Support : Publications : Chronolog Archives : January/February 2005

Catalyst for Success: The Dialog Chemistry Collection

Dialog has long offered knowledge workers in the chemical and pharmaceutical industries an impressive array of chemical information covering millions of chemical substances. The wide scope of chemistry and ancillary information from Dialog is a valued resource for researchers in chemical and pharmaceutical companies around the world. To meet ongoing customer demand, Dialog continues to strengthen its collections. Recent reloads of Beilstein, Merck Index Online^SM, USP DI, the addition of literature abstracts from Chemical Abstracts, and reporting features in DialogLink have prompted requests for an up-to-date summary overview of the Dialog Chemistry Collection, which we are pleased to offer in this issue.

Databases with Chemical Information

Dialog's extensive collection of chemical information offers substance and physical property data, literature references, reaction data, patents, chemical business information and more. Specific Dialog databases providing chemical information include:

• The Merck Index Online^SM (File 304), CHEMSEARCH™ (File 398), CHEMNAME® (File 301), Beilstein Facts (File 390) and Beilstein Reactions (File 391), which contain structures and properties of organic substances, preparative data and chemical reactions.
  
  
• International scientific literature, journals, conference proceedings, dissertations and technical reports can be found in CA SEARCH®: CHEMICAL ABSTRACTS® (File 399), Analytical Abstracts Online (File 305), Inside Conferences (File 65), Chemical Safety Newsbase (File 317) and Beilstein Abstracts (File 393).
  
  
• CLAIMS/U.S. Patents (Files 340, 341) provides United States patents with chemical patents dating back to 1950; Derwent World Patents Index (Files 351, 352) and INPADOC/Family and Legal Status (File 345) provide broad international patent coverage.
  
  
• Information about chemical companies and suppliers, news and product announcements can be found in Directory of Chemical Producers–Companies (File 364), Chemical Business NewsBase (File 319) and Gale Group New Product Announcements/Plus® (File 621).
  
  
• Displays of chemical structures are included in records from databases such as Prous Science Drugs of the Future™ (File 453), Prous Science Drug Data Report (File 452), IMS R&D Focus (File 445) and Pharmaprojects (File 128).

Dialog's chemical information coverage also includes many trade publications in Dialog NewsRoom such as Chemical Week, European Chemical News, Chemical Week International, Asian Chemical News and Plastics News, to name a few.

Chemical Information Searching

Dialog also has thorough indexing, a sophisticated search language and special features that enable you to search for millions of chemical substances across files. For example:

• Identify a chemical substance
  Records in the CHEMSEARCH™ and CHEMNAME® databases provide data on millions of chemical substances, including chemical names, the molecular formula, synonyms and the CAS® Registry Number, a unique number that identifies a chemical substance. Searching the Dialog DIALINDEX®/OneSearch® categories like CAS® Registry Numbers—Chemical Files (RNCHEM) and CAS® Registry Numbers—Chemical and Medical Files (CASREGNO)—let you use the Registry number to retrieve all references to a substance, regardless of the names or synonyms used in the record.
  
  
• Save time searching across files with the MAP command
  Once you find a Registry number or synonyms, use the MAP command for cross-file searching. MAP is a shortcut that saves time by automatically keying in all the selected search terms, rather than requiring you to do it manually. In addition, it provides thorough results by searching more search terms than you might initially have considered.
  
  You can MAP synonyms, Registry numbers and patent numbers to name a few examples. For instance, in CA SEARCH®: CHEMICAL ABSTRACTS® (File 399), you can MAP all patent numbers that appear in your search results into Derwent World Patents Index to obtain descriptive abstracts or detailed patent family information with a few keystrokes.
  
  
• Display chemical structures
  Images of chemical structures are available as part of the records in a number of Dialog drug chemical databases. To view the structures, simply display the complete record.
  
  
• Link seamlessly to abstracts
  Abstracts can be viewed for over 17 million citations available in all of the Dialog CA SEARCH files including 308-314 and 399.
  
  
• Use DialogLink 4.0 report features for postprocessing
  Using the report feature in DialogLink 4.0, you can download data into customized templates to create Microsoft® Excel or Word reports. This feature is especially helpful when organizing data about chemical substances. You can download a ready-made template from the Dialog Web site, use the template builder to create your own custom template or work with Dialog staff to have your special application built. A sample template for reporting chemical substances using the OneSearch® category CHEMSUBS is available at support.dialog.com/dialoglink/templates.
  
  
• Practice your chemical searching
  Using the Chemistry Training and Practice files (CHEMTAPS) allows you to practice search techniques at no charge. Ten databases, including Beilstein, let you search for chemical substances and MAP from a dictionary file to a chemical literature or patent file.

View Figure 1. Excel Chemical Substance Report.

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