CAS (formerly Chemical Abstracts Service) is a division of the American Chemical Society. It is a source of chemical information. CAS is located in

Columbus, Ohio Columbus () is the state capital and the most populous city in the U.S. state of Ohio. With a 2020 census population of 905,748, it is the 14th-most populous city in the U.S., the second-most populous city in the Midwest, after Chicago, an ...

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., federal district, five ma ...

Print periodicals

''Chemical Abstracts'' is a periodical index that provides numerous tools such as SciFinder as well as tagged keywords, summaries, indexes of disclosures, and structures of compounds in recently published scientific documents. Approximately 8,000 journals, technical reports, dissertations, conference proceedings, and new

book A book is a medium for recording information in the form of writing or images, typically composed of many pages (made of papyrus, parchment, vellum, or paper) bound together and protected by a cover. The technical term for this phys ...

s, available in at least 50 different languages, are monitored yearly, as are

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 disclo ...

specifications from 27 countries and two international organizations. ''Chemical Abstracts'' ceased print publication on January 1, 2010.

Databases

The two principal databases that support the different products are CAplus and Registry.

CAS References

CAS References consists of bibliographic information and abstracts for all articles in chemical journals worldwide, and chemistry-related articles from all scientific journals, patents, and other scientific publications.

Registry

Registry contains information on more than 130 million organic and inorganic substances, and more than 64 million protein and

nucleic acid sequence A nucleic acid sequence is a succession of Nucleobase, bases signified by a series of a set of five different letters that indicate the order of nucleotides forming alleles within a DNA (using GACT) or RNA (GACU) molecule. By convention, sequence ...

s. The sequence information comes from CAS and GenBank, produced by the

National Institutes of Health The National Institutes of Health, commonly referred to as NIH (with each letter pronounced individually), is the primary agency of the United States government The federal government of the United States (U.S. federal government or U ...

. The chemical information is produced by CAS, and is prepared by the CAS Registry System, which identifies each compound with a specific CAS registry number, index name, and graphic representation of its chemical structure. The assignment of chemical names is done according to the chemical nomenclature rules for ''CA'' index names, which is slightly different from the internationally standard IUPAC names, according to the rules of IUPAC.

Products

CAS databases are available via two principal database systems, STN, and SciFinder.

STN

STN (Scientific & Technical Information Network) International is operated jointly by CAS and FIZ Karlsruhe, and is intended primarily for information professionals, using a command language interface. In addition to CAS databases, STN also provides access to many other databases, similar to Dialog.

SciFinder

SciFinder is a database of chemical and bibliographic information. Originally a client application, a web version was released in 2008. It has a graphical interface, and can be searched for chemical structures and reactions as well as literature in chemistry and related disciplines. The client version is for chemists in commercial organizations. Versions for both the

Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for ...

and

MacOS macOS (; previously OS X and originally Mac OS X) is a Unix operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc. since 2001. It is the primary operating system for Apple's Mac (computer), Mac computers. Within the market of ...

operating systems exist.

CASSI

''CASSI'' stands for ''Chemical Abstracts Service Source Index''. Since 2009, this formerly print and CD-ROM compilation is available as a free online resource to look up and confirm publication information. The online CASSI Search Tool provides titles and abbreviations, CODEN, ISSN,

publisher Publishing is the activity of making information, literature, music, software and other content available to the public for sale or for free. Traditionally, the term refers to the creation and distribution of printed works, such as books, newsp ...

, and date of first issue (history) for a selected journal. Also included is its language of text and language of summaries. The range is from 1907 to the present, including both serial and non-serial scientific and technical publications. The database is updated quarterly. ''Beyond CASSI'' lists abbreviated journal titles from early chemical literature and other historical reference sources.

History

''Chemical Abstracts'' (''CA'') began as a volunteer effort and developed from there. The use of volunteer abstractors was phased out in 1994. ''Chemical Abstracts'' has been associated with the American Chemical Society in one way or another since 1907. For many years, beginning in 1909, the offices of ''Chemical Abstracts'' were housed in various places on the Columbus, Ohio campus of

Ohio State University The Ohio State University, commonly called Ohio State or OSU, is a public land-grant research university in Columbus, Ohio. A member of the University System of Ohio, it has been ranked by major institutional rankings among the best pu ...

, including McPherson Laboratory and Watts Hall. In 1965, CAS moved to a new site on the west bank of the Olentangy River, just north of The Ohio State campus. This campus became well known in the Columbus area and famous as the site of many Columbus Symphony Orchestra pop concerts. In 2009, the campus consisted of three buildings. In 1907, William A. Noyes had enlarged the ''Review of American Chemical Research'', an abstracting publication begun by Arthur Noyes in 1895 that was the forerunner of ''Chemical Abstracts''. When it became evident that a separate publication containing these abstracts was needed, Noyes became the first editor of the new publication, ''Chemical Abstracts''.

E. J. Crane Evan Jay Crane (February 14, 1889 – December 30, 1966) was an American chemist and the editor of '' Chemical Abstracts'' 1915–1958. He graduated from Ohio State University in 1911, and received an Honorary D.Sc. there in 1938. In 1951 he was ...

became the first Director of Chemical Abstracts Service when it became an American Chemical Society division in 1956. Crane had been ''CA'' editor since 1915, and his dedication was a key factor in its long-term success. Dale B. Baker became the CAS Director upon Crane's retirement in 1958. According to CAS, his visionary view of CAS' potential "led to expansion, modernization, and the forging of international alliances with other information organizations." CAS was an early leader in the use of computer technology to organize and disseminate information. The CAS Chemical Registry System was introduced in 1965. CAS developed a unique registry number to identify chemical substances. Agencies such as the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and local fire departments around the world now rely on these numbers for the definite identification of substances. According to the ACS, this is the largest chemical substance database in the world. In 1965, CAS left their offices at OSU for a new headquarters north of campus. Ground was broken in 1971 for an expansion to the building designed by architects

Brubaker/Brandt Brubaker/Brandt was an architecture firm based in Columbus, Ohio. The firm completed some of the tallest buildings affecting the city's skyline including the 42-story Rhodes State Office Tower and the Continental Center, along with other notable b ...

to accommodate the review of 400,000 new research reports printed each year. The 5-story 142,000 square foot building opened in May 1973. In 2007, the ACS designated its Chemical Abstracts Service subdivision an ACS National Historic Chemical Landmark in recognition of its significance as a comprehensive repository of research in chemistry and related sciences. In 2021, CAS rebranded along with a change in logo. The organization updated their mission to be more focused on dynamic responsiveness due to ongoing changes within scientific industries and communities. In 2022, CAS announced the release of almost half a million CAS registry numbers under an open license in thei
Common Chemistry
project.

References

External links

* {{Authority control American Chemical Society Chemical databases Chemistry journals Bibliographic databases and indexes 1907 establishments in Ohio Companies based in the Columbus, Ohio metropolitan area