Links to Wikipedia records provided in collaboration with Wikipedia volunteers

COLUMBUS, Ohio, May 13 /PRNewswire/ -- Chemical Abstracts Service (CAS), a division of the American Chemical Society and the most comprehensive and authoritative source of chemical information, has launched a new, free, web-based resource called Common Chemistry (www.commonchemistry.org).

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This resource is helpful to non-chemists and others who might know either a chemical name or a CAS Registry Number(R) of a common everyday chemical and want to pair both pieces of information.

Common Chemistry contains approximately 7,800 chemicals of widespread and general interest, as well as all 118 elements from the periodic table. With the exception of some of the elements, all other substances in this collection were deemed of widespread interest by having been cited 1,000 or more times in the CAS databases. Examples of substances in Common Chemistry include widely recognizable ones such as caffeine, benzoyl peroxide (acne treatment), and sodium chloride (table salt).

"Anyone can easily search by CAS Registry Number or chemical name and confirm the substance details, such as the CAS Registry Number, chemical names or synonyms, molecular formula, chemical structure, and a reciprocal Wikipedia link when available," said Christine McCue, CAS Vice President, Marketing. "Visitors also have the ability to bookmark the page using social media tools, such as Delicious and Digg."

While not intended to be a comprehensive CAS Registry Number (CAS RN) lookup service, Common Chemistry does provide access to information on chemicals of general interest. The CAS Registry Number is recognized throughout the world as the most commonly used, unique identifier of chemical substances. The full CAS REGISTRY(SM) database contains more than 46 million organic and inorganic substances. Research discovery and patent tools such as SciFinder(R) and STN(R) allow users to search the entire database.

CAS thanks the Wikipedia volunteers, especially Professor Martin Walker at SUNY Potsdam, who collaborated with CAS to provide the links to Wikipedia records (when available). The Common Chemistry database will be updated periodically and Wikipedia links will be added when possible.

CAS, a division of the American Chemical Society, provides the world's largest and most current collection of chemical and related scientific information, including the most authoritative database of chemical substances, the CAS REGISTRY(SM). CAS combines these databases with advanced search and analysis technologies to deliver the most complete, cross-linked and effective digital information environment for scientific research and discovery, including such products as SciFinder, STN, STN Express(R), and STN(R) AnaVist(TM), among others. The CAS web site is www.cas.org.

SOURCE Chemical Abstracts Service

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