Nature is coming up with an interesting initiative where in they publish the protocols of the papers that they publish in a seperate section called the Nature Protocols.The protocols page is coming up for BETA release in ‘mid march’ as the website says with a full release in in June 2006.Too bad that they dont release this as open access as they say that the protocols page would supplement their journal papers,it wouldn;t hurt to release just the protocols as open access so that they can be picked up by search engines.Anyhow this should help people who have to go through a complete paper just to design/adapt a protocol.

Protocol categories will include:

Recombinant DNA, protein and other macromolecules
Construction and screening of libraries and arrays of nucleic acids, proteins and chemical compounds
Isolation and purification of biological molecules
Detection and probing of biological molecules
Structural analysis of biological molecules
Functional analysis of biological molecules, including trafficking
Analysis of interactions between biological molecules
Functional analysis of drugs and drug-like entities
Analysis and manipulation of gene expression
Cell and tissue culture
Spectroscopy
Cytometry
Electrophysiology
Imaging
Immunological techniques
Bioinformatics
Chemoinformatics
Model organisms, and assays on, including creation, husbandry, development, behavioural assays, disease models
In silico modelling that, where possible, has been validated experimentally
Nanotechnology

I would also urge you to check out the other BETA from Nature the Nature|Methods BETA Application Notes.It also is a similar service.