FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE | July 27, 2011

American Chemical Society enables new subject-based taxonomic categorization of content across its industry-leading databases of chemical information

WASHINGTON, July 27, 2011 — The ACS Publications and Chemical Abstracts Service (CAS) divisions of the American Chemical Society (ACS) announced jointly today the integration of CAS’ CA Section subject index topics to tag articles across the 39 preeminent scholarly research journals published by the Society, including the ACS’ flagship publication Journal of the American Chemical Society.

The incorporation of these well-established CA Section assignments will enable ACS’ global audience of scientific authors and readers to browse and discover leading, cutting-edge research results from across the nearly 500,000 articles published in ACS peer-reviewed journals between 1996 and 2011.

ACS Publications and CAS have partnered to map the 80 CA Section subject topics to tables of contents, abstracts, and article-level content displays on the ACS Publications Web Editions platform. The content mapping enables readers to browse research articles from multiple titles and to filter and sort search results by scientific topic, thereby facilitating simultaneous discovery across multiple ACS journals and analysis of articles published across a variety of research areas and subdisciplines. Subject-specific landing pages for each of the 80 CA Sections have also been introduced on the ACS Publications Web platform. These topic pages highlight recently published ACS articles assigned to each scientific topic, feature an option for readers to obtain subject-based RSS feeds, and deliver a comprehensive list of articles pre-categorized under each CA Section subject. In addition to the subject pages, readers can also apply each of the 80 Sections as a filter with the Advanced Search interface on the ACS Web Editions platform, and narrow their results list using author name, keyword, journal title, publication date, and article type filter options. More information about the new CA Section subject feature, including a complete list of the 80 Section categories, can be found at http://pubs.acs.org/page/demo/enhancements.html.

“Each weekday the ACS Publications Web Editions platform records more than 1 million page views from a global audience of researchers –– scientists who regularly browse several ACS Journals’ Articles ASAPSM listings or Current Issues to stay current with their field of study,” said Jonathan Morgan, assistant director of Web Strategy & Innovation, ACS Publications. “The availability of CA Section subjects for ACS articles marks an important advance for the user experience on the platform, allowing scientists to keep up to speed on the research that matters to them for their specific areas of investigation. For example, readers can now follow and browse ACS articles within the CA Section of ‘Inorganic Analytical Chemistry,’ starting from a single index that encompasses research published in Analytical Chemistry, Environmental Science & Technology, Inorganic Chemistry, and Nano Letters. Just as the award-winning ACS Mobile app is giving our readers greater flexibility in following multiple ACS titles, and the ACS Grid View is offering a modernization of the online Table of Contents rapid browsing experience, we see the CA Section semantic tool as a new user-driven option for viewing, sorting, and organizing articles of interest.”

CAS, recognized as the world’s most authoritative and comprehensive source for chemical information, assigns CA Section categories according to the novelty of the process or substance that is being reported in the literature. The 80 CA Sections are categorized within five broad scientific groupings: Applied; Biochemistry; Macromolecular; Organic; and Physical, Inorganic, and Analytical. These topical hierarchies are now available via Publication A-Z menu displays, as a toggle option on the site-wide Quick Search module, and through the advanced search interface on the ACS Publications Web Editions platform.

"Within our SciFinder® research tool, which is regarded as the first choice for chemists and related scientists around the world, ACS journals continue to be among the most explored peer reviewed publications indexed by CAS,” said Kirk Schwall, Director of SciFinder Product Development at CAS. “Given the tremendous volume of Web referral traffic now flowing between the primary literature published in ACS Journals and the rich substance, reaction and citation information found in SciFinder, CAS views these types of collaborations as an essential service to the broader chemical research community.

“The relationship between ACS product development and IT teams in Columbus and Washington represents a major source of innovation for the Society and its mission as a provider of indispensable information for chemists and R&D professionals in the allied sciences. Building on the dynamic linking features between ACS Publications and SciFinder, the integration of CA Section subjects into ACS Journals is a great example of the collective innovation now being generated through our ongoing collaborative development initiatives,” added Schwall.

The American Chemical Society is a nonprofit organization chartered by the U.S. Congress. With more than 163,000 members, ACS is the world’s largest scientific society and a global leader in providing access to chemistry-related research through its multiple databases, peer-reviewed journals and scientific conferences. Its main offices are in Washington, D.C., and Columbus, Ohio. The ACS Publications Division currently publishes 39 leading journals in the chemical and related sciences, including the flagship Journal of the American Chemical Society, as well as Chemical & Engineering News, the Society’s weekly newsmagazine. ACS peer-reviewed research journals, regarded as the most trusted, most cited, and most read publications in their respective fields, can be found at http://pubs.acs.org.

Chemical Abstracts Service (CAS), a division of the American Chemical Society, is the world’s authority for chemical information. CAS databases are curated and quality-controlled by CAS scientists and recognized as authoritative by chemical and pharmaceutical companies, universities, government organizations and patent offices around the world. By combining these databases with advanced search and analysis technologies (SciFinder®, STN® and Science IP® products and services), CAS delivers the most current, complete and cross-linked secure digital information environment for scientific discovery. Learn more at http://www.cas.org

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Michael Bernstein
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m_bernstein@acs.org

Bob Sadowski
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