LexisNexis Expands Online Collection with New Digital U.S. Serial Set Maps Collection

Innovation Makes Valuable, Historic Maps Accessible for web-based viewing

Alliance with University of Maryland creates easy access to over 56,000 maps from the 18th Century to Today

NEW YORK, NY, June 13, 2007 — LexisNexis today announced it will expand its Congressional archives with the new LexisNexis^® U.S. Serial Set Maps Digital Collection that will provide easy access to more than 56,000 map records containing nearly 70,000 individual map sheet images when complete. Almost half of these maps contain color or fine detail and are being scanned as high-resolution imagery from the originals. The maps will be showcased at booth #3541 at the American Library Association annual meeting in Washington, DC, from June 23 to June 26, 2007.

These maps offer unparalleled research potential to historians, law students, labor studies researchers, political scientists, and other social scientists, as well as to biologists, geologists, geographers, meteorologists, and epidemiologists. Serial Set maps, dating from 1789, include great 19th Century exploratory surveys of the American West, Civil War battlefields, as well as flood protection and beach erosion studies in the 1950s and 1960s, just to name a few. This maps digitization effort, conducted in cooperation with the University of Maryland, is the latest step in LexisNexis' ongoing commitment to building a complete, easy-to-use repository of Congressional information. The maps in this new collection, some of which represent the first geologic, soil, and population maps of many states and territories, are being conserved, encapsulated, and scanned from the U.S. Serial Set collection housed at the University of Maryland Libraries.

Advanced Technology Applied to Historic Maps
LexisNexis is converting the digital, historical map collections into the standard JPEG 2000 image format to provide advanced web-based viewing features of the maps, such as panning and zooming, without any barriers, additional software or browser plug-ins. "These maps will satisfy a wide and diverse range of research needs, and we are pleased to continue our tradition of bringing this type of relevant, historical documentation to our customers in a format they find easy to use," said Tim Fusco, vice president of Publishing Operations for LexisNexis Government and Academic Markets. "By working closely with alliance partners such as the University of Maryland, we are able to access and create digital databases of some of our country's richest historical documents and make them accessible to a wide range of researchers, students and librarians who find them valuable."

Detailed Indexing For Easy Access
The LexisNexis U.S. Serial Set Maps Digital Collection includes detailed indexing for every map in the more than 13,000 volumes of the U.S. Serial Set though the year 1969. Originally created by the University of Kansas and recently enhanced by LexisNexis editorial staff, this special indexing makes it easy for researchers to access maps using key indexing terms, including date, subject and geographic terms, personal and organizational names, map title, relief method, notation of content abstracting, or to search the document in which the map was published.

Combined with the LexisNexis Congressional user interface, this powerful search functionality allows users to quickly and efficiently focus and hone their search results to a useable data set. All maps will be accessible through an image content server (ICS), provided by LuraTech Inc., which renders segments of the entire map image to a user's browser quickly without the need for additional software.

"Consistent with our Total Solutions company strategy, we are creating a single, unified information service that provides value-added indexing and full-text access to Congressional content from 1789 to the present," said Fusco. "We began the process in 2003 by digitizing the U.S. Serial Set and continued it by creating the LexisNexis^® Congressional Research Digital Collection, LexisNexis^® Congressional Hearings Digital Collection and redesigning LexisNexis^® Congressional. Making the LexisNexis U.S. Serial Set Maps Digital Collection available is our next step."

About LexisNexis
LexisNexis^® (www.lexisnexis.com) is a leading provider of information and services solutions, including its flagship Web-based Lexis^® and Nexis^® research services, to a wide range of professionals in the legal, risk management, corporate, government, law enforcement, accounting and academic markets. A member of Reed Elsevier Group plc [NYSE: ENL; NYSE: RUK] (www.reedelsevier.com), LexisNexis serves customers in 100 countries with 13,000 employees worldwide.

LexisNexis Academic & Library Solutions has been gathering and indexing congressional information for more than 35 years and is now a recognized source for locating congressional information.

About the University of Maryland
The University of Maryland is the state's flagship university and one of the nation's preeminent public research universities. Ranked No. 18 by U.S. News & World Report, it also has 31 academic programs in the Top 10 and 92 in the Top 25. The faculty includes three Nobel Laureates, six Pulitzer Prize winners, 40 members of the National Academies of Science, and scores of Fulbright scholars.

About LuraTech
LuraTech is a leading provider of open, ISO-compliant JPEG2000 and PDF/A technology. LuraTech makes image and document compression, archiving and delivery a reality for public and private sector organizations by delivering easy-to-implement, open-standard imaging products, coupled with enterprise-class service and support. For more information, visit the LuraTech website at www.luratech.com, or email info@luratech.com to learn more about LuraWave JP2 ICS Enterprise Edition. Or visit them at the ALA, booth #4032.

Editor's note: sample maps available upon request.

Media Contact:

LexisNexis
Marina Azariah
301-951-4604
marina.azariah@lexisnexis.com

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