The Beilstein database is a

database In computing, a database is an organized collection of data or a type of data store based on the use of a database management system (DBMS), the software that interacts with end users, applications, and the database itself to capture and a ...

in the field of

organic chemistry Organic chemistry is a subdiscipline within chemistry involving the science, scientific study of the structure, properties, and reactions of organic compounds and organic matter, organic materials, i.e., matter in its various forms that contain ...

, in which compounds are uniquely identified by their Beilstein Registry Number. The database covers the scientific literature from 1771 to the present and contains experimentally validated information on millions of

chemical reaction A chemical reaction is a process that leads to the chemistry, chemical transformation of one set of chemical substances to another. When chemical reactions occur, the atoms are rearranged and the reaction is accompanied by an Gibbs free energy, ...

s and substances from original scientific publications. The electronic database was created from ''Handbuch der Organischen Chemie'' (''Beilstein's Handbook of Organic Chemistry''), founded by Friedrich Konrad Beilstein in 1881, but has appeared online under a number of different names, including Crossfire Beilstein. Since 2009, the content has been maintained and distributed by

Elsevier Elsevier ( ) is a Dutch academic publishing company specializing in scientific, technical, and medical content. Its products include journals such as ''The Lancet'', ''Cell (journal), Cell'', the ScienceDirect collection of electronic journals, ...

Information Systems in Frankfurt under the product name "

Reaxys Reaxys is a web-based tool for the retrieval of information about chemical compounds and data from published literature, including journals and patents. The information includes chemical compounds, chemical reactions, chemical properties, related ...

". The database contains information on reactions, substances, structures and properties. Up to 350 fields containing chemical and physical data (such as

melting point The melting point (or, rarely, liquefaction point) of a substance is the temperature at which it changes state of matter, state from solid to liquid. At the melting point the solid and liquid phase (matter), phase exist in Thermodynamic equilib ...

, refractive index etc.) are available for each substance. References to the literature in which the reaction or substance data appear are also given. The Beilstein content made available through

is complemented by information drawn from Gmelin (which gives access to the Gmelin Database), a very large repository of

organometallic Organometallic chemistry is the study of organometallic compounds, chemical compounds containing at least one chemical bond between a carbon atom of an organic molecule and a metal, including alkali, alkaline earth, and transition metals, and so ...

and

inorganic An inorganic compound is typically a chemical compound that lacks carbon–hydrogen bonds⁠that is, a compound that is not an organic compound. The study of inorganic compounds is a subfield of chemistry known as '' inorganic chemistry''. Inor ...

information, as well as by information drawn from the

Patent A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an sufficiency of disclosure, enabling discl ...

Chemistry Database. The Reaxys registered trademark and the database itself are owned and protected by Elsevier Properties SA and used under license.

History

Beilstein was founded as German-language standard reference work for organic chemistry was intended to supplement the content of the Chemisches Zentralblatt. In light of the leading role of German chemistry in international science, Beilstein's handbook quickly became renowned as a standard reference throughout the world. The first edition of his "Handbuch der organischen Chemie" appeared in two volumes in 1881 and 1883, referencing 15,000 compounds in about 2,200 pages. The second edition appeared in three volumes from 1885 to 1889 and 4,080 pages, and from 1892 to 1899 came the third edition in 4 volumes and 6,844 pages. In 1896, the continuation of the handbook was placed in the care of the German Chemical Society, which first published the supplementary volumes of the 3rd edition and, from 1918, the fourth edition. Starting with the 5th supplement, following the superseding of German by English as most relevant scientific language, the handbook appeared in English.''Brockhaus ABC Chemie'', VEB F. A. Brockhaus Verlag Leipzig 1965, S. 162.

In popular culture

Isaac Asimov Isaac Asimov ( ; – April 6, 1992) was an Russian-born American writer and professor of biochemistry at Boston University. During his lifetime, Asimov was considered one of the "Big Three" science fiction writers, along with Robert A. H ...

's short story " What's in a Name?" (1956) introduced the Beilstein ''Handbook of Organic Chemistry'' as an important plot element.

References

{{Reflist Chemical databases Organic chemistry Bibliographic databases and indexes

History

In popular culture

See also

References