Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (chemistry)

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Contents 1 Any objections? 2 Discussion on adopting the draft MOS as official 3 Centralized discussion 3.1 General section/skeleton 3.2 Nomenclature 3.2.1 Deuterium (D) and Tritium (T) vs. 2H and 3H 3.2.2 Isotope labeling in prose 3.3 Structure drawing 3.4 References and external links 3.5 Compounds 3.6 Compound classes 3.7 Reactions 3.7.1 Multiple lines 3.7.2 Reaction versus chemical reaction article 4 Styleguide of the WP:Chem 5 Safety 6 Another one to merge? 7 Intermediate versus reactive intermediate? 8 Some reaction guidelines. 9 Need chembox for ions?

[edit] Any objections?

...to sticking the "Wikipedia style guidelines" cat on this page? Even though you guys are still developing it, you've clearly done a lot more work that many other pages that name themselves "Manual of Style" and are in the style guidelines cat. - Dan Dank55 (talk)(mistakes) 02:52, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Discussion on adopting the draft MOS as official

I made Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (chemistry)/draft (redlinked) redirect to this page, so we can keep discussion together. Please give your opinions and suggestions on the draft MOS? Cheers, Walkerma (talk) 02:42, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

I wrote some guidelines for multiple equations as well as nuclear chemistry. The only thing I'm not sure is linking for nuclear reactions. I would suggest always linking or never linking, at the authors' discretion. I would also recommend identifying isotopes by Symbol-12 after they've been spelled out once, to save space and improve flow. See Plutonium for an example of what I mean.Headbomb {^ταλκ_{κοντριβς} – WP Physics} 06:28, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Ratified per the lack of dissent, as well as discussion on IRC meeting of 3 March 2009. --Rifleman 82 (talk) 17:50, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Centralized discussion

[edit] General section/skeleton

Discussion about Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style_(chemistry)/draft in general, and Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style_(chemistry)/draft#General

[edit] Nomenclature

Discussion about Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style_(chemistry)/draft/Nomenclature

Need someone to write up this section (Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style_(chemistry)/draft/Nomenclature) Volunteers please? --Rifleman 82 (talk) 18:26, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Deuterium (D) and Tritium (T) vs. ²H and ³H

This one needs to be address, as it is the only element which can change name depending on the isotope.Headbomb {^ταλκ_{κοντριβς} – WP Physics} 17:41, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Discussion imported from User talk:Headbomb

Hi there

I notice your comments on nuclear chemistry/nuclear reactions. Respectfully, I would like to remove the section from the CHEM MOS draft for the moment. We have a huge number of things to grapple with at the time, and since nuclear chemistry is not a particularly pressing issue, I would like to exclude it from discussion for now.

Does WP:Physics have a style guide for that? We will probably defer to them, and that's that? --Rifleman 82 (talk) 18:17, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

WP:PHYS doesn't have any inhouse style, hence why I thought that nuclear chem. should be mentionned on the chem mosnum, and defer to the regular chem guidelines.Headbomb {^ταλκ_{κοντριβς} – WP Physics} 18:31, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Seems like you're the best person for the job. Would you care to write the draft? The issues as I see them are:

• Position of the atomic/mass numbers. Or does it even matter? Most of the time chemists simply write ¹⁸F, and I have yet to see any other style.
• Any preference for 3H or 3T or T; 2H or 2D or D?

I don't think it is so complicated as to require it's own subpage. --Rifleman 82 (talk) 18:44, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Well personally, I prefer ²H and ³H and loathe the deuterium/tritium nomenclature. But I also know chemists like to speak of deuterated molecules and whatnot. Me deciding on that aspect of nomenclature would be placing myself in shoes that are way too big for me. I'm moving this to the MOSCHEM talk page, so all others can benefit from this discussion.Headbomb {^ταλκ_{κοντριβς} – WP Physics} 19:36, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

As for the subpage, I only placed one because it seemed customary to place one (all sections had a /Subpage link, some red ,some blue).Headbomb {^ταλκ_{κοντριβς} – WP Physics} 19:42, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

The use of CDCl₃, MeOD, DMSO-d₆ is common in the literature. --Rifleman 82 (talk) 20:17, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Is D and T more common or less common than ²H and ³H in your opinion?Headbomb {^ταλκ_{κοντριβς} – WP Physics} 05:06, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

IMO? ²H is (almost?) never encountered; it is always labelled D. This is the most significant, because of its NMR/kinetics applications. I rarely encounter tritium, I am not in a position to comment. --Rifleman 82 (talk) 12:09, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Well tritium has this ridiculously low lifetime/halflife, so that's probably why you don't see it much. I've only really seen it in astrophysics and stellar nucleosynthesis or in table of isotopes (usually as ³H, but probably because it's listed next to other isotopes such as ¹H/²H/³H rather than H/D/T). So basically you could get away with using D or ²H pretty much everywhere but in the element infobox. And yeah, deuterium's all over the place in NMR. I chuckle everytime I hear chem undergrads freak out that their NMR spectra are all screwed up and they can't figure out why.Headbomb {^ταλκ_{κοντριβς} – WP Physics} 12:20, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Isotope labeling in prose

Using the form ²³⁹Pu in equations is a no brainer for me but can become cumbersome and hard to read in prose. I therefore prefer forms such as plutonium-239 and Pu-239 in prose b/c it is easier to read and type. What does everybody else think? Compare the below two examples:

The longest-lived isotopes of plutonium are Pu-244, with a half-life of 80.8 million years, Pu-242, with a half-life of 373,300 years, and Pu-239, with a half-life of 24,110 years.

vs

The longest-lived isotopes of plutonium are ²⁴⁴Pu, with a half-life of 80.8 million years, ²⁴²Pu, with a half-life of 373,300 years, and ²³⁹Pu, with a half-life of 24,110 years.

The second example requires the reader to jump back and forth each time an isotope is mentioned to properly construct the natural-sounding name of the isotope. The first example flows more smoothly and, IMO, is in better compliance with WP:COMMONNAME and WP:ACCESSIBLE. --mav (talk) 16:57, 15 March 2009 (UTC)

Personally I greatly prefer Pu-239 over ²³⁹Pu in prose. Much more readable. Headbomb {^ταλκ_{κοντριβς} – WP Physics} 10:25, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

I don't think we should be encouraging forms such as Pu-239: just look at the length of the disambiguation page for C-12, for example. Spelling out element names in prose where possible, instead of using symbols, seems by far the most preferable to me. Physchim62 (talk) 13:58, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Ambiguity is context dependent. That said, I think a good compromise would be to use the full form 'carbon-12 (C-12)' the first time an isotope is mentioned in an article and 'C-12' thereafter. --mav (talk) 22:49, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Structure drawing

Discussion about Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style_(chemistry)/draft/Structure_drawing

I've tidied up Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style_(chemistry)/draft/Structure_drawing, trying to make the guide less verbose. Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style_(chemistry)/draft/Structure_drawing#Uploading_and_copyright needs some work. Apart from that, this has been one of our oldest guides, and has seen little changes. Are we ready to ratify this section? --Rifleman 82 (talk) 18:24, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

[edit] References and external links

Discussion about Wikipedia:Manual of Style (chemistry)/draft/References and external links

[edit] Compounds

Discussion about Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style_(chemistry)/draft/Chemicals

[edit] Compound classes

Discussion about Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style_(chemistry)/draft/Compound classes

[edit] Reactions

Discussion about Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style_(chemistry)/draft#Reactions

[edit] Multiple lines

I've removed "When writing many chemical reactions one after the other, align the elements of the equation by placing them in a table.

CH3COOH			→	CH3CO+	+	OH−
NaCl	+	AgNO3	→	NaNO3	+	AgCl
N2	+	3H2	→	2NH3

Non-trivial reactions should be drawn as images."

The current practice has been simply to stack them up, without attempting tables of any sort. The wikicode is tedious to input, confusing to read, and the output is no better than:

CH₃COOH → CH₃CO⁺ + OH⁻

NaCl + AgNO₃ → NaNO₃ + AgCl

N₂ + 3 H₂ → 2NH₃

--Rifleman 82 (talk) 06:01, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

How about a suggestion that you can do this if you want to go the extra mile, but that this is not mandated?Headbomb {^ταλκ_{κοντριβς} – WP Physics} 06:28, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

I'm still not convinced, but I'll wait for others to weigh in. Where did you get these equations from? They don't make sense! CH3CO+ + OH-!? --Rifleman 82 (talk) 06:55, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

I pulled them out of my ass. I figured that if they were wrong, someone would fix them.Headbomb {^ταλκ_{κοντριβς} – WP Physics} 08:54, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Reaction versus chemical reaction article

Thanks K for your help. I think a distinction needs to be made. Reactions occur in almost all types of articles, so perhaps they should go to "general" for formatting issues, etc. Whereas we have a class of articles which deal with chemical reactions, named or unnamed.

I'm going to change two aspects of K's contribs: images and reactions should be aligned left, per what has been agreed upon; last three sections should be "see also", "references", "external links" per Wikipedia:Layout#.22See_also.22_section. --Rifleman 82 (talk) 00:43, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Styleguide of the WP:Chem

Hi guys, should we include/merge/discuss the advisory styleguide of Chemicals wikiproject here? It has several important and well thought out recommendations for chemicals (and chemistry) articles. Wim van Dorst (talk) 21:47, 28 February 2009 (UTC).

Hi Wim

In fact, Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style_(chemistry)/draft#Compounds and Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style_(chemistry)/draft/Chemicals, and Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style_(chemistry)/draft/References and external links were derived from the Chemicals style guidelines. The intention was to use the chemicals style guidelines to write something more general and encompassing for chemical and chemistry articles, while reducing duplication and overlap. --Rifleman 82 (talk) 03:49, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Safety

I've imported our old guidelines on safety, in the full knowledge that they need revising to bring them up to date with current practice and opinion. Any comments are welcome! Physchim62 (talk) 15:49, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks PC! I've moved "Safety" and "Current events" to main as discussed on IRC. The section being discussed, of course, will supersede this eventually. --Rifleman 82 (talk) 16:31, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Rather than suggest bringing up safety considerations to the talk, how about simply asking the reader to refer to Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style_(chemistry)#Current_events? --Rifleman 82 (talk) 16:39, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I get a general impression that some editors want more guidelines than these. Fortunately, we don't have many "current events" in chemistry. What we do have are a large number of past events and current political debates. We also have areas where individuals are trying to use Wikipedia as a soapbox for their views, and so we need to ensure a reasonable weighting of what we cover. These are the reasons why I would like some more input on the old criteria to see if they fit in with what we're doing now and with what our current editors think. Physchim62 (talk) 17:00, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

I agree that we want to get the safety (and related guidelines) carefully reworked so that we have a fair and thoughtful standard to refer all those that we will revert in the future. Most editors that seek to insert inappropriate safety info are well-intentioned and would listen to the guideliness. We also need to write bearing in mind those anxious to get on a soapbox, to promote conspiracy theories, or have come to the terrifying realization that there are a lot of really nasty chemicals out there. Talk:Sodium fluoride illustrates the kind of issues that we will be dealing with on safety. I will try to look this section over the weekend.--Smokefoot (talk) 18:25, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

There's also an old page I started I while back, Wikipedia:Chemical safety, which is probably better merged in here (with a redirect from that handy hook in the main project space!). Some of the links to safety sources are outdated as well, I will try to fix those asap. Physchim62 (talk) 14:16, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

It might be useful to have a page along the lines of WP:MEDRS as well: medicine has many of the same problems as us, and they have managed to get this accepted by the Community. Physchim62 (talk) 23:34, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Another one to merge?

Is Wikipedia:Molecular structure diagram now redundant to the structure drawing subpage here? Physchim62 (talk) 14:44, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Intermediate versus reactive intermediate?

Do we have a policy for using intermediate versus reactive intermediate in articles? Should such a policy be included in the style guide? My personal preference is reactive intermediate, and I notice that the main article is indeed reactive intermediate. Shanata (talk) 09:18, 15 March 2009 (UTC)

The article title is actually reaction intermediate.

Ben (talk) 12:44, 15 March 2009 (UTC)

Good point, reactive intermediate redirects to reaction intermediate thereby adding a third level of confusion. My understanding is that intermediates are always, importantly, lower in energy than the transition states along the pathway between reactants and products. My question is: should we systematically emphasize that point in chemistry articles by including guidelines about using intermediate versus reactive intermediate in our style guide? Is putting reactive in reactive intermediate redundant? We currently go back and forth between using reactive and not: in aryne, carbanion, nitrenium ion, resonance (chemistry), and many more we use reactive intermediate. On the other hand, in SN1, Henry Eyring, and others we use intermediate. Worse yet, carbocations are referred to as reactive intermediates in the main article, but as intermediates in the SN1 article (and quite possibly elsewhere). I think that a unified policy designating which to use, or when to use each, would be valuable. Shanata (talk) 15:37, 15 March 2009 (UTC)

What is the situation in the literature? Is intermediate or reactive intermediate more common, or are both used interchangeably?

Ben (talk) 15:47, 15 March 2009 (UTC)

Might I be slightly abrasive here, without wishing to offend either point of view. I, personally, am a reaction intermediate between (glucose + oxygen) and carbon dioxide: but if we take the term at that level it becomes meaningless. The IUPAC term "intermediate" usually implies an intermediate which is short-lived on a human timescale, but has flexibility. It is obviously different from the term "transition state". The former ("intermediate") is defined as a local minimum; the latter ("transition state") is defined as a local maximum. So what, I ask myself, is a so-called "reactive intermediate": how does it differ from a normal intermediate? Physchim62 (talk) 21:30, 15 March 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Some reaction guidelines.

Hello WPChem,

I've been on an *extended* wikibreak, but Walkerma asked me to write a bit about reactions. So I did. In the great wiki tradition, if you like it, keep it. Otherwise, change it. I'll check back in a week or two.

~K (talk) 22:42, 15 March 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Need chembox for ions?

While trying to cleanup ammonium, I added a Chembox to it, only to discover that Chemboxes seem to be tailored for actual compounds, not ions, and that most ion articles do not have Chemboxes. Should articles on ions have Chemboxes or not?—Tetracube (talk) 19:23, 20 May 2009 (UTC)