Archival literature

The world's total knowledge in the fields of science and engineering is stored in written form as published books and papers. Much of this is now stored digitally and available on-line. For a research team to successfully undertake new research they must contribute ‘new knowledge’ to this total store of knowledge through publication in the same way (i.e. through writing books and papers). In order to assess if a contribution is new knowledge, the research team must take the following steps:

• Review this vast store of knowledge;

• Conduct research to develop additional knowledge by building upon this previous knowledge; and

• Make their new knowledge available to the world-wide research community through publication following a rigorous peer review.

The world-wide published scientific literature is commonly referred to as ‘archival literature’, because it is permanently stored and is deemed to be of value to future generations of research scientists and engineers. Once information is printed on paper, the content cannot be changed. This form of publication is different from some web based publications, where the content can be changed relatively easily.