EUROSPEC the international spectroscopic data bank and archive project

An EU funded project started on January 1 ^st 2002 will develop an electronic database and archive for spectroscopic and other associated data from peer reviewed publications and other scientific literature. The project will run initially for three years and develop electronic data submission protocols in close collaboration with the major scientific publishers and authors. This database and archive project addresses the massive deficit in the size of the reference quality spectroscopic data currently available to the analytical community. The largest electronic collections of analytical data represent 1 % or less of the known chemical structures. It is estimated that as many spectra are recorded in industrial and academic laboratories in a single day as are contained in the largest electronic analytical databases. Nearly all of these spectra are discarded or are unavailable, even to those who acquired them. The up-to-date numbers of chemical substance registrations has now passed 35 million (see figure 1).