CHIRBASE, A MOLECULAR DATABASE FOR THE SEPARATION OF ENANTIOMERS BY CHROMATOGRAPHY

A selected review on the separation of the stereoisomers of menthol by gas chromatography serves to demonstrate a new approach to tackle the increasing number of publications on enantiomer separation. The graph ical molecular database CHIRBASE covers information (structural, bibli ographic and chromatographic data) on liquid chromatography, supercrit ical fluid chromatography and gas chromatography. CHIRBASE is based on standard database software, thus meeting the requirements of ''state of the art'' information management in the chemical and pharmaceutical industries and academia. The scrutiny required to create and maintain a factual database revealed that the information content of the conte mporary literature with respect to chromatographic data requires impro vement.