Thanks to the dozen or so institutions who responded to my query about their
use of faculty research profiles.  Charlie Graham's recent posting about
developing a cooperative database prompts me to post a summary of the responses
I got.

Several institutions have difficulty convincing their faculty of the value
of an interest database.  Faculty would rather locate collaborators through
their known network of colleagues.  High implementation costs for questionable
value was another concern.

Others said that these databases can be used as administrative tools in
locating potential funding opportunities for faculty who participate.  SPIN
searches were often cited as a benefit to faculty.

Some praised these databases as tools to locate collaborators, both within and
outside of the institution, which also allows industry to tap into university
resources.  On the other hand, by not channelling industry through an
administrative office (tech transfer, for example), faculty become potentially
"available" to industry, and they do their own deals, often without protecting
their own (much less the institution's) intellectual property.  An argument for
unlimited access is that it provides a window on the institution's research
activities.

Some institutions have their databases available on a WAIS server, others are
content with hard copy, others use various internal software.

I got one other response in French from a Canadian member of the list, but
fluent French isn't one of our strong points in this office.

Anyone still reading this message is obviously interested in
the topic, so I'll briefly tell you what we do here at Indiana University.  Our
database has been in existence for five years or more.  We maintain it on a
dbase program on our local area network and upload information to the IU Gopher
server.  It is accessible to IU faculty, staff, and students only, as we
believe our tech transfer folks have enough headaches without industry
tapping into our researchers directly.

We do use the 5th edition of the Rodman thesaurus, but also encourage
Bloomington faculty to add their own terms and a paragraph description of their
research interests.  (It's wais indexed on our gopher, so we can search full
text.)

We use the database heavily in disseminating information to the Bloomington
faculty, and we disseminate it via e-mail whenever possible.  Human intervention
is built into every step on purpose, as we felt that a completely electronic
system would inundate faculty who happened to choose broad keywords.  Some
departments have nearly 100% participation in the database, some have very
little.  Participation is voluntary, but if a faculty member is not listed, it
is unlikely that he/she will receive funding opportunity information directly.

I appreciate the information I received--thanks.

-Marcia Zuzolo
Sponsored Research Services
Indiana University
xxxxxx@indiana.edu