The Institute of Sound and Vibration Research (ISVR), based at the University of Southampton, has published annual reports of its findings since its founding in 1963. These constitute an incredibly important historical record of major contributions made by ISVR to the field of sound and vibration. Following recent interest in the history of European acoustics, this collection has been highlighted as one in need of preservation. The printed reports, spanning 1963 to 2010, are housed in Special Collections in Hartley Library; it was agreed that digitisation of these works would ensure their presence as a resource in the future and improve accessibility.
Left: Institute of Sound and Vibration Research Annual Report 1968-9, Figure 3.3 An impulse noise-induced temporary threshold shift experiment, p.37.
Right: Institute of Sound and Vibration Research Annual Report 1986-7, Figure 4.1 Double pulsed holographic interferogram of a commercial vehicle, p.19.
Professor Stephen Elliott of the ISVR presented a paper at the 2023 Forum Acusticum conference, covering the institute’s role in acoustics in the 20th century. A group of current and retired members of the ISVR, led by Professor David Thompson, is now developing this paper into a journal article, collating and recording the institute’s work. The annual reports have been an essential part of their research, as they list, among other things, major projects and external publications from across the years.
Digital Scholarship were able to provide their digitisation services, and upload these copies to the university’s Digital Library, alongside the post-2010 born-digital editions. Every page from the print publications have been scanned, processed with Optical Character Recognition (OCR) to generate machine-readable text, stored securely in a digital archive, and a copy added to the online collection. The written content is searchable and more accessible, open and secured for future researchers. Striking photographs, such as those shown above, are more readily available, providing insights into historic research practices and formulation of experimentation. The ISVR annual reports are now part of over 28,000 digital records, available to all.
To discuss other digitisation projects using library collections, contact Digital Scholarship at digitalscholarship@soton.ac.uk. The team are able to digitise books, documents, and a range of other media, including photographic slides and VHS tapes.
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