The Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) has announced the release of ChemSpider SyntheticPages^beta - a community resource of reaction synthesis procedures. 

The launch of a beta site is the result of a collaboration between ChemSpider (the foremost and free online structure centric community for chemists) and the original SyntheticPages. The partnership, which sees ChemSpider host the content from SyntheticPages, furthers their jointly held missions: to provide rich, high quality chemistry resources for the synthetic chemistry community. 

A search of ChemSpider SyntheticPages^beta allows identification and detailing of the experimental procedures for the synthesis of specific chemical compounds. The database has been seeded with SyntheticPages.org data and will be expanded by inclusion of data from journal articles published by RSC. Researchers will also be able to deposit their own synthetic procedures to the site. 

Using online semantic markup technologies and integrating to the ChemSpider database will allow interactive display of chemical structures, spectral data and a multitude of related data. Scientists can comment upon a growing resource of interactive synthetic processes, while leveraging the rich resources contained within the ChemSpider databases. 

"We are very pleased to partner with SyntheticPages to provide a reaction database for the community. Students, teachers and researchers will have access to a free, highly curated database of synthetic procedures populated by curated depositions from the community and abstracted from RSC publications" commented Dr Antony Williams, Vice President of Strategic Development, ChemSpider. 

He added "Our editorial board is made up of active synthetic organic chemists including the original founders of SyntheticPages. Their leadership and guidance will mesh our expertise in web-based technologies supporting semantic chemistry with deep knowledge and understanding of synthetic chemistry." 

Professors Kevin Booker-Milburn (University of Bristol), Stephen Caddick (University College London, UCL), Peter Scott (University of Warwick) and Dr Max Hammond are the original founders of SyntheticPages. 

A spokesperson for the group commented "When we started, we believed that there was a place for an interactive database which would allow synthetic chemists who carry out reactions, to find procedures that work. Our aim is to develop a web-based resource that will be on every synthetic chemists' desktop, and will be regularly used by experimentalists over the world. Our early work has set the stage to achieve this goal and we look forward to the collaboration with ChemSpider to develop a resource that will help sustain high quality synthetic chemistry worldwide". 

"We are particularly grateful to CEM Microwave Technology UK without whom we could not have developed SyntheticPages. We are also grateful to our thousands of members and users who have helped sustain the SyntheticPages endeavour and we look forward to even greater success with ChemSpider.'' 

ChemSpider SyntheticPages^beta is released in beta form for feedback from the community.