22 ms·

Chemical Calligraphy [pdf]

34 points by elkingtowa 12y ago

ttflee 12y ago
Awesome. Reminds me of those ancient alchemical symbols. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alchemical_symbol http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alchemical_symbol
dekhn 12y ago
he left out the conjugated bonds in all the examples; for example, cyclohexane and benzene would be identically represented.
- ttflee 12y ago
  Chirality is missing as well.
  - crasterx 12y ago
    Molecular formula does not include bonds or chirality either It is ambiguous in some ways, some of which could be easily fixed (should be plenty of ways of adding bond strength) Pretty much all chemical notation is ambiguous is one way or another. Even full standard notation, no matter how hard it tries, can be ambiguous (even though it attempts to conserve stereo-chemistry, if the molecule is big enough information can be lost and impossible to represent all at once) 3D information is impossible to be fully represented in 2D no matter how hard you try
    - zwegner 12y ago
      > 3D information is impossible to be fully represented in 2D no matter how hard you try Nit: it is possible. Maybe not in a simple human-readable way, but there are mappings, such as [0]. A simple example is representing a 2D bitmap image as a 1D string of bits, which could easily be generalized to 3D as well. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space-filling_curves https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space-filling_curves
- twic 12y ago
  In another document [1], the author writes: The Dscript principle can be extended beyond alphabetical language. It can also be used as a 2D notation system. By using the letters to represent elements for example, a chemistry notation system can be devised. The first attempt at such is Dchem, a chemistry notation system geared toward bio-chemistry and bio-molecule notation. Dchem sacrifices stereo-chemistry, bond strength, and hydrogen's. Leaving out the hydrogens is entirely reasonable; standard organic graphical notation does it too. Leaving out stereochemistry is fine for a lot of uses, and it could easily be tacked on to this notation when needed. But leaving out bond strength is madness. A singly-bonded carbon and a double-bonded carbon are enormously different things; a notation which doesn't distinguish them simply doesn't let you express organic chemistry. Other than that, though, this notation is beautiful and fun! [1] http://dscript.org/dscript.pdf http://dscript.org/dscript.pdf

34 points by elkingtowa 12y ago

Awesome. Reminds me of those ancient alchemical symbols. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alchemical_symbol http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alchemical_symbol

dekhn 12y ago

he left out the conjugated bonds in all the examples; for example, cyclohexane and benzene would be identically represented.

ttflee 12y ago
Chirality is missing as well.
- crasterx 12y ago
  Molecular formula does not include bonds or chirality either It is ambiguous in some ways, some of which could be easily fixed (should be plenty of ways of adding bond strength) Pretty much all chemical notation is ambiguous is one way or another. Even full standard notation, no matter how hard it tries, can be ambiguous (even though it attempts to conserve stereo-chemistry, if the molecule is big enough information can be lost and impossible to represent all at once) 3D information is impossible to be fully represented in 2D no matter how hard you try
  - zwegner 12y ago
    > 3D information is impossible to be fully represented in 2D no matter how hard you try Nit: it is possible. Maybe not in a simple human-readable way, but there are mappings, such as [0]. A simple example is representing a 2D bitmap image as a 1D string of bits, which could easily be generalized to 3D as well. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space-filling_curves https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space-filling_curves
twic 12y ago
In another document [1], the author writes: The Dscript principle can be extended beyond alphabetical language. It can also be used as a 2D notation system. By using the letters to represent elements for example, a chemistry notation system can be devised. The first attempt at such is Dchem, a chemistry notation system geared toward bio-chemistry and bio-molecule notation. Dchem sacrifices stereo-chemistry, bond strength, and hydrogen's. Leaving out the hydrogens is entirely reasonable; standard organic graphical notation does it too. Leaving out stereochemistry is fine for a lot of uses, and it could easily be tacked on to this notation when needed. But leaving out bond strength is madness. A singly-bonded carbon and a double-bonded carbon are enormously different things; a notation which doesn't distinguish them simply doesn't let you express organic chemistry. Other than that, though, this notation is beautiful and fun! [1] http://dscript.org/dscript.pdf http://dscript.org/dscript.pdf