On 30 July the RSC, with Waterstone's bookshop Gower Street London, were delighted to host the launch of John Emsley's highly anticipated book Molecules of Murder: Criminal Molecules and Classic Cases. John Emsley is a great science communicator, best known for his series of highly readable books about everyday chemistry. His latest book looks at 10 toxic molecules, discusses their chemistry and effects in humans, and re-examines their deliberate misuse in high profile murder cases. 

At the book launch, guests were joined by two actors in Victorian costume, posing as the murderer and victim from Chapter 2 of the book: Hyoscine and the Murder of Belle Elmore (Mrs Crippen). The infamous Edwardian killer Dr Crippen poisoned his wife, Belle Elmore, then dissected and buried her under the cellar floor. The victim was a minor celebrity noted for her flamboyant clothing, and had appeared at music halls around the country at that time. The two came to life in the basement of Waterstone's bookshop, and intrigued guests with spine chilling tales of poison and murder!

John Emsley signed copies of the book, described his reasons for embarking on the project and then read a piece of the work. Guests reading the book for the first time were interested to find out about other murder cases, such as the use of ricin in a rolled umbrella to assassinate Georgi Markov 30 years ago, and most recently the murder of Alexander Litvinenko in London by polonium. Molecules of Murder is a gripping read with appeal to chemists and non-chemists alike. Anyone with an interest in popular science and crime will be enthralled by this exciting new book.

It was an action-packed few days at the ACS Fall 2008 National Meeting in Philadelphia. The first print issue of Energy & Environmental Science generated a lot of interest, with its impressive range of articles on solar cells, hybrid fuel cells, hydrogen storage, biofuel production, sustainable energy, and more. Integrative Biology  and Metallomics, the two new journals launching in 2009, were in the spotlight and grabbed the attention of many visitors to the RSC booth. RSC Publishing staff were on hand as people signed up for journal e-alerts, hoping to win a solar-powered charger for mobile devices. The book sale proved popular, and authors John Emsley (Molecules of Murder) and Stephen Beckett (The Science of Chocolate) signed copies of their recent books for an appreciative audience. Other activities included stimulating talks on science writing and chocolate - and the arrival of cookies, cakes and other goodies, gave everyone a chance to boost their energy levels!

The RSC Reception, held at a nearby Philadelphia hotel, gave assembled guests the opportunity to hear from RSC President Dave Garner about developments across the whole of the RSC, including how the RSC Roadmap will shape future RSC strategy.

Walk through an enhanced online journal article and discover the wealth of additional information available to you using our new RSC Prospect User Guide. RSC Prospect is the award-winning service that structures the science within our journal articles.

Our user-friendly guide shows you how to make the most of our enhanced articles by demonstrating all of the special features available to you, including:

- biomedical terms linked to definitions and related papers

- RSS feeds containing biomedical terms and compound structures

- hyperlinked compound information in text

- downloadable compound structures

- searching for articles by compound structure

Each step is illustrated with screenshots taken from actual enhanced articles and a glossary of terms helps you get to grips with new terminology.