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Chemical

The Chemical field contains controlled data on the significant substances and materials systems discussed in source documents. Organic substances are not covered.

Note To display this field on the Search page, review the instructions for Add Another Field.

To search this field:

  1. Enter a substance (using chemical notation) in the left-hand box.

  2. Select a role from the list on the right.

There are three basic roles. Each substance is assigned one of these:
  • element
  • binary system
  • system with 3 or more components
Additionally, any of four special roles may be assigned where appropriate:
  • adsorbate or sorbate
  • dopant
  • interface system
  • surface or substrate

When a substance is assigned one of the special roles, it will also be automatically assigned the appropriate basic role. You have the choice to search for substances with special roles or simply for substances with the appropriate basic roles.

Examples:


Enter NA as an element in the text field.


Enter Cu used as a surface substance or substrate in the text field.


Enter V2D2 as a binary system (that is, a chemical substance containing exactly two elements) in the text field.

Note You cannot combine the names of chemical substances with Boolean operators on the Search page. However, you can use Boolean operators and search for multiple chemical substances in Advanced Search.

Search Tip

The search engine does not differentiate between upper case and lower case letters, and so it treats Co (Cobalt) and CO (Carbon Monoxide) the same. You have to use the roles and rely on the context of your search to distinguish such differences.