The prospects of a new line of research in high-pressure chemistry are disc
ussed, which is associated with investigations of chemical reactions accomp
anied by large volume effects at ambient pressure and, hence, resulting in
greater compressibilities of the reaction products. The compounds formed by
intercalation of alkali metals in graphite and intermetallic compounds for
med between alkali metals and silver or Group V metals (Sb, Pi), which crys
tallize with the BiF3 structural type, are considered as examples of "chemi
cal compression.".