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Subject: 7. General Chemistry-related Information on the Internet Compiled by: Neil Flatter Lev A. Gorenstein Theodore Heise Mark Perks Mutilated by: Bruce Hamilton There are so many references that relate to chemistry on the Internet that this section could become overwhelming in size. Instead of trying to provide a comprehensive listing of all such sites, what follows is more a collection of pointers to other sources that carry a diverse range of material related to chemistry. By knowing where to look for an answer, these references should provide a springboard for an information search on the Internet. Specialist software and search engines are available to search for keywords using Gopher and the WWW, and they will also point to additional sources not accessed by the sites below. 7.1 How can I access databases such as Chemical Abstracts? These databases are almost all inevitably commercial, it costs serious money to build and update them, thus it will cost money to access them. Either you or your institution will be paying the supplier. Do not expect to find copyrighted databases ( such as the Merck Index, Chemical Abstracts, Kirk Othmer, or Sax ) freely available on the Internet. There are several commercial suppliers of databases that contain chemical information. These can usually be accessed either via the Internet or telephone Packet Switching Networks. The most well known specialist database is the American Chemical Society's Chemical Abstracts [1], which is provided by the Chemical Abstracts Service. CAS offers a commercial database service called STN International, which contains over 190 scientific and technical databases. These databases cover all aspects of Chemistry, including CAS Registry Numbers, and are accessible via the WWW. http://www.cas.org/ Chemical Abstracts Service. http://info.cas.org/stn.html STN Introduction http://www.dialog.com/ Dialog The most universal and comprehensive database supplier is Knight Ridder, whose Dialog service offers over 40 databases that solely concentrate on aspects of chemistry, including Chemical Abstracts since 1967 ( but it does not offer the actual abstract, just the bibliographic information ) and the CAS RN database [2]. Dialog also offers several hundred other commercial and technical databases, and Knight Ridder also offers selected general and technical databases on a low-cost, home user ( off-peak :-) ) system known as " Knowledge Index " at approx 25% of the normal Dialog cost. Knowledge Index is also available from some on-line suppliers such as Compuserve - but remember that KI does not include CA. The ability to perform on-line searches is becoming an essential attribute for modern chemists. Major database suppliers offer a wide range of training courses and there are several excellent articles on searching the chemical literature ( database and/or journals) in journals such as J.Chem.Ed.[3-5]. If you have access to a CD-ROM database, you should practise your search logic on that first, before going on-line. Because of the cost structure of database suppliers such as Dialog, and the inappropriate selection of keywords by authors :-), it is often more cost-effective to focus on grabbing around 100-200 titles and scanning them offline ( using the 30 minutes "hold search" function ), and then going back online to grab the desired abstracts and citation information. 7.2 What chemistry-related material is on the WWW? Searching There are several well-known search engines available on the WWW that will provide updated searches for keywords. Because of the huge expansion of the WWW, I've decided to select some sites and allow users to use search engines and/or web crawlers to locate resources. If you find a real treasure house of chemical goodies, email me the address and I'll check it out. It is important to realise that many of the WWW search engines are complementary, and so it is useful to utilise several when trying to locate information on the web - good places to start are directories of various WWW search engines. http://home.netscape.com/home/internet-search.html http://cuiwww.unige.ch/meta-index.html Free search engines include:- http://altavista.digital.com/ Alta Vista http://www.google.com/ Google http://www.lycos.com/ Lycos http://www.yahoo.com/ Yahoo http://infoseek.go.com/ Infoseek http://www.excite.com/ Excite http://www.webcrawler.com/ Webcrawler Chemistry Overview sites http://chemfinder.camsoft.com/ The fastest and best way to discover information about chemicals on the WWW is CambridgeSoft Corporation's Chemfinder free searching server. This has to be one of the most convenient ways to obtain chemical information on the Internet. Highly recommended. http://www.chemsoc.org/crl/links.htm The Royal Society of Chemistry maintains an excellent list of sites containing chemistry-related material, and is a good starting point. http://www.chemcenter.org/ This is the new WWW site from the American Chemical Society, and is intended to be their prime location of chemical information. Other very useful sites include;- http://www.chemdex.org/ The University of Sheffield comprehensive listing of WWW Chemical info. Over 2200 sites indexed as of September 1996. http://www.chemie.uni-regensburg.de/external.html List of Chemical Services and Resources http://webbook.nist.gov/ Comprehensive compilation of the NIST Chemistry WebBook, which includes thermochemical, IR, and mass spectral data. http://www.chem.ucla.edu/chempointers.html The World-Wide Web Virtual Library: Chemistry. http://rustico.chem.indiana.edu/ Gary Hieftje's site, covering many aspects of spectrochemistry. http://www.indiana.edu/~cheminfo/ Gary Wiggins' extensive compilation of WWW chemical sites. http://www.netsci-journal.com/ Internet Journal of Science - Biological Chemistry http://www.cas.org/ Chemical Abstracts Service offers a diverse range of information with a search facility. http://www.camsoft.com/ CambridgeSoft site, ChemDraw, glassware, clip-art http://www.chem.vt.edu/chem-ed/vt-chem-ed.html The Chemistry Hypermedia project, especially chemical education. http://www.rpi.edu/dept/chem/cheminfo/chemres.html Another listing of Chemistry Internet Resources http://dir.yahoo.com/science/chemistry/ The searchable Yahoo Collection of Chemistry Resources http://www.mdli.com/ Home of the ISIS/DRAW chemical structure drawing programme ( free for academic and personal home use ). Chemistry Education Many of the WWW chemistry directories above also have extensive links to educational resources, services, and institutions:- http://www.chemdex.org/ http://www.chemie.uni-regensburg.de/external.html http://www.chem.ucla.edu/chempointers.html http://www.indiana.edu/~cheminfo/ http://www.chem.vt.edu/chem-ed/vt-chem-ed.html Additional useful sites include:- http://jchemed.chem.wisc.edu/ Journal of Chemical Education Online. http://www-hpcc.astro.washington.edu/scied/chemistry.html A comprehensive listing of education resources. http://www.inform.umd.edu:8080/UMS+State/UMD-Projects/MCTP/Technology/Chemistry.html Internet Resources for Science and Mathematics Education compiled by Tom O'Haver. http://www-sci.lib.uci.edu/SEP/SEP.html UC Irvine Science Education Program, not only chemistry. http://ice.chem.umbc.edu/Chem351l/index.html Typical University Organic Chemistry Laboratory information. http://http://scifun.chem.wisc.edu/scifun.html Bassam Shakhashiri's home page - full of entertaining information. Other Chemistry-related Resources http://www.che.ufl.edu/WWW-CHE/index.html The Virtual Chemical Engineering Library http://electrochem.cwru.edu/estir/ The Electrochemical Science and Technology Information Resource. http://www.improb.com/ For the best science satire around, check out the Annals of Improbable Research, successor to the Journal of Irreproducible Results. Whilst the full version is only available via subscription services, such as ClariNet, smaller items are published free in the Mini AIR. http://www.chemheritage.org Chemical Heritage Foundation site about history of chemical industry http://www.acdlabs.com/ Diverse range of chemistry drawing, interpretation, and modelling software. General Education Resources Many of the Chemistry Overview sites also point to general science sites, and use of the large search engines is recommended, but some additional sites include:- http://www.ccc.uni-erlangen.de/jmolmod/index.html Journal of Molecular Modeling http://www.inform.umd.edu:8080/UMS+State/UMD-Projects/MCTP/Technology /MCTP_WWW_Bookmarks.html Internet Resources for Science and Mathematics Education compiled by Tom O'Haver. Chemical Reference Spectra http://webbook.nist.gov/ Comprehensive compilation of the NIST Chemistry WebBook, which includes thermochemical, IR, and mass spectral data. 7.3 What information is available commercially on-line? As well as the database suppliers such as Knight-Ridder's Dialog ( and low-cost home-user Knowledge Index ) and CAS's STN International, there are several other technical database suppliers that include chemistry-related material, eg Orbit. These organisations usually approach institutional librarians and provide comprehensive descriptions of their available services. The best place to start is at your local library, talking to the librarian in charge of on-line services to ascertain what is available, and what levels of support are provided. The obvious first places to start are Dialog and STN. The range of chemistry- related databases are extensive. There are several full-text databases of patents, full-text newspapers and journals, and many specialised databases. - industry-specific Aluminium Industry Abstracts, Paperchem - subject-specific Fine Chemicals Database, Chemical Engineering and Biotech Abstracts - chemical properties Beilstein, Heilbron, Merck Index, Agrochemicals Handbook - location-specific IMS World R&D focus. - chemical market Chemical Business Newsbase, Chemical Industry Notes, Freedonia Market Research. If you plan on using Knight Ridder's lower cost Knowledge Index, ensure that the databases you are interested in are available on KI, as not all Dialog databases are. With nearly 200 databases on STN and approximately 500 on Dialog, they both offer access to a wide range of information. For more specialist information, accessing individual businesses is required, and they can provide specialist sales, marketing and technical support for their products - many such businesses are now accessible via the WWW. There are also the various registry companies like Thomas that list chemical and equipment suppliers, and who also offer a free evaluation period:- http://www.thomasregister.com/ 7.4 What information is available free on-line? The best technique is to use a WWW search engine to locate information you desire, but some interesting locations are listed below. http://chemfinder.camsoft.com/ CambridgeSoft Corporation's Chemfinder free searching server will locate much of the diverse information about chemicals ( physical properties, CAS RN, MSDS, etc. ) available on the Internet. http://chemistry.mond.org/ Chemistry Today is a daily news service that can also be obtained by email. Several science journals are now making some of their commentary items and abstracts available on the WWW, however subscriptions are still required for access to the full journal. These include:- http://www.nature.com/ Nature http://www.newscientist.com/ New Scientist Many of the Journals published by the American Chemical Society and Royal Society of Chemistry also have homepages or articles available. The ACS index also includes some of the UK and Japanese journals as well. American Chemical Society http://pubs.acs.org/about.html ACS Journal Index http://pubs.acs.org/journals/cenear/about.html Chemical & Engineering News http://dchas.cehs.siu.edu/Magazine/default.htm Chemical Health & Safety http://pubs.acs.org/journals/ancham/index.html Analytical Chemistry http://pubs.acs.org/journals/esthag/index.html Environmental Science and Technology http://pubs.acs.org/journals/jacsat/index.html Journal of the American Chemical Society http://pubs.acs.org/journals/joceah/index.html Journal of Organic Chemistry Royal Society of Chemistry http://www.rsc.org/is/journals/j1.htm RSC Journal Index http://www.rsc.org/is/journals/current/jcr/jcrpub.htm Journal of Chemical Research http://www.rsc.org/is/journals/current/oprd/oprpub.htm Organic Process R&D. Society of Chemical Industry http://ci.mond.org/ Chemistry & Industry The Bulletin of the Chemical Society of Japan homepage is also available via the ACS publications page. http://pubs.acs.org/journals/bljapan/about.html 7.5 What chemical patent information is available on-line? Both Dialog and STN offer commercial access to US and International patents online, many with full text - however the international ones, especially those devoted to capturing the current status of patents can be expensive, so ensure your searching skills are honed if you wish to avoid a large bill. http://patent.womplex.ibm.com/ http://www.patents.ibm.com/ A new site that offers free searching of the last 20+ years of US patents, and also provide the abstracts, some images, and the claim summary free. Complete copies of the patents can also be ordered. It has a good search engine, and probably should be the first site to visit, but note that it requires a browser that supports frames (eg version 3 of Netscape or Internet Explorer). http://metalab.unc.edu/patents/intropat.html STO Patent retrieval service Gregory Aharonian has struggled for several years to provide a free, comprehensive patent title service. This excellent free service offers the titles of chemical, mechanical, or electrical patents via email to subscribers. Recently he also offered one years worth of patent abstracts, but requires some financial donations to expand the service. The abstracts are freely retrievable by patent number (sorry no searching yet, that needs the big donations). For subscription info, send 'help' to patents@world.std.com. http://www.uspto.gov/patft/index.html USPTO/CNIDR Patent Project This page provides access to both the U.S. Patent Bibliographic Database, which includes bibliographic data from 1976 to 1997, and the AIDS Patent Database, which includes the full text and images of AIDS related patent issued by the U.S., European and Japanese Patent offices. 7.6 Which FTP sites contain chemistry-related material? ftp://kekule.osc.edu/pub/chemistry/ Jan Labanowsky's server, also contains an archive of the computational chemistry mailing list. ftp://qcpe6.chem.indiana.edu/ QCPE archive ftp://oak.oakland.edu/pub/simtelnet/ Dos and Windows public domain and shareware 7.7 What chemistry-focused mailing lists exist? LISTSERV@Beaver.Bemidji.MSUS.edu Chemistry laboratories (both academic and research), students' experiments (high school, college and university), classroom demonstrations and shows for the public of chemical processes, chemistry stockroom management, lab safety, and small-scale chemical waste handling procedures. 7.8 How can I contact Chemical Societies electronically? In general, most WWW sites will also contain email addresses that they can be contacted through. http://www.acs.org/ The American Chemical Society homepage provides access information, and additional email support is available via the following:- division@acs.org ACS Division information expo@acs.org ACS expositions meminfo@acs.org ACS membership information natlmtgs@acs.org ACS national meeting information rxnt@acs.org Reaction Times (college newspaper) reglmtgs@acs.org ACS regional meeting information slga@acs.org ACS state and local government affairs http://www.rsc.org/ marketing@rsc.org The UK Royal Society of Chemistry, WWW and email address. http://sci.mond.org/ The UK Society of Chemical Industry. http://www.gdch.de/ pr@gdch.de The German Chemical Society (Gesellschaft Deutscher Chemiker, GDCh) http://wwwsoc.nacsis.ac.jp/csj/index-e.html The Chemical Society of Japan ( English index ) 7.9 How can I contact large chemical companies? Check their WWW pages for information. http://www.argus.it/ Argus Chemicals http://www.dow.com/ Dow Chemicals http://www.eastman.com/ Eastman Chemicals http://www.ge.com/plastics/ GE Plastics http://www.hoechst.com/ Hoechst http://www.lilly.com/ Eli Lilly http://www.monsanto.com/ Monsanto http://www.chemfirst.com/qci/ Quality Chemicals http://www.rohmhaas.com/ Rohm and Haas http://www.sigma-aldrich.com/ Sigma, Aldrich and Fluka http://www.sumitomo-chem.co.jp/ Sumitomo Chemicals You can observe the naming conventions, so try www.company-name.com for other companies not listed, and you can also try using the on-line version of the Thomas Register. http://www.thomasregister.com/ 7.10 How can I contact chemical suppliers? Several major chemical suppliers now have on-line catalogues on the WWW. http://www.sigma-aldrich.com/ Sigma, Aldrich, Fluka, and Riedel de Haen chemical catalogues http://www.fisherscientific.com/ Acros Chemicals catalogue Fisher Chemical catalogue http://www.romil.com/ Romil Chemicals catalogue ( high purity chemicals ) Check out the FAQs in rec.pyrotechnics and alt.drugs, they may also list some legal suppliers. With the rapid growth of the WWW, it is usually a good idea to conduct a search to locate suppliers, and you could try the Chemsources or Thomas Register sites to locate addresses. http://www.chemsources.com/ http://www.thomasregister.com/ Use of WWW search engines and specific terms like "biochemicals" will locate the WWW and email addresses of speciality suppliers 7.11 How can I contact equipment suppliers Check out the FAQs in rec.pyrotechnics and alt.drugs, they may also list some legal suppliers. With the rapid growth of the WWW, it is usually a good idea to conduct a search to locate suppliers on the Internet, and using the Thomas Register site to locate suppliers not on the Internet. http://www.thomasregister.com/ Thomas Register ( manufacturers and suppliers ) http://www.sigma-aldrich.com/ Sigma, Aldrich, Fluka and Supelco ( techware and books ) http://www.fisherscientific.com/ Fisher Catalogue ( general lab equipment ) 7.12 How can I contact US government agencies? http://www.fedworld.gov/ telnet://fedworld.gov/ FedWorld Information Network at the National Technical Information Service NTIS) was created "to provide a one-stop location for the public to locate, order, and have delivered to them, U.S. Government information." gopher://marvel.loc.gov/11/federal/fedinfo/byagency/executive Executive Branch Gophers (Library of Congress) http://www.nist.gov/ National Institute of Standards and Technology http://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/atsdrhome.html Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (Searchable) http://www.dot.gov/ Department of Transportation http://www.epa.gov/ Environmental Protection Agency http://www.fcc.gov/ Federal Communications Commission http://www.access.gpo.gov/ Government Printing Office 7.13 Where can I find compilations of science humour? http://www.improb.com/ For the best science satire around, check out the Annals of Improbable Research, successor to the Journal of Irreproducible Results. Whilst the full version is available via subscription services, such as ClariNet, smaller items are published free in the Mini AIR. ftp://ftp.in.umist.ac.uk/pub/Text/scijokes.zip http://www.xs4all.nl/~jcdverha/scijokes/ A huge 500kB compilation of science jokes regularly posted to Usenet. http://dir.yahoo.com/Entertainment/Humor/By_Topic/Science/ Annals_of_Improbable_Research/ Search selections from the Annals of Improbable Research 7.14 Where can I purchase scientific software? Aldrich and Fisher sell software, as do some of the Chemical Societies http://www.sigma-aldrich.com/ Sigma, Aldrich, Fluka and Supelco http://www.fisherscientific.com/ Fisher Catalogue http://www.acdlabs.com/ Diverse range of chemistry drawing, interpretation and modelling software. Refer also to "Chemistry Overview Sites " and "Other Chemistry-related Resources" in section 7.2. User Contributions:Section Contents
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