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Chemistry and Biochemistry

A new generation of SciFinder

Produced by the Chemical Abstracts Service (CAS), SciFinder is the most comprehensive database for the chemical literature, searchable by topic, author, substances by name or CAS Registry Number. You can also conduct searches by using the editor to draw chemical structures, substructures, or reactions. It is a core research tool for chemistry, biochemistry, chemical engineering, materials science, environmental science and other science and engineering disciplines. CAS SciFinder provides a new interface with many of the same search capabilities as SciFinder and integrated access to the following indexes.

  • Chemical Substances (CAS REGISTRY® and CAS Registry Numbers®) 
  • References (CAplus, MEDLINE, ChemZent)
  • Reactions (CASREACT®)
  • Chemical Suppliers (CHEMCATS)
  • Regulated Chemicals (CHEMLIST®)
  • Markush Representation in Patents (MARPAT®)
  • Formulations (CAS Formulus®)
  • Chemical Industry Notes (Trade Publications, CIN®)

Want to learn more? Visit CAS Content and SciFinder FAQ.
Read more about SciFinder-n at https://www.cas.org/products/scifinder.

CAS SciFinder provides new content and functionalities that can help enhance your search productivity. Enhancements include: 

  • Relevance scoring of reference results
  • Enhanced workflow tools (e.g., live search history, auto-suggested search queries, multi-tab browsing)
  • Experimental and predictive retrosynthetic analysis for known and novel substances
  • Biosequence searching (BLAST, CDR, and Motif)
  • Touchscreen-enabled structure drawing with ChemDoodle
  • Enhanced, visual citation mapping (i.e., references citing and cited by)
  • Enhanced view and navigation of full-text patents with PatentPak®
  • Detailed synthetic methods
  • Searchable NMR spectra
  • Extended experimental spectra coverage

PatentPak: Allows easy access to patents from over 40 patent offices with the ability to easily locate chemical substances within the patent and to reference equivalent patents in a familiar language.  

Biosequence Searching: Searches biological sequences from the patent literature and will expand to publicly available information in the future. 

MethodsNow Synthesis: Provides step-by-step procedures and protocols from journal articles and patents which you can load into an electronic lab notebook.  

Retrosynthesis Planner: Uses computer-aided synthetic design algorithm to generate possible retrosynthetic routes along with easy access to commercial availability and pricing information for reactants.  

ChemDoodle: Touch-friendly structure editor for drawing on phones and tablets. Structures drawn in ChemDoodle will be the same in CAS Draw, and vice versa

Using SciFinder

You must register for a SciFinder account before using the database for the first time. To register, visit the SciFinder database page and follow the instructions. Note that you must use your UDEL email address to complete your registration.

Choose how to sign in

1 - Select the UD option:

University of Delaware Shibboleth SSO
University of Delaware - Library

2 - Sign in using your Central Authentication Service credentials

3 - Sign in with your SciFinder account information

Did you have an account at another institution?
You will need to register for a new account through our registration link (see SciFinder database page). Any saved searches, alerts, etc. must be recreated in your new account. You may also need to delete your browser's cookies so that your new login will work. 

Account deactivated? Password problem?
Contact CAS for help with username/password problems and deactivated accounts.
https://www.cas.org/contact

CAS provides training resources to help you get started with many of the key features of SciFinder. 

Description

SciFinder is a collection of chemical databases, including: 

  • CAS Registry - Database of 165 million organic and inorganic substances, with structures, names, synonyms, CAS Registry numbers, calculated and experimental properties, and spectra.
  • CAS References - Comprehensive index of the chemical literature, from 1907 to date with some selective earlier coverage. More than 52 million records, including journal articles, patents, conference proceedings, meeting abstracts, technical reports, and more.
  • CAS Reactions - Millions of single- and multi-step reactions, including synthetic preparations, from 1840 to present. Now with a retrosynthetic planner.

You can search SciFinder by research topic as well as by substance or reaction. To be more comprehensive, considering searching Reaxys, another chemistry database, in addition to SciFinder.