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Chemistry

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This list was created for the Chemical Literature course offered by the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga's Chemistry Department.

The Web, Chemical Information and Search Engines

The searching the via a search engine is web is a fast and easy way to get valuble information fast, but beware, because what is easy is not always correct.

Traditionally, when scientific information is published, it is reviewed by other scientists knowledgable in the field. This process helps to insure the accuracy of the information. However, when one searches the internet, the material that is good science done correctly and accepted by the scientific community via the peer review process gets mixed up with poorly done academic science, high school projects in science, fourth grade science fair projects, and occasionally intentionally misleading information.

It is a mixed bag so you have to pay attention to your source. It is best only to use material that is referenced back to the traditional literature.

Note that the internet/web is a constantly changing medium and that what we do here may be gone in six months.  Information may still be out there,  just in a different location.

UTC Sites

Chemistry Sites

  • American Chemical Society - The American Chemical Society's resource list is a good place to start.
  • American Elements - Information on elements and other materials from website of an Advanced Materials Company
  • Caltech List of Chemical Websites - An extremely comprehensive list of chemical website sused at Caltech. Some links that used paid databases or article for fee won’t work if you are not on a Caltech computer, but most sites work and are quite useful. If you want to know where to look and what is available, scroll through the listings in this site.
  • Chemfinder - Type a chemical name, get synonyms, structure, properties, MSDS, links to other sites, may require free registration.
  • Directory of Graduate Research - If interested in graduate school in chemistry this site list all chemistry graduate school departments and faculty in the United States.

Online searching of the Chemical Literature

  • Chem Abstracts on the Web -  An easy online version of the Chemistry Abstracts service that can access any abstract in the database. (requires Password and our UTC Chemistry academic license is limited to use after 5 pm).
  • Ingenta  - a free method of searching for journal articles. Not as complete as chem abstracts and only contains last decade of articles, but useful none the less.  Also contains an excellent compilation of chemistry links.

Chemistry Journals

  • American Chemical Society Journals - Computers in the chemistry department have access to journal articles online. A very powerful tool.
  • Scientific Journals on the Web - Alphabetical list; mainly biology and chemistry
  • Medscape - Requires a registration, but all info is free. This site has reprints of high-quality articles from prestigious medical journals and is especially good for looking up background information on medical issues.
  • Google Scholar - Select Advanced Scholar Search and then you can select subject area, year range, keywords, and keyword location. Free and powerful tool that sometimes allows access to full article.
  • Scifinder Scholar – SFS is the most complete method of searching primary chemical literature, but access is limited to few computers – see your Professor if you need to do a very complete search, for example for research project.

Databases

  • National Institute of Standards Chemistry Databases - A huge compilation of information on chemical compounds including thermochemical data, IR spectra, mass spectra, UV vis spectra, chemical constants, ionization energies and more  
  • Protein Database (pdb)  - A database of the atomic coordinates of structurally characterized proteins
  • Grateful Med/MEDLINE - Free medical database from the National Library of Medicine. Don't overlook this site for chemical information such as safety and analysis.
  • Phytochemical and Ethnobotanical Databases - Lists plants and chemicals with given biological activities. Even if you're not interested in the pharmacology, a list of major constituents of foods and botanicals can be quite handy for analytical chemists.
  • Spectral Data for Organic Compounds - A database of NMR, IR, and Mass, and UV vis spectra.
  • E-Molecules - Searching for commercial sources of chemicals .

Patents/Trademarks

  • U.S. Patents - Search not just by terms but also inventor name, company assigned, product class, patent number, and more. For now, this lists basic ownership info, references, and an abstract, but by next year the full text of patents will be available for free.
  • Canadian patents - Search in French or English. (It's best to do both, since patents can be submitted in either language and are not cross indexed.) Basic info, claims, and illustrations can be found, but no full text as of yet.
  • Japanese patents - Lots of info in English, and a good search engine. Japanese abstracts are more detailed than those of English-speaking countries and include structural images. One drawback: the database lags about three months behind and is not updated with any regularity.
  • Where to find patent info on the Web - This European Patent Office site has links to the patent offices of many countries, not just European ones. It also has links to other useful sites.

Regulatory/ Legal Information