Biomedical Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
entities to chemical structures using a series of name-to-structure conversion
tools, SureChem has delivered a database integrated to nearly 10 million indi-
vidual chemical structures. The free-access online portal allows scientists to
search the system based on structure, substructure, or similarity of structure
as well as the text-based searching expected for patent inquiries.
22.2.4
Wikipedia
Wikipedia [18] is an unprecedented success story in the domain of community
intellectual contribution and crowdsourcing. For chemistry it represents an
important shift in terms of the future access of information associated with
small molecules. A wiki is a type of computer software allowing users to easily
create, edit, and link Web pages (see also Chapters 5 and 28). A wiki enables
documents to be written collaboratively, in a simple markup language using a
Web browser, and is essentially a database for creating, browsing, and search-
ing information. For small molecules on Wikipedia each one generally has a
drug box or a chemical infobox. The drug box shows a chemical structure, one
or more chemical names or identifi ers, links out to related resources, chemical
and pharmacokinetic data, and therapeutic considerations. At present there
are approximately 10,000 articles with a chembox or drugbox and more are
added on a regular basis. The detailed information offered on Wikipedia
regarding a particular chemical or drug can be excellent [19] or weak in the
case of stub articles [20].
There are many dedicated supporters and contributors to the quality of the
online resource. This community curation process makes Wikipedia a very
important online chemistry resource whose impact will only expand with time.
The author of this chapter is part of a dedicated team that has worked on
validating and curating Wikipedia chemical compound pages for over two
years [21], though this work is never complete, as will be shown later in this
chapter. ChemSpider is the only online public compound database that directly
provides a mash-up of the Wikipedia article into its compound pages, thereby
making Wikipedia structure and substructure searchable via a ChemSpider
search.
22.2.5
Community Wikis and Blogs
As described in detail in Chapter 5, an increasing number of scientists have
an urge to communicate either their own science or science in general, com-
monly with the intention of educating others, proliferating data or opinions,
or connecting with others for the purpose of collaboration or advice. There is
an increasing interest in using Web-based software tools to speed communica-
tion. Both wikis and blogs are fast becoming chosen platforms for the exchange
of information between many scientists [22].
A blog, or weblog, is a website where entries are written in chronological
order and generally provide commentary or news on a particular subject (see
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