Two million downloads from UKnowledge spread institutional research

Research items available from UKnowledge have been downloaded more than 2 million times around the world. Since its establishment in late 2010 as University of Kentucky’s institutional repository, UKnowledge has enabled timely discovery of and unfettered access to a variety of scholarly contents generated at or sponsored by UK.  

UKnowledge includes a map tool to visualize downloads worldwide.

Theses and dissertations command the major portion of the 2 million-plus downloads. Meanwhile, open access journals housed in UKnowledge continue to draw much attention. To see an up-to-date list of the 10 most downloaded items, visit this page. 

The featured collections page offers a window into some of the remarkable collections on UKnowledge. Currently highlighted there are three publications and an image gallery:

• Proceedings from the UK Linguistics Program’s Defaults in Morphological Theory Conference revealing how researchers of four major morphological theories analyze word structure. Visitors can not only download the slides and abstracts of the conference presentations, but also view the videos of different sessions. 
• Frontiers in Public Health Services and Systems Research, an open access journal based at the UK College of Public Health, which publishes peer-reviewed papers on actionable public health infrastructure research. One of its articles, "Public Health Services Most Commonly Provided by Local Health Departments in the United States," has been the most downloaded article for months among the thousands of items available from UKnowledge. 
• The Kentucky Transportation Center Research Report demonstrates the center’s expertise in and authority over various transportation engineering topics. With reports dating back to the 1940s, this growing collection is readily available 24/7 and has been of interest to researchers and engineers around the globe. 
• Created in celebration of the College of Arts and Sciences’ Year of the Middle East, Middle Eastern Passage showcases intriguing images of Arabic and Persian calligraphic manuscripts archived in the UK Libraries Special Collections Research Center. The zoom and pan functionalities enable viewers to examine every minute detail of an image. In addition, Ghadir K. Zannoun, assistant professor of Arabic and Islamic studies, and Kamyar C. Mahboub, Lawson Professor of Civil Engineering, have provided annotations to illuminate the cultural and historical significance of the featured manuscripts. 

Created in celebration of College of Arts and Sciences’ Year of the Middle East, "Middle Eastern Passage" showcases intriguing images of Arabic and Persian calligraphic manuscripts archived in the UK Libraries Special Collections Research Center. From "Storehouse of Mysteries," this is an image of the first of five narrative poems, or "Panj Ganj" (the "Five Treasures"), written by Persian poet Nizami.

Holding more than 11,300 items, UKnowledge aims to share the university's research and scholarship with learners and researchers everywhere.

UK faculty and students interested in using the resources and services made available by UKnowledge may contact Adrian Ho, director of Digital Scholarship.

Article reprinted from UKNow.