American Chemical Society
Teaching Chemical Information:
Tips and Techniques
— March 1998 —
Drexel University: Chemistry 767: Final Examination Answer Key
September 5, 1995
You are to do this examination by yourself in three hours, utilizing whatever on-line resources or Hagerty Library resources you need. You are not to confer with anyone else in the course about this examination, while you are doing it or for several days afterwards (note that all students are not taking the exam on September 5). You must hand in this examination paper with answers to the questions given below. You should also hand in a file on disk or a print-out of that file to support your answers with data. Your exam will be graded on the basis of the correctness and completeness of your answers and the quality of the data which you have gathered to corroborate the answers. Late exams will not be accepted.
Problem statement:
The use of combinatorial methods in chemistry, also known as “combinatorial chemistry,” has undergone a recent strong growth in interest and in publication activity. The purpose of this 3-hour project is to collect bibliographic data which support this assertion, and to prove to you that in three hours you can learn a good deal about this field and why it has mushroomed!
- What related terms are used in Chemical Abstracts to index combinatorial applications in chemistry?
E2 1 COMBINATOR E3 607* COMBINATORIAL E4 213 COMBINATORIAL LIBRARY E5 1 COMBINATORIALLY E6 7 COMBINATORIC E7 3 COMBINATORICAL E8 34 COMBINATORICS E9 17 COMBINATORY - How many publications in combinatorial chemistry and related areas are abstracted
in Chemical Abstracts? Break down your answer into 5-year intervals starting in
1970 and going through 1995.
S1 638 "COMBINATORIAL" OR "COMBINATORIAL LIBRARY" OR
"COMBINATORIALLY" OR "COMBINATORIC" OR
"COMBINATORICAL" OR "COMBINATORICS"By searching S1 and PY=1966, 1967, etc. the following statistics can be developed:
1966–1970: 11 records 1971–1975: 17 records 1976–1980: 37 records 1981–1985: 48 records 1986–1990: 71 records 1991 on: 454 records (31 in 1991, 49 in 1992, 93 in 1993, 173 in 1994, and 108 so far in 1995) - In what subject areas within chemistry have publications on combinatorial
chemistry occurred? [Hint: look at Section Codes] Look at all time periods, not just
the recent years.
Display records with the suffix /SC to get this list; this is incomplete, and focuses only on recent records.
CA201004 Pharmacology CA265008 General Physical Chemistry CA234003 Amino Acids, Peptides, and Proteins CA222XXX Physical Organic Chemistry CA280XXX Organic Analytical Chemistry CA221003 General Organic Chemistry CA277XXX Magnetic Phenomena CA225000 Benzene, Its Derivatives, and Condensed Benzenoid Compounds CA235XXX Chemistry of Synthetic High Polymers CA206XXX General Biochemistry CA233XXX Carbohydrates CA215XXX Immunochemistry CA209009 Biochemical Methods CA203XXX Biochemical Genetics - How many conference proceedings on combinatorial chemistry have been published
in the past 5 years? From the search below, 1+5+14+18+1=39 books or conference
proceedings were published on combinatorial aspects of chemistry from 1991–1995.
S26 31 S1 AND PY=1991 S27 49 S1 AND PY=1992 S28 93 S1 AND PY=1993 S29 173 S1 AND PY=1994 S30 108 S1 AND PY=1995 S31 722211 DT="BOOK" OR DT="CONFERENCE PROCEEDING" S33 1 S26 AND S31 S34 5 S27 AND S31 S35 14 S28 AND S31 S36 18 S29 AND S31 S37 1 S30 AND S31 Display the titles, editors, and publication years of these proceedings. For set 33 (for example), use T33/ti,au/py/all to display this information.
- Have there been any books published on combinatorial chemistry during the same period?
If so, give the complete CA record for each.
S38 1 (S33 OR S34 OR S35 OR S36 OR S37) AND DT=BOOK There has been one book published:
38/5/1
DIALOG(R)File 399: CA SEARCH(R)
(c) 1995 American Chemical Society. All rts. reserv.
123041350 CA: 123(4):41350r BOOK
The Theory and Practice of Combinatorial Chemistry. (In: Perspect. Drug
Discovery Des., 1995; 2 (2)
AUTHOR(S): Houghten, Richard A.; Editor
LOCATION: Neth.
DATE: 1995 PAGES: 75 PP. CODEN: BOOKA7 LANGUAGE: English
PUBLISHER: (ESCOM, Leiden, Neth.)
SECTION: CA265008 General Physical Chemistry
IDENTIFIERS: book combinatorial chem
DESCRIPTORS: Chemistry…the theory and practice of combinatorial chem. - How many reviews on combinatorial chemistry have been published in the 1994–1995
period? List the titles and authors of each of these reviews.
S41 70 S25 AND REVIEW - From the information that you have gathered so far, attempt a definition of the subject,
“combinatorial chemistry,” and indicate the year of the upsurge in interest
in this field.
The definition of combinatorial chemistry can be inferred from the title of the articles and reviews and from the index terms used to describe the records found thus far, even though no abstracts are available in CA SEARCH on DIALOG. Of course, by using SciSearch, you have access to the abstracts of modern articles and can do a more precise job of defining this field. In the early years of Chemical Abstracts on-line, combinatorial methods of mathematics were used on many different chemical problems in all areas of chemistry. Modern combinatorial chemistry is the simultaneous use of large sets of chemically similar reagents (such as amino acids or carbohydrates) in binary chemical reactions to produce thousands of products which are then screened for biological activity or specific chemical properties. Publications in combinatorial chemistry have mushroomed in the past few years as the pharmaceutical potential of these synthetic/screening methods has become evident.
- What is the earliest publication referring to the term “combinatorial library”?
How many references are there to this term? How much overlap is there between this
reference list and that of the more general subject with which you are dealing? I did this
question using SciSearch, but using CA SEARCH would be OK also.
?s combinatorial(n)chemistry S7 805 COMBINATORIAL(N)LIBRAR? ?s s7 and py=1992 805 S7 720444 PY=1992 S8 16 S7 AND PY=1992 ?s s7 and py=1991 805 S7 706089 PY=1991 S9 7 S7 AND PY=1991 ?s s7 and py=1990 805 S7 686428 PY=1991 S10 1 S7 AND PY=1990Thus, the term “combinatorial library” or “combinatorial libraries” occurred first in 1990. Here is the SciSearch record:
FN- DIALOG(R)File 434: SciSearch(R)| CZ- (c) 1995 Inst for Sci Info. All rts. reserv.| AN- 10041760| GA- CW342| TI- *COMBINATORIAL**LIBRARIES* - A FAST NEW TRACK TO MONOCLONALS| LA- ENGLISH AU- LEWIS R| CS- SUNY ALBANY, BIOL/ALBANY/NY/12222| GL- USA| JN- SCIENTIST *1990*, V4, N7, P29| PY- 1990| DT- ARTICLE| NR- O| SF- SciSearch; SciSearch; CC PHYS--Current Contents, Physical Chemical & Earth Sciences; CC LIFE--Current Contents, Life Sciences; CC AGRI--Current Contents, Agriculture, Biology & Environmental Sciences; CC CLIN--Current Contents, Clinical Medicine; CC ARTS--Current Contents, Arts & Humanities; CC ENGI--Current Contents, Engineering, Technology & Applied Sciences; CC SOCS-Current Contents, Social & Behavioral Sciences| SC-MULTIDISCIPLINARY SCIENCES|
- How does the indexing of this subject area in SciSearch differ from its indexing in
Chemical Abstracts?
Here I was looking for your realization that SciSearch covers all scientific fields, whereas Chemical Abstracts deals only with chemistry and related chemical fields.
In general, more of the early records in SciSearch which deal with combinatorial libraries or even combinatorial chemistry are from biological or medical publications.
- One widely cited author in the area of combinatorial chemistry is R. A. Houghten. Find
out what you can about his career, his present affiliation, and his publications in
combinatorial chemistry. How many times are publications by Houghten cited?
S16 1386 CA="HOUGHTEN RA" S17 127 S16 AND PY=1990 S18 37 S16 AND S5 S19 107 S16 AND S1 S20 188 AU="HOUGHTEN RA" From these searches, we see that RA Houghten has 188 records in SciSearch, and is cited 1386 times. Here is the abstract from a very recent review which cites RA Houghton. This abstract contains a good definition of combinatorial chemistry.
DIALOG(R)File434:(c) 1995 Inst for Sci Info. All rts. Reserv.
Abstract: The synthesis of large numbers of peptides can be very labor intensive and, if a conventional peptide synthesizer is used, only small numbers of peptides can be produced within a reasonable time. The techniques described below can make large numbers of different peptides simultaneously with varying degrees of mechanization, ranging from the wholly manual methods, to those involving complete mechanization of the whole synthesis process. Most of the multiple synthesis methods are primarily intended for small scale production ranging from microgram amounts up to a few tens of milligrams. All of the systems are economical in use of solvents and reagents, enabling cost-effective synthesis. The techniques described can also be used to prepare peptide libraries, containing several millions of peptide sequences, to enable the rapid screening of all possible permutations of amino acids within short peptides. However, it is considered that multiple synthesis methods are not particularly suited where extreme high purity or very long peptides are required. - In the field of combinatorial libraries there is a widely cited article in which Houghten
is the first author. Find this article, print out its full record (including the abstract),
and determine the number of times it has been subsequently cited.
E6 197 CR=HOUGHTEN RA, 1991, V354, P84, NATURE S20 188 AU="HOUGHTEN RA" S30 7 S20 AND JN=NATURE S31 1 S30 AND PY=1991 Here is the abstract of this article:
31/AB/1
DIALOG(R)File434:(c) 1995 Inst for Sci Info. All rts. reserv.
Abstract: EXISTING methods for the synthesis and screening of large numbers of peptides are limited by their inability to generate and screen the requisite number (millions) of individual peptides 1-4 and/or their inability to generate unmodified free peptides in quantities able to interact in solution 4-8. We have circumvented these limitations by developing synthetic peptide combinatorial libraries composed of mixtures of free peptides in quantities which can be used directly in virtually all existing assay systems. The screening of these heterogeneous libraries, along with an iterative selection and synthesis process, permits the systematic identification of optimal peptide ligands. Starting with a library composed of more than 34 million hexa-peptides, we present here the precise identification of an antigenic determinant recognized by a monoclonal antibody as well as the straightforward development of new potent antimicrobial peptides. - Determine the number of reviews which cited the article in question 11. After reading
the abstracts of these reviews, write a paragraph explaining what a combinatorial
library is, and what applications it has in chemistry.
S32 197 CR="HOUGHTEN RA, 1991, V354, P84, NATURE" S33 22 S32 AND DT=REVIEW I was looking for a paragraph which is consistent with the abstracts displayed above.