Eleven More Countries Adopt Cambridge Structural Database System National Provision

Today, the Cambridge Crystallographic Data Centre (CCDC) announced that National Affiliated Centres covering Australia, Croatia, Finland, Hungary, FYR Macedonia, Norway, Russia, Serbia, Slovenia, Spain and Sweden secured countrywide access granting all of their academic institutions unlimited and open use of the Cambridge Structural Database System. These agreements expand the CCDC’s national access initiatives to 17 countries adding to those already in place in Brazil, Israel, Taiwan, The Netherlands, Switzerland and South Africa. Through local and web applications, academic researchers and educators enjoy immediate access to the CSD, the definitive resource for experimental organic and metal-organic crystal structure information.

“Providing all academic institutions in these countries with unfettered access to the CSD System aligns directly with both our open access philosophy for academia and our not-for-profit and charity status,” said Colin Groom, the Executive Director of the Cambridge Crystallographic Data Centre. “We will continue to expand this programme around the world to ensure researchers, educators and students benefit from the CSD and the associated software packages for knowledge-based modelling of molecular structure and interactions.”

Several NAC partners commented on the significance of the agreements. “Beginning in 2015, Spanish institutions will have unlimited access to the Cambridge Structural Database System through a new countrywide arrangement. The current 34 academic and research institutions at the Spanish NAC will now have the opportunity to expand access to the CSD system within their own institutions”, said Agnès Ponsati Obiols, Director, Unit of Information Resources for the Research Spanish National Research Council. “In addition, countrywide CSD provision enables us to extend access to new research groups in Spain. Such groups, normally small or from adjacent research areas, would otherwise never have the opportunity to take advantage of the CSD database and all the included tools.”

In Finland, academic users have accessed the Cambridge Structural Database System since 1990 through the CSC - IT Centre for Science. “For 2015, we are taking a great step forward by opting for a national agreement. This arrangement will increase access to the database for a larger group of researchers and in turn make their research more efficient”, said Atte Sillanpää, PhD, Senior Application Scientist, the programme manager for the last nine years.

In Brazil, Mario Ximenes, Dotlib Commercial Coordinator for CAPES stated, "By offering access to the Cambridge Structural Database to the whole Brazilian academic community working in Chemistry and Physics, we will increase database usage, the potential of harvesting results, and the awareness of the product’s capabilities by all stakeholders enrolled.”