Private On-Line Services

Chemical Abstracts Service One major source of scientific and technical information for the chemical industry is Chemical Abstracts Service (CAS) of Columbus, Ohio. CAS is a self-sustaining division of the American Chemical Society (ACS) and monitors new developments published in the world s chemical literature. In a recent five year period, CAS monitored over 15,000 journals, periodicals, conferences and technical reports gathered from over 150 nations and published in over 50 languages. CAS also monitors the patents from 26 major countries of the world for new chemical developments. CAS reviews this literature for new information published related to chemical engineering and over 75 different fields of chemistry. Each week for the past 74 years CAS has published the abstracts or summaries pertaining to the new developments cited in the world s chemical literature. On the average, over 500,000 citations are being added to the CAS information base each year. 

Information in the CAS data base is selected, combined and organized automatically to produce a wide range of publications, indexes, computer and microform information files, and special services. Together they provide a variety of approaches to locating, retrieving, and keeping up with chemical information. 

The most comprehensive and best known of CAS s publications is Chemical Abstracts recognized the world over as the key to the world s chemical literature. Abstracts are published in weekly issues that are about half the size of the Manhattan Telephone Directory and contain 8,000 to 9,000 abstracts each. 

CAS ONLINE is Chemical Abstracts Service s computerized system that provides access to substance information from the CAS registry file. CAS ONLINE allows users to search for substances on the basis of structural units, registry number, chemical name, or molecular formula. Portions of the CAS information base are licensed by several information vendors. 

CA Selects is a series of current awareness publications derived from the Chemical Abstracts data base. For each topic in the series, a special profile assures the retrieval of pertinent abstracts. The CA Selects series topic that is most relevant to chemical labeling needs is Chemical Hazards, Health eind Safety. This current-awareness service covers documents dealing with safety in the chemical industry, as well as the health and safety of personnel working with hazardous substances. Coverage includes effects of human exposure to hazardous substances and hazardous properties of chemical substances and reactions. The annual cost for this service is 75.00. 

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