Objective:
Medical and science librarians are supporting new models of research and scholarly output that include the management, sharing, and stewardship of diverse sets of scientific data. To effectively support their institutions’ research communities, librarians need a robust understanding of science, the relevance of specific data sets, and the inherent technologies utilized to generate, store, and manage data. To educate and foster collaboration among New England medical and science librarians, a team of medical librarians and library students are developing an e-Science portal. This portal will provide news on e-Science initiatives, information resources, tutorials, and a forum for librarian discussion.

Methods:
The funding for the e-Science portal project has been provided by the National Network of Libraries of Medicine. The portal project team includes two library administrators, project coordinator, webmaster, technical consultant, and two library school students. Initial groundwork activities have included the selection of members for an advisory board, creation and implementation of a portal needs assessment, presentation on the portal project at a science librarian conference, development of strategic plan for portal, designation of portal link location, creation of editorial board and content selection criteria.

Poster presented at the University of Massachusetts and New England Area Librarian e-Science Symposium, Shrewsbury, Mass., on April 7, 2010.