Overview
The Chemistry collection supports active research in Penn's Chemistry Department and is not a historic collection; therefore, the major thrusts of the collection may change slightly over time as the research program evolves. In general, however, we collect in the broad areas of organic, inorganic, physical, theoretical, and biological chemistry, with additional material that supports important analytical techniques used by our researchers.
Collection description
The University's core collection in chemistry is located in the Chemistry Library, which is housed on the fifth floor of the Chemistry Department building at 231 S. 34th Street. The collection includes over 200 current journal subscriptions and has full runs of most of the English-language core journals in chemistry. The monographs provide a good working collection for the Chemistry Department's primary research interests, and the monograph collection is especially strong in organic synthesis and natural products chemistry. Materials that support the study of chemistry are also found in other locations across campus, as is indicated below.
Related collections
Doing research
Searching for chemical information can be challenging. Primary research is published as journal articles and dissertations, as well as being protected in the patent literature. Secondary search tools allow one to discover relevant information through text-based searching by keyword and controlled vocabulary, numeric searching for property values and ranges, and structure and substructure searching for substances and reactions. Please see the Chemistry Library home page for a list of selected search tools, and contact Judith Currano (currano@pobox.upenn.edu) if you have questions about finding a particular piece of information or doing an exhaustive search of the literature on a topic.
Research guides
Services
Contact Judith Currano (currano@pobox.upenn.edu) for assistance using the Chemistry collection or to suggest additions to the collection.
