Getting the Most Out of SciFinder

In order to search SciFinder-n, you are required to register for a SciFinder account.  Access is provided to you by Penn Libraries and CAS, so, this will not cost you anything.  Your account allows you to establish session preferences, create preferred lists of chemical vendors and suppliers, and establish and maintain search alerts.  It also helps CAS to ensure that only Penn affiliates are using Penn's SciFinder and SciFinder-n subscription.  If you had previously created an account while affiliated with another institution, you will need to create a new account using your Penn e-mail address.

To view or change personal information associated with your account, you can access the My CAS Profile page. This is accessible from the SciFinder homepage by clicking on the icon at the top right.

From the CAS Profile, you can change Personal Information, some Institutional Information, Security, and Contact Information associated with your account.

Note: You cannot change your institution from the University of Pennsylvania. If you wish to access SciFinder through another institution, you must make a new account through that institution.

You can edit any of these boxes by pressing the pencil icon in the top right of the box. Also note the option to change your password in the Security box.

SciFinder allows for some personalization of your experience using the search engine, which you can edit through settings. You can access your Settings through the profile icon at the top right.

The Settings page allows you to cater how SciFinder operates according to your preferences.

The options that be adjusted include:

1. Manually Apply Filters: When ON, filters will immediately apply to a search result. When OFF, user input will be required for filters to apply and renew your results.

Note: Turning this setting off will reduce the amount of times SciFinder needs to process and load your query. It is recommended you turn this function on if you want to use many filters and avoid wasting time.

2. Customize Result Filter Order: Set preferences for how the filters appear in the results pages of SciFinder. This can be altered individually for each type of search (Substances, Reactions, References, and Suppliers).

Filters can be dragged to included filters to have them show for results, and they can be dragged to unused and available filters to have those filters not show up. All filters are enabled by default. Note that you can reset substances to default in this menu, as well.

3. Date and Time Preferences: Set the order for year, month, and day for dates in SciFinder, as well as switch between 12 and 24 hour clock.

4. Structure Preferences: Change whether you want to see the index name or the preferred name by CAS for structures.

5. Show Structures on Reference Detail: Change the appearance of the list of structures in the details pages for references. See the two images below for a comparison, using the same reference. The first screenshot has the setting turned ON, whereas the second screenshot has the setting turned OFF.

6. Alert Preferences: Toggle if you want to get emails for alerts in SciFinder.

7. Substance Preferences: Change what properties will be displayed in the Substances search results. This can be used to tailor your substance searches to peruse properties more easily without having to click each individual substance from your results. Note that you can also reset this option to default.

Note: Some properties repeat in the menus because they exist in multiple categories. See logP in the example below.