Formal & Natural Sciences
Chemistry
The science of substances, their transformations, and the bonds that make matter interesting.
10 fields · 84 topics · 10 curated works
Fields within Chemistry
Physical Chemistry
10The physical laws underneath chemical behaviour.
Chemical Bonding · Thermochemistry · Chemical Kinetics · Chemical Equilibrium · Quantum Chemistry
Organic Chemistry
11Carbon compounds and the logic of building them on purpose.
Structure & Nomenclature · Reaction Mechanisms · Stereochemistry · Functional Group Transformations · Pericyclic Reactions
Inorganic Chemistry
8Everything that is not built around a carbon skeleton.
Periodic Trends · Coordination Chemistry · Crystal & Ligand Field Theory · Organometallic Chemistry · Main Group Chemistry
Analytical Chemistry
9Determining what is in a sample, and how much.
Chromatography · Mass Spectrometry · NMR Spectroscopy · Infrared & Raman Spectroscopy · X-ray Diffraction
Biochemistry
9The chemistry that living systems run on.
Protein Structure & Folding · Enzyme Kinetics & Catalysis · Nucleic Acid Chemistry · Lipids & Membranes · Carbohydrate Chemistry
Materials Chemistry
9Designing substances for a property you specify in advance.
Polymer Chemistry · Ceramics & Glasses · Nanomaterials · Composite Materials · Semiconductor Materials
Medicinal & Pharmaceutical Chemistry
7Turning molecules into drugs.
Drug Design · Structure-Activity Relationships · Pharmacophores · Prodrugs & Delivery · Combinatorial Chemistry
Environmental & Green Chemistry
8Chemistry judged by what it leaves behind.
Atmospheric Chemistry · Water Chemistry · Soil Chemistry · Pollutant Fate & Transport · Atom Economy
Nuclear & Radiochemistry
6Chemistry where the nucleus itself is the reagent.
Radioisotopes · Radiochemical Separation · Nuclear Fuel Cycle · Radiopharmaceuticals · Radiation Chemistry
History of Chemistry
7From alchemy to the periodic table to the synthesis of everything.
Alchemy · The Chemical Revolution · Discovery of the Elements · Mendeleev & the Periodic Table · Rise of Synthetic Chemistry
Reading in Chemistry
10Start here
No prior grounding assumed.
- BookThe Periodic TablePrimo Levi, 1975
Twenty-one chapters named for elements, by a chemist who survived Auschwitz — on matter as something that resists you and therefore teaches you.
- BookThe Machinery of LifeDavid S. Goodsell, 1993
Draws the interior of a cell accurately to scale, so molecular crowding stops being an abstraction and starts constraining how you think.
Then
Assumes you know the vocabulary.
- BookQuantitative Chemical AnalysisDaniel C. Harris, 1982
The standard analytical text, and unusually careful about error, calibration and what a measurement is actually entitled to claim.
- BookAn Introduction to Medicinal ChemistryGraham L. Patrick, 1995
Follows a drug from target to molecule to clinic, which makes clear how much of pharmacology is constrained by synthesis.
- BookGreen Chemistry: Theory and PracticePaul Anastas & John Warner, 1998
Sets out twelve principles for designing waste out of a synthesis rather than treating it afterwards, and founded the field that follows them.
Go deeper
Primary sources and full treatments.
- BookThe Nature of the Chemical BondLinus Pauling, 1939
Applies quantum mechanics to bonding — resonance, hybridisation, electronegativity — and makes chemistry follow from physics rather than from rules.
- ReportRadioactive SubstancesMarie Curie, 1903
The doctoral thesis that isolated polonium and radium and established radioactivity as a property of the atom rather than of a compound.
- BookSolid State Chemistry and its ApplicationsAnthony R. West, 1984
Connects crystal structure to the electrical, magnetic and optical behaviour that makes a material worth manufacturing.
- BookInorganic ChemistryShriver & Atkins, 1990
Organises the whole periodic table around structure, bonding and symmetry rather than treating each element as a separate fact.
- BookOrganic ChemistryClayden, Greeves & Warren, 2001
Teaches reactions as electron movement rather than transformations to memorise, which is the difference between predicting chemistry and reciting it.