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CONTACT: Lyndon Holmes (978) 975-7570

Aries Introduces Knowledge Web^TM Medical Literature Access for the Internet

London -- December 2, 1996. At the International Online Conference being held in London, Aries Systems Corporation of North Andover, Massachusetts, USA (tel 978-975-7570; fax 978-975-3811, e-mail kfinder@ariessys.com), today introduced its Knowledge Web medical literature search services available on the Internet.

Powered by Aries' Knowledge Host ® search servers, Knowledge Web users can access medical literature reference databases either through popular Web browsers, or through the Knowledge Finder® expert search interface. Initially providing access to the National Library of Medicine's MEDLINE® database, Knowledge Web will offer access to other popular medical databases early in 1997. Knowledge Web offers a unique combination of features, attractive to both novice and expert searchers. Natural language queries, relevance ranked search results, Fuzzy and Boolean search options, combined with very fast response times, make the system appealing and effective for novices. The Knowledge Finder expert client offers advanced search features, including full MeSH thesaurus searching, bibliography manager compatibility, and extensive personal customization options. Both novice and expert modes provide access to the full MEDLINE database, from 1966 to the present, containing almost 9 million journal article references.

The Knowledge Finder client software for Knowledge Web access provides multi-modal access to Aries' databases published on CD-ROM and on the Internet. A single launch of the Knowledge Finder client (available for both Windows and Macintosh platforms) can access both local CD-ROM and remote Internet databases. Lyndon Holmes, president of Aries Systems, noted "As users gain experience with the Internet, they discover some painful realities. Despite our high-performance search servers, Internet bottlenecks on backbones or through remote service providers can slow search sessions significantly. The option to have CD-ROM access when Internet access is unavailable offers the best of both worlds. And better still, Knowledge Finder offers an identical, powerful and intuitive search interface for both environments."

Knowledge Web MEDLINE subscriptions are available now for both individuals and institutions. Personal subscriptions, starting at $250 annually, provide unlimited access for the individual subscriber. Institutional subscriptions allow a library or information center to "out-source" the traditional maintenance of the search server and database maintenance. Institutional subscriptions are provided on the basis of number of concurrent users needed, and start at $1,500 annually for a single concurrent user license.

Web users can test drive Knowledge Web with MEDLINE at http://www1.kfinder.com. The Expert Knowledge Finder client software can also be downloaded without charge from Aries.

Aries Systems publishes many CD-ROM medical reference databases, including the MEDLINE, HealthSTAR and AIDSLINE^TM databases from the National Library of Medicine; CANCERLIT® from the National Cancer Institute; CINAHL^TM for nursing and allied health from CINAHL Information Systems; PsycLIT® from the American Psychological Association; and EMBASE Alert® from Elsevier Science B.V. In cooperation with journal publishers, Aries also produces a number of full-text journal CD-ROMs, incorporating the full-text, images, charts, graphs and tables from the journal, as well as MEDLINE abstracts linked to article bibliographies. These titles include The New England Journal of Medicine, Anesthesiology, Anesthesia & Analgesia, Neurosurgery, British Journal of Anaesthesia, Canadian Journal of Anaesthesia, Journal of Magnetic Resonance Imaging, and Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery (American Edition).

Aries Systems Corporation was founded in 1986, to develop innovative information retrieval and dissemination products, with special emphases in the fields of biomedicine and science. Aries Systems works cooperatively with other organizations in the information and health care industries, to identify and deliver improved knowledge access and delivery tools.

Knowledge Web, Knowledge Host, Knowledge Finder, "Enhancing the Power of Knowledge" and the Pennant logo are trademarks of Aries Systems Corporation. All other trademarks referenced herein are property of their respective owners. Copyright © 1996, Aries Systems Corporation. All Rights Reserved.