Identification of environmentally relevant chemicals in bibliographic databases: a comparative analysis

Abstract

Valid and reliable information on the use and effects of chemicals is a key factor in the industry and not least within many regulatory agencies. Identification data from lists of substances sometimes leads to incomplete bibliographic analysis in the major chemical databases. The present study takes as its starting point environmentally important chemicals and the retrieval of selectively chosen substances in the four databases: SciFinder, Web of Science (WoS), Scopus and Google Scholar. The way chemical data are stored in the databases plays a major role in the recovery process but differences in coverage, sometimes major, are still found. No single database records all publications about a substance. Inspection of individual titles is necessary when performing a complete count of references. Special care is taken in order to make data from the different databases comparable using the same journals and time periods (2000-2009). A number of nomenclature as well as problems related to the chemical structure and function, often inherent in quantitative or qualitative bibliographic studies of chemicals, are discussed. The practical implications for registration of chemicals in different databases are demonstrated.

The bibliometric analysis of scholarly production: How great is the impact?

“…Further, in the literature, analysis of specialized content is possible. Data can be extracted which highlights chemical substances which are hazardous to the public (Grandjean et al 2011 ; Ellegaard and Wallin 2013 ). A recent project has been launched which examines book contents in entirety via analysis of n-grams (Michel et al 2011 ).…”

Toward a Global Understanding of Chemical Pollution: A First Comprehensive Analysis of National and Regional Chemical Inventories

“…A stronger link between chemicals on the global market and chemical pollution in the environment needs to be established. It may entail a wide range of coordinated activities, inter alia: (i) developing guidance on and fostering standardized reporting of chemical information by everyone (including by using common chemical identifiers) to ensure easy access to reliable information for the same chemicals; (ii) developing environmental and biomonitoring programs using information available for chemicals on the global market, e.g. by scaling up previous studies; , (iii) advancing and applying high-throughput and in silico tools and guidance to fill in information and knowledge gaps in order to allow screening and prioritization of chemical pollutants using information on chemicals on the global market; and (iv) enhancing the understanding of mixture effects, particularly developing a better understanding of field effects from laboratory testing.…”

Improving the Quality of Literature Reviews in Chemistry: Tools and Techniques

“…In addition, different resources deal with chemical data in different ways; this has implications on how to approach building a search strategy, especially in terms of what resource to use and what is the most effective entry point to retrieve information. For instance, chemical names in SciFinder are “mapped” to CAS RN (and structure), but Web of Science uses the name as found in the title, abstract, or keywords of the document . For in-depth information on structure and reaction searches, we refer to the excellent chapters published in Chemical Information for Chemists: A Primer .…”