The University of Iowa Libraries

The University of Iowa Libraries is the largest library system in Iowa and one of the largest public research library systems in the United States.

• Our collections feature 3.7 million print titles, 1 million e-books, 1 million locally digitized items, and 5.1 miles of manuscripts.

• In addition to our Main Library, the University of Iowa is also home to seven subject-specific libraries: the Art Library, Marvin A. Pomerantz Business Library, Lichtenberger Engineering Library, Hardin Library for the Health Sciences, Law Library, Rita Benton Music Library, and Sciences Library. In total, our libraries receive over 2 million visitors a year.

• Our Special Collections unit contains over 1,250 unique collections, with items spanning thousands of years of global history, culture, and politics.

• Can’t find what you need at Iowa? Don’t worry! With our interlibrary loan service, you can borrow materials from our partner institutions across Iowa and the Midwest. We’re a member of the Big Ten Academic Alliance, which collectively owns over 140 million volumes and has conducted over $17.4 billion in funded research. 

• If you’d like help finding the right resource for your project, you can make a research consultation appointment with any of our 30+ subject specialist librarians.

Humanities & Social Sciences

In addition to general library collections spanning disciplines from literature to history to performing arts, the University of Iowa Libraries holds many specialized collections of rare materials of interest to humanities and social sciences researchers. Among these:

• The Iowa Archives of the Avant-Garde comprises several major collections representing key movements in twentieth-century art and literature. The three main components of the Archives, the International Dada Archive, Alternative Traditions in the Contemporary Arts, and the Ruth and Marvin Sackner Archive of Concrete and Visual Poetry, are internationally recognized as essential resources for the study of modern art and have attracted researchers from around the world.

• The University of Iowa serves as the repository for the papers of two of 20th-century Britain’s most significant writers of fiction: Iris Murdoch (1919-1999) and Angus Wilson (1913-1991). These primarily consist of manuscripts, typescripts, and correspondence, with some photographs and audio materials.

• The University of Iowa holds the papers of José Donoso (1924-1996), one of Chile’s best-known novelists. This collection provides notebooks, correspondence and typescripts that detail the development of some of Donoso's most significant works, as well as significant correspondence from numerous writers.

• The Iowa Women’s Archives holds more than 1,200 manuscript collections that chronicle the lives and work of Iowa women, their families, and their communities. These personal papers and organizational records date from the 19th century to the present. Together with oral histories, they document the activities of Iowa women throughout the state and beyond its borders.

• Our diverse Science Fiction Fandom Collections consist of a variety of sci-fi fanzines, fan fiction, convention paraphernalia, and other papers related to the development of popular sci-fi franchises (yes, we do have a pair of Spock ears!). This includes the Organization for Transformative Works Fanzine and Fan Fiction Collection, which contains fanzines and pieces of fan fiction written and/or collected by various fans and acquired for Special Collections via the Organization for Transformative Works.

• At Hardin Library, the John Martin Rare Book Room holds 6,500 volumes of original works that represent classic contributions to the history of the health sciences from the 15th through 21st centuries.

• The University of Iowa possess the most complete Leigh Hunt collection in the world. The Brewer-Leigh Hunt Collection is a comprehensive gathering of books and manuscripts by and about English writer James Henry Leigh Hunt (1784-1859). The collection is nearly complete in first and subsequent editions of Hunt’s books. There are also presentation copies, association copies, and periodicals edited by Hunt, as well as his contributions to journals, manuscripts, and letters.

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  Our unique Social Documents Collection is a large assemblage of research materials published by conservative organizations. The collection was started to preserve pamphlets distributed by foreign governments as propaganda during World War II; today, it contains periodicals, pamphlets, radio broadcast scripts, handbills, leaflets, bulletins, news sheets, correspondence, bumper stickers, and even tea bags!

• The University of Iowa has long been a home for the study of Walt Whitman, and our Special Collections unit is no exception. Our collection includes letters, manuscripts, souvenir products, portraits of Whitman, his works in translation, and all editions of Leaves of Grass.

Engineering & Science

From driving safety to public health, the University of Iowa has long been a leading innovator in engineering and the sciences. As an international fellow, you will have access to our state-of-the-art laboratories and technology.

• Our Driving Safety Research Institute hosts the National Advanced Driving Simulator, one of the world’s highest-fidelity driving simulators. It gives the most realistic driving simulation experience in the country as it tilts, drives, and rotates to simulate the movements a car makes on the road.

• Van Allen Hall, named after U.S. space pioneer and Regent Distinguished Professor of Physics at the University of Iowa James A. Van Allen, is the hub for cutting-edge physics and astronomy research on campus, including a rooftop observatory.

• The Macbride Nature Recreation Area is a 485-acre natural area with landscape dominated by native woodland made up from remnant ecosystems in various stages of restoration and recovery of the historic open woodland that once covered the land. Much of MNRA woodlands are still representative of an Old Growth Woodland ecotype community, with many of the relic vegetative species populations and long-lived individuals from the historic woodland persisting. Flood plain ecotypes and two reconstructed and one remnant prairie are also onsite

• The State Hygienic Laboratory is Iowa’s environmental and public health laboratory, serving all 99 counties by testing and tracking infectious diseases and illnesses; performing newborn and maternal screening; and monitoring the air, water and soil for environmental contaminants.

• The Iowa Technology Institute is a world-class research hub at the University of Iowa. Grounded in engineering and science, ITI cultivates collaboration across disciplines, invents advanced technologies, and conducts trailblazing basic and applied research in design, simulation, and experimentation that enables a safer and more productive future.

• Protostudios is a state-of-the-art rapid-prototyping facility. This one-stop shop assists entrepreneurs, inventors, startups, educational and medical faculty, staff, and students by converting napkin sketches to functional prototypes in using the latest technologies in CAD design, and additive and subtractive processes in creating your research and product idea.