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CAS Chemical Safety Library™
Access a free database of hazardous reaction information from global academic, industry, and government institutions to enhance chemical safety in your laboratory.
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About the CAS Chemical Safety Library
The CAS Chemical Safety Library is a repository for the scientific community to capture and confidentially share hazardous reaction information from real-world laboratory experiences to reduce and prevent incidents. Information in the library is publicly available and uploaded to PubChem.
The repository is overseen by an advisory panel made up of experts from CAS, ACS, and academic, industry, and non-profit organizations worldwide.
Prior to September 1, 2023, the Chemical Safety Library was created and maintained by Pistoia Alliance.
The use of dangerous chemicals in the laboratory can lead to major risks. To prevent related disasters, hazardous reaction incident information must be shared across the global research community. With the CAS Chemical Safety Library:
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Chemical Safety Library timeline
Fall 2016
A presentation by Mark Manfredi (Bristol Myers Squibb) at ACS Fall 2016, “Ensuring That Lessons Learned Are Not Forgotten, Leveraging ELN to Transform the Safety Paradigm”, inspired the idea for a simple crowd-sourced hazardous reaction data collection system. Further championed by Ramesh Durvasula (Lilly), the Pistoia Alliance led the development of the Chemical Safety Library.
Spring 2017
Hazardous reaction information from Bristol Myers Squibb was added to the Pistoia Alliance Chemical Safety Library, which was then expanded through datathons, hackathons, and data extraction from C&EN Safety Letters and other sources.
Winter 2018 - Spring 2020
A simplified submission system helped the Pistoia Alliance Chemical Safety Library reach 138 records. Data was made available to users through .csv file requests and the entire library was shared with PubChem (National Library of Medicine).
Summer 2020 - Spring 2024
CAS began hosting the Pistoia Alliance Chemical Safety Library and established the Advisory Panel, chaired by Carmen Nitsche (The Cambridge Crystallographic Data Centre) and Mark Manfredi (Bristol Myers Squibb) to drive future development. A strategic partnership with the Campus Safety, Health, and Environmental Management Association (CSHEMA) was also established and extended outreach to academia. A reusable data collection protocol (Chemical Safety Library in a Box) was developed through data mining projects with Purdue University and the University of Minnesota.
Spring 2024
Chemical Safety Library in a Box was deployed at UCLA and promoted at CSHEMA Safety Week. In March, a datathon was hosted at ACS Spring 2024 to expand the information collection. The resource was officially renamed “CAS Chemical Safety Library” after ownership was transferred from the Pistoia Alliance to CAS. Today, the CAS Chemical Safety Library includes more than 500 records.
CAS Chemical Safety Library™ Advisory Panel
The CAS Chemical Safety Library is overseen by an advisory panel of experts from CAS and others in the commercial, academic, and non-profit sectors.
The CAS Chemical Safety Library Advisory Panel also recognizes contributions from:
For questions about the CAS Chemical Safety Library, email csladvisorypanel@cas.org.
