Linking Molecular Structure via Functional Group to Chemical Literature for Establishing a Reaction Lineage for Application to Alternatives Assessment

The evaluation of potential alternatives for chemicals of concern (CoC) requires an understanding of their potential human health and environmental impacts during the manufacture, use, recycle, and disposal life stages. During the manufacturing phase, the processes used to produce a desired chemical are defined based on the sequence of chemical reactions and unit operations required to produce the molecule and separate it from other materials used or produced during its manufacture. This Article introduces and demonstrates a tool that links a chemical's structure to information about its synthesis route and the manufacturing process for that chemical. The structure of the chemical is entered using either a SMILES string or molecule MOL file, and the molecule is searched to identify functional groups present. On the basis of those functional groups present, the respective named reactions that can be used in its synthesis routes are identified. This information can be used to identify input and output materials for each named reaction, along with reaction conditions, solvents, and catalysts that participate in the reaction. Additionally, the reaction database contains links to Internet references and appropriate reaction-specific keywords, further increasing its comprehensiveness. The tool is designed to facilitate the cataloging and use of the chemical literature in a way that allows user to identify and evaluate information about the reactions, such as alternative solvents, catalysts, reaction conditions, and other reaction products which enable the comparison of various reaction pathways for the manufacture of the subject chemical. The chemical manufacturing processing steps can be linked to a chemical process ontology to estimate releases and exposures occurring during the manufacturing phase of a chemical.