Science

Our resources support the needs of specialists working in academia and business, and can support multidisciplinary research interests.

Collection guides

Science overview
We support the needs of specialists working in academia and business, and can support multidisciplinary research interests
Science electronic resources
We subscribe to a large and growing number of electronic resources and bibliographic databases
Patents
The British Library is the UK’s national patent library
Wildlife and environmental sounds
The largest collection of its kind in Europe and the most comprehensive in the world

Help

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Science Reading Rooms

Floor 2 focuses on Medicine and Life Sciences, Floor 3 focuses on Physical Sciences and Engineering.

Find information on the open-access shelves
Access online databases and electronic books and journals
Order collection items to the Reading Rooms via our catalogues

If you need help, please ask our Reference Specialists at the Enquiry desk or contact the Science Reference Service Team.

We offer free Discovery and 1-2-1 Sessions to help you make the best use of the Library's collections.

You’ll need a Reader Pass

Mon: 10.00 – 20.00
Tue – Thu: 09.30 – 20.00
Fri – Sat: 09.30 – 17.00
Sun & English Public Holidays: closed

Opening hours for all Reading Rooms

News stories

TalkScience@BL - Replace, Reduce, Refine

The next TalkScience@BL event: "Replace, Reduce, Refine: Animals in Research"

27 September 2016

Join us to discuss the changing use of animals in scientific research and testing

Announcing our next TalkScience@BL event: "Doping in sport: fair game?"

26 May 2016

Join our expert panel to debate the ethical, social and legal implications of doping in sport

Blog posts

Wonders 'Gone Viral' in the Sixteenth-Century Deccan

Monday, September 3, 2018

Today's guest blog is by Vivek Gupta, a historian of Islamic and South Asian art, currently working on his PhD thesis “Wonder Reoriented: Manuscripts and Experience in Islamicate Societies of South Asia (ca. 1450–1600),” at SOAS University of London, History...

The 150th anniversary of the first observation of helium

Friday, August 17, 2018

Saturday is the 150th anniversary of a total eclipse of the Sun that was seen across a wide band of Asia on 18th August 1868. Any total eclipse is interesting, but this one is particularly historic for chemists, as it...

A costume fit for a centaur

Tuesday, August 14, 2018

Among the many intricate designs compiled in the 15th-century sketchbook of an unknown Italian engineer (Add MS 34113), a centaur costume has an irresistible appeal. It is amusing to think that someone devoted their technical and artistic skills to designing...

Mrs Boulton and the woodland warbler

Friday, July 20, 2018

Have you ever noticed how some animals are named after people? Hume's Partridge. Lady Amherst's Pheasant. Waller's Starling. I come across this quite a lot when cataloguing new collections and have often wondered who these people were. You'd be forgiven...

Projects

Access to Understanding

Access to Understanding is a collaboration, led by the British Library, which unites individuals and organisations that want to promote wider understanding of biomedical research findings.