iChemLabs was founded in February 2007 by Kevin Theisen to distribute the scientific software he was developing. He initially studied and developed algorithms to simulate nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy. This research involved the production of scientifically oriented graphical user interfaces, and his interests expanded to incorporate scientific visualization and graphics. Over the last few years, our goals have become more focused:
- Provide the Gold Standard in quality and function for chemical publishing software.
- Be at the forefront of the next generation of web-based scientific software.
- Grow our presence in this industry by providing quality proprietary and open source software solutions to benefit our partners and collaborators.
- Focus on compatibility in all aspects: operating systems (Linux fully supported), platforms (netbooks, mobile devices), web services (ChemDoodle Web Components), 3rd party support (Databases, OpenOffice, iWork)
ChemDoodle
ChemDoodle was released to the market in February of 2008. We wanted to provide an application that was affordable to students and scientists while upholding a rigorous standard of quality. ChemDoodle provided customers with a chemical structure environment that could do much more than other chemical sketchers. Widgets included in the package were tiny applications that provided powerful functionality from database integration, to real time statistics, to template management. The MolGrabber widget provided users with access to the entire PubChem database where returned structures could be dragged right onto the sheet. This widget alone is acclaimed by many to be one of the most useful and innovative functions they have seen in this area of software.
ChemDoodle 2 was launched in June of 2009. This update introduced huge changes to the software and a continuance of our dedication to innovation and quality in this market. One new addition was the ability to change the stroke style of structures for more artistic and less formal diagrams. We also developed an important library, VectorPaste, to allow our Java technologies to transfer scalable vector graphics and metadata to other applications via the system clipboard, an ability previously unavailable to Java developers. To date, ChemDoodle is used in thousands of institutions around the world, from major companies, to government organizations, to high schools.
ChemDoodle 3 was launched in May of 2010. This update was a complete overhaul of the ChemDoodle application, providing performance improvements, graphical improvements and a long list of new features. These new features included the ability to create stunning graphics for your reactions and spectra, the simulation of NMR spectroscopy, tools for creating a customizing ChemDoodle Web Components, storage device chemical searches, complete access to our elemental database and much more. In just a few years, ChemDoodle has become one of the most popular chemical drawing tools available. Its development is actively followed by news sites, blogs and members of the scientific community from around the world.
ChemDoodle 4 was released in August of 2011. Included features were glassware templates, a new Elemental Analysis widget, a beautiful interface, integration with our mobile tools, rendering of implicit hydrogens and more. ChemDoodle is now a universal standard, will tools across desktop, web and mobile devices.
Keep up to date with our development by subscribing to our RSS feed. We know you will be impressed.
Cheminformatics on Periodic Systems
In 2008, Mr. Theisen began his PhD work at the University of California at Berkeley. There he began to develop the field of materials informatics. He produced periodic analogues to standard small molecule informatics algorithms, from ring perception, to descriptors, to visualization. He also developed abstract visualization techniques for depicting the void space topology of three-periodic nets, aiding engineering goals. Due to the success of iChemLabs, Mr. Theisen graduated from Berkeley in 2009 with a non-terminal MS in Chemistry and an invitation to return. We continue to collaborate with individuals at UC:Berkeley.
ChemDoodle Web Components
ChemDoodle Web Components were unveiled in August of 2009. This product was based on the budding HTML5 technology, <canvas>. iChemLabs provides this Javascript cheminformatics and web visualization toolkit under the open source GPL license to best serve the community. Included in the library are several components to present chemically-relevant images, animations and interactive components for cheminformatics tasks such as sketchers. The project quickly went viral, being discussed within online communities such as Twitter and FriendFeed. We are currently providing custom development for several collaborators that use this library.
We are also actively pursuing WebGL to provide hardware accelerated 3D graphics natively in the browser. 3D ChemDoodle Web Components were released as an addition to the ChemDoodle Web Component library in February of 2010. The 3D components were one of the first examples of WebGL technology applied to the sciences and excited many working with <canvas>/WebGL, not just chemists. The Khronos Group, which develops the WebGL API, was quick to cover this product and we are happy to inspire other scientific web applications. With the emergence of WebGL and the proof of 3D ChemDoodle Web Components, any software interface previously created in the physical sciences may now be reproduced natively in the browsers. We are optimistic as we watch this technology grow and replace Flash and Java applets.
In the summer of 2010, ChemDoodle Web Components saw two major updates. The first update provided full support for ChemDoodle Web Components on iPhone OS and Android devices. An advanced mapping was included to allow touch events and mobile gestures to work with the mouse event interfaces so interaction is consistent across all desktop browsers and mobile devices. Developers can also quickly link in custom touch events and gestures for web apps targeted directly at mobile devices. The second update provided graphical improvements, performance improvements, and new components to render reactions and spectra. With all of this functionality, the ChemDoodle Web Components library is only 100KB in size! Several organizations, including ChemExper and ChemSpider, have partnered with us to utilize ChemDoodle Web Components in their services, and many websites around the world now use this library to power their chemical graphics engines.
ChemDoodle Web Components saw a major update in January of 2011. This update introduced an all new ChemDoodle sketching component and full access to the ChemDoodle desktop API through AJAX XMLHttpRequest Level 2. Everything was polished, from the API, to the source, to the animation and mobile frameworks. Using the ChemDoodle Web Components, full-featured scientific apps can now be distributed in any medium that supports HTML5 including desktops, browsers and mobile devices such as iPhones, iPads and Android devices. Several updates followed in 2011, bringing significant improvements to the spectroscopy components, unique components such as a periodic table, CIF file interpreters, and new 3D graphics including protein ribbon models, nucleic acid cartoons, unit cells and much more.
ChemDoodle Mobile
ChemDoodle Mobile was released for the iPhone on the Apple App Store in May of 2011. An Android version was released on the Android Market shortly after in September, 2011. We give this app away for free as a gift to our customers. ChemDoodle Mobile is a calculator for drawn chemical structures. It was the first mobile application to simulate NMR and handle spectroscopy. An iPad version for ChemDoodle is also under development, focusing on chemical graphics and publishing. With the release of ChemDoodle Mobile, ChemDoodle is now a universal standard, with applications across all operating systems, in all browsers and on mobile devices.
The Future
As always, we continue to pursue our goals. In addition to advancing our main products and collaborations, we are also researching and developing other new projects. We will always strive to reinvent common tools to improve their efficiency and productivity. We are also expanding, so if you are interested in a cheminformatics job, please send us your resume. We believe chemists with computational skills are among the most essential members of the chemistry community and we offer great opportunities. A BA or BS is all we require. If you are interested in working or collaborating with us, please feel free to contact us.
Loading ...