ODEUROPA is a European research project which bundles expertise in sensory mining and olfactory heritage. This project, whose goal is to show that engaging our sense of smell and our scent heritage is an important means for connecting and promoting Europe’s tangible and intangible cultural heritage, is developing new methods to collect information about smell from both text and image collections. To ascertain how ‘smell’ was expressed in different languages, with what places it was associated, what kinds of events and practices it characterized, and to what emotions it was linked, researchers, analysing circa 30,000 images and 62,000 historical European texts in six languages (English, German, French, Dutch, Italian, and Slovene), are making use of several state-of-the-art AI techniques. Information gathered is stored in the ‘European Olfactory Knowledge Graph’ (EOKG), and then drawn on to create new ‘storylines’ informed by cultural history research.

The digital collection before you consists of more than 5,000 textual digital objects, contributed by the National and University Library to the ODEUROPA project.

The digital collection before you comprises doctoral theses stored in the digital repositories of four Slovenian universities – the University of Ljubljana, the University of Maribor, the University of Nova Gorica and the University of Primorska. It was created as a result of collaboration between the aforementioned universities and the National and University Library. With the purpose of up-to-date acquisition od statutory copies of doctoral theses and of transferring these from the repositories of the three central public universities and from the repository of the private University of Nova Gorica to the portal of the Digital Library of Slovenia, the National and University Library developed a software tool called R2NUK. In addition to the automatic monthly acquisition of new digital objects from the four repositories, this tool also enables regular automatic updating of all the digital objects that have already been included in the digital collection.

In this way, a new digital space was opened on the dLib.si portal, which will continue to expand and provide valuable information to both researchers and the general public.

Photo taken from Etnoinfolab.

After studying medicine in Paris, Balthasar Hacquet (1739 or 1740–1815) became a soldier in the French navy, and later also a military surgeon. In 1766, he accepted the job of a mine surgeon and obstetrician in Idrija. He remained there as Scopoli's successor until 1773, after which he worked in Ljubljana as a lecturer in anatomy, surgery and obstetrics at the Ljubljana Lyceum and at the midwifery school. Between 1774 and 1787 he was the secretary of the Society for Agriculture and Applied Arts in Carniola. From 1785 to 1787 he lectured on agricultural and handicraft chemistry. In addition to his medical and lecturing work, he also dedicated himself to the research of geological, botanical, geographical, ethnographic and other characteristics of today's Slovenian territory. He described them in the work Oryctographia Carniolica, as well as in traveller’s journals, and individual studies. In 1777, he attempted to climb Triglav, but was only able to reach Mali Triglav. He succeeded in climbing to the top two years later, and supposedly repeated the climb in 1782. He was also a member of the Zois circle.

The collection presents Hacquet's works as well as biographical and other studies on his life and work.

Giovanni Antonio Scopoli (1723–1788) studied in Vienna and in Innsbruck. In 1753, he passed the state exam needed for an independent practice of the medical profession under Gerard van Swieten in Vienna. He was sent to Idrija, which until then did not have a permanent physician. Between 1754 and 1769, he worked there as a mine physician, and established schooling for metallurgical and chemical education. Already in his youth he was interested in botany, and in the early 1860s he began to explore the Julian Alps. In 1760, he published the book Flora Carniolica, the first scientific work on nature in Slovenia, in which he described around 1,100 plant species from the north-western part of Slovenia. He also corresponded with Carl von Linné about his discoveries. He was a member of many prominent European scientific institutions. He published twenty-one works in the fields of botany, zoology (mainly entomology), mineralogy with crystallography, metallurgy and chemistry, as well as other natural and applied sciences.

The collection presents individual copies of Scopoli's works as well as biographical and other studies on his life and work.

Are library collections growing bigger or are they diminishing in size? How many people have used library services in the year 2000 and how many members do libraries have nowadays? Are libraries keeping up with the demands of their users in terms of modern types of library materials and more modern approaches? The answers to these questions, and many others, can be found in the comprehensive set of statistical data on the operation of libraries, which the National and University Library has been collecting and presenting for years. Standardized search variables and unified methodology allow for the longitudinal comparison of individual data as well as insight in trends in the field of library operations. The main part of the collection consists of annual reports about activities of public, special, national and academic libraries of the Republic of Slovenia starting in 1990, which contain detailed overview of collected statistical data for every participating library. Combined with the reports on the operation of school libraries, various statistical reports reaching back to the beginning of statistical evaluation of libraries in this area, and articles written on the subject, the collection provides valuable information for researchers and general public and aims at being the most complete set of Slovenian library statistic.

Over the last four decades, ZRC SAZU has become one of the driving forces of citizen engagement in science. It offers a forum for discussions of socially relevant issues and holds a series of public events.

What are the residents of Slovenia like and how do we live? What do we have in common with other Europeans and how do we differ from them? Do we really live in a country of forests? How oil prices are changing? How many tourists visit Slovenia per year, and which tourist attractions they visit? What were the temperatures like and how many cloudy and sunny days were there in our region in the 1960s?

The Statistical Office of the Republic of Slovenia collects and processes a wide range of data about Slovenia and its inhabitants, as well as about Europe and the world. The mission of the Slovene statistical office is to provide users with statistics on economic, demographic, social and environmental conditions and trends. The data must be of high quality, timely, comparable in time and internationally, and presented in a clear and understandable way.

The collection includes publications of the Office from 1953 onwards, from boring tables to modern official statistics which are always transparent and interesting; the employees of the Statistical Office know how to make statistics amusing.

In 1693, Academia operosorum Labacensium was founded following the example of Italian scientific academies. Its initiators were historian and lawyer Joannes Gregorius Thalnitscher, and the cathedral provost Joannes Baptista Preschern. They also drew the majority of prominent educated citizens of the time into membership. The most important members of the Academy were: chair dean and the founder of the Seminary library Joannes Antonius Thalnitscher, the states counsel Joannes Stephanus Floriantschitsch, jurists Franciscus Erasmus Hohenwart, Goeorgius Andreas Gladitsch, and Joannes Georgius Hozhevar, president of the provincial court Joannes Bertoldus Höffer, and doctors Marcus Gerbezius, Joannes Andreas Coppini and Joannes Baptista Werloschnig. They devoted their attention to literature, local historical studies, science, and art. At the initiative of the academics, Academia philharmonicorum, Academia incultorum, and a branch of the Roman Arcadia, Academia Emonia, were also founded. The Academy ceased in 1725. The collection presents a selection of works by the Academy members from the National and University Library's collections, which were suitable for digitization.

Public funding of research work is the foundation stone of a country's research system. To this aim, countries set up public agencies that through public tenders evaluate and select the best research projects for funding. The Slovenian Research Agency performs professional, development and executive tasks related to the implementation of the adopted Research and Innovation Strategy of Slovenia within the framework of the valid budget memorandum and the state budget; in accordance with its founding, it also performs other tasks of promoting research activity. The Agency performs duties in the public interest provided by law, with the aim of ensuring permanent, professional and independent decision-making on the selection of programmes and projects that are financed from the national budget and other sources of financing.

The collection comprises the Agency's reports on completed researches and targeted research projects, research programs and postdoctoral projects. In cooperation with the Agency, NUK has been collecting them in electronic form since 2007. All reports are freely accessible.

Following the chronological order of their creation, the collection presents some prominent works from the field of anatomy that were displayed at the National and University Library's exhibition When the Dead Teach the Living in 2015. Scientific studies, manuals, anatomical atlases, and other materials, which are kept at the National and University Library of Slovenia, and the Seminary Library represent the development of anatomy from the first known systematic attempts to discover the structure and functioning of the human body until the 20th century. The authors of the works feature many world-famous and renowned names such as Hippocrates, Galenus, Avicenna, Mesue, Vesalius, Bartholin, Eustahius, Hunter, and Zinn, as well as two local authors - Alojzij Homan and Janez Plečnik, who significantly contributed to the development of anatomy in Slovenia.

Numerous handwritten notes and additions on front pages and on the margins of the exhibited books bear witness to a strong interest in medicine and anatomy in today's Slovenian territory throughout history. Many of the books presented were once owned by important individuals and institutions.