Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Chemistry/archive07

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Archive This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

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Molecule

This article hasn't been claimed by either Wikiproject Chemistry or Physics. Is there a reason for this? youngvalter 02:06, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

Bduke has planted the {{Chemistry}} flag! Physchim62 (talk) 09:24, 6 November 2006 (UTC)
I did not even know it existed until it came up on the Physics Project page! I'll try to improve it, but I am tied up on organising a conference that is in 10 days!! --Bduke 12:05, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

Peer review of Cyclol

Hi all, I'm thinking of submitting Cyclol to be a featured article candidate and I'd really appreciate your suggestions and insights before I do that. Strictly speaking, the topic is more biochemistry than chemistry, but it might interest some of you here nonetheless. Thanks for your help! :) Willow 17:54, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

  • just added simply the peerreviewers output to its Talk page, with lots of non-chemical recommendations. And I added a short chemical recommendation of my own. Seems definitely like it is going somewhere! Keep up the good work. Wim van Dorst (Talk) 00:18, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
    • I would go for peer review. It is not FA standard yet, and needs quite a bit of copy-editing, but it would be useful to get the opinions of non-chemists in further improvements. You need to take particular care with the section on "Cyclos and the scientific method", as there is more than one PoV as to what is the scientific method! (not everyone agrees that Popper is the last word on the philosophy of science...) Physchim62 (talk) 08:22, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
Thanks, those are all good suggestions! I'll try to fix those up today or tomorrow and then submit for peer review. The "scientific method" part was indeed tricky to write, but I think it's a valuble part of the article for our readers. I've found analogous passages in the Britannica as well, so I don't feel too guilty. ;) Willow 19:52, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
I never said to pull the scientific method completely! However, I can guess your PoV from the way it's written, which is not ideal for an article. I will see if I can make a few more concrete suggestions on the article talk page. Physchim62 (talk) 10:04, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

Possibly relevant Admin vote

An excellent editor of scientific articles, Opabinia regalis, is being considered for adminship. Her work has primarily been in biochemistry, but she is broadly educated and scientifically discerning, which could catalyze the development of science articles on Wikipedia. Please support her candidacy, if you feel as I do that she would an excellent administrator. Willow 19:45, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

...and stop by Femto's RFA also while you're there. --Ed (Edgar181) 20:11, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

Portal

Hi everybody, I was feeling bold, so I made some small changes to the portal. Feel free to yell at me tell me what you think about them; I've made some suggestions on the portal talkpage which would probably need to help of more experienced contributors to carry out. Thanks! riana_dzasta 10:55, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your edits to Portal:Chemistry! --HappyCamper 16:12, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
Thanks, here as well as at Portal talk:Chemistry. All constructive edits are welcome at the portal—otherwise it will die from lack of use! Physchim62 (talk) 17:36, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
Hey, I left a message on the portal talk page 3 days ago about changes I made in my sandbox, but no reply! Oh well... I went ahead and implemented them on the main page. Feel free to tell me if they're really bad... :) riana_dzasta 03:53, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Cyclol is now a FAC

Hi all, you were great in the scientific peer review of Cyclol — thanks! I tried to make the changes that you recommended and I submitted it this morning to be a featured article candidate. So if you have other helpful criticisms — or unabashed Support ;) — now's the time to write! Thanks again, Willow 22:45, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

List of enatiomeric crystals...

Hello everyone - I came across something while reading Louis Pasteur's accomplishments which suggested that there are exactly 9 compounds from which enatiomeric crystals can be formed which are big enough to separate with the naked eye. Does anyone know what these nine compounds are? --HappyCamper 01:44, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Well tartaric acid is obviously one! I am more than sceptical about this claim—whose crystal growth techniques, whose naked eye? The number of potential candiades is infinite, maybe only nine have actually been observed... Physchim62 (talk) 08:08, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
I think 1,1-binaphthol may be one, I read a paper (years ago) on its crystals being separated. Walkerma 08:16, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
In the Pasteur expt, a solution of the racemic acid yielded macroscopic crystals that were each optically pure, a spontaneous separation in a sense, instead of each crystal being composed of a mixture of enantiomeric molecules. That's more (maybe lots more?) of a trick than just being able to grow a giant single-enantiomer crystal starting from a single enantiomer in solution. DMacks 08:26, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
Agree completely: in the case of Pasteur's experiment it only worked because of a cold spell in Paris (the equilibrium temperature between the enantiomeric and racemic crystal forms is around 23 °C, from memory). I still think it is going a bit far to say that there are exactly nine compounds where the enantiomeric crystals are more stable (at which temperature?): it is not as if we are talking of platonic solids here! Physchim62 (talk) 08:52, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
Everything there, except the original Pasteur exeriment, involves doing something to promote one enantiomer to crystalize preferentially or somesuch, no "spontaneous resolution". Do tartaric acid crystals have macroscopic mirror-image shapes, or is the only detectable difference their optical activity? DMacks 17:55, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
  • The question is: when will a racemate crystallize in a chiral space group instead of an achiral (centric or acentric) one, and the paper to read is J. Donohue, Acta Cryst. (1985). A41, 203-4. DOI Turns out that some 30 % of known crystals are chiral. This is an overestimate, of course, as any enantiopure compounds will crystallize in a chiral space group. So, no, one would guess that there are more than nine compounds that can be separated mechanically. Dr Zak 19:43, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

wikEd formula formatter

The wikEdlogo

wikEd is a Wikipedia editing extension that has an integrated tool to wikify chemical formulas with one click:

Before After
h2o H2O
C8H10N4O2 C8H10N4O2
2 Na+ + OH- + H2SO4 --> 2 H2O + Na2SO4 2Na+ + OH- + H2SO4 → 2H2O + Na2SO4

Other features include: • pasting formatted text, e.g. from MS-Word (including tables) • converting the formatted text to wikicode • wikicode syntax highlighting • regular expression search and replace • server-independent Show preview and Show changes • fullscreen editing mode • single-click fixing of common mistakes • history for summary, search, and replace fields • and much, much more.

For a full feature list and installation instructions see the wikEd homepage and the wikEd help page. wikEd works only for Mozilla Firefox and other Mozilla browsers and is installed simply by pasting a single line to your Wikipedia User:Username/monobook.js page.

Cacycle 16:39, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

This looks very nice! I'll have to try it soon. Thanks, I know you've been working on this a long time. Walkerma 17:21, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Article request - Organocatalysis

Hope this is not out of place. I think this topic is quite important but it is only mentioned in Homochirality and On water reaction, without a full topic of its own. Anyone can chip in? --Rifleman 82 20:02, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Sadly not, but its an important topic, anyway even catalysis, which is a broader concept, needs a lot of work Knights who say ni 00:06, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Titanium on FAR

This popped up on my watchlist, people should know that Titanium is undergoing Featured article review, which means it may lose its FA status if issues aren't resolved. Please take a look at the comments here, these seem reasonable. Perhaps we can beef up this article and save it? Walkerma 04:15, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Titanium is up for a featured article review. Detailed concerns may be found here. Please leave your comments and help us address and maintain this article's featured quality. Sandy (Talk) 14:56, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Article request

Here is one article that didn't exist on Wikipedia until fairly recently: rubber policeman... --HappyCamper 01:26, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

Lux-Flood acid-base definitions

This is something I have not encountered before: Lux-Flood acid-base definitions. Does anyone here know more about this? --HappyCamper 22:42, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

Apparently its a theory for solids at high temperature: acids are those specied that accept O2 anions into their 3D net and bases give O2 anions. For example CaO + SiO2 → CaSiO3 CaO is a base and SiO2 an acid Knights who say ni 23:13, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
Related to that: Usanovich acids and bases. Haven't encountered it ever in real life, only in textbooks, though.
Thanks. I've never encountered these definitions before so makes them quite interesting. --HappyCamper 15:43, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

Aldol reaction on FAC

Hope no one minds that Aldol reaction is now up as a featured article candidate. Everybody please weigh in! Dr Zak 19:05, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

Strange set of articles

Extraordinary claims and shares to sell. IMHO. Perhaps someone want to comment on the possibility of water electrolysis producing atomic oxygen and hydrogen and the alleged properties of this mixtures.

Pjacobi 20:20, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

My God. Normally the extra energy comes from one of the electrodes that is getting dissolved. It may be worth having one article about that particular canard (since it is regrettably a popular canard), but where does one find reliable sources?! Dr Zak 20:36, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
I don't know whether it will count as reliable source, but I'd assume best critical coverage is found here:
Pjacobi 20:52, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

We've got an article on the water fuel cell, too. The name of Michael Laughton at QMW is mentioned there, saying that he reviewed the contraption. Well, I asked him about this way back, and yes, he did review the thing. He also pointed out to the inventor where the extra energy came from (the article doesn't mention that!), upon which Stanley Meyer got very angry and marched off steaming. Dr Zak 21:02, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

  • I am very dissapointed to see brown's gas up again for deletion after it was decided on 19 August 2006 to keep the article as a result of the original nomination. I did participate in the discussion on the first nomination and I am not going to participate again. The Wiki rules apparantly do allow this sort of thing. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by V8rik (talkcontribs) .
    • But do we really need four or more different articles on the same piece of pseudoscience? As you said in the previous AfD, there is a place in Wikipedia for popular pseudoscience topics, but what is at Brown's gas isn't the article on the subject. (That's what I said in the present AfD.) I'd vote to redirect all of these to water fuel cell because at least that article is salvageable. Dr Zak 22:08, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
This WikiProject wasn't set up to help resolve edit disputes really. --HappyCamper 23:55, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
Can anybody find references from a peer reviewed journal or something like that? None are given in the article and it sounds like pseudoscience to me Knights who say ni 00:31, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

Chiral synthesis

I've created a new template for chiral synthesis:

The intent is to group the main concepts relating to chiral synthesis together, to show connectivity, rather than looking at each topic piecemeal. There are currently several redlinks and a redirect link. I think the presence of the redlink will cause the article to be created eventually.

I've added these to the See also sections of the various articles. Are there any comments, + or -, about the suitability, etc? Reason I'm asking is that the template from crystallization, and I wonder if there are any other objections, etc. --Rifleman 82 15:14, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

Stablepedia

Beginning cross-post.

See Wikipedia talk:Version 1.0 Editorial Team#Stablepedia. If you wish to comment, please comment there. TWO YEARS OF MESSEDROCKER 03:40, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

End cross-post. Please do not comment more in this section.

List of chemical compounds with unusual names

I do not see any of the chemists involved with Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of chemical compounds with unusual names . The page List_of_chemical_compounds_with_unusual_names complies with Wikipedia:Unusual_articles so not against Wiki policies. Although the page is not original, at times childish it is relevant to how chemists name their chemicals and I do not want to leave it to the non-chemists to make the decision V8rik 21:30, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

Lipscomb rules for boranes

Hi wikichemistry community, i have been trying to look up for Lipscomb rules on inorganic chemistry to understanding the nature of the chemical structure of boranes, but it seems nobody has written an article on such a subject. I would deeply appreciate someone can summarize or adding at least the equations to know the values of p,q,s,t,x,y (involved on boranes structure). By the way, would someone could add the Cleanup tag or Expand on Boranes page?, i found it a little bit short to understand the nature of the boranes. Thanks for reading my query, Cheers :).--HappyApple 03:26, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

  • The stix rules of Lipscomb are obsolete and clumsy. We would be far better served to focus our editing energies on Polyhedral skeletal electron pair theory, which embody some theoretical concepts and are more modern. There is a reason that Lipscomb's rules have been dropped from most textbooks - no one uses it. --Smokefoot 03:41, 27 November 2006 (UTC)