MDL ''Chime'' was a free plugin used by

web browsers A web browser is application software for accessing websites. When a User (computing), user requests a web page from a particular website, the browser retrieves its Computer file, files from a web server and then displays the page on the user' ...

to display the

three-dimensional Three-dimensional space (also: 3D space, 3-space or, rarely, tri-dimensional space) is a geometric setting in which three values (called ''parameters'') are required to determine the position of an element (i.e., point). This is the informal ...

structures of

molecules A molecule is a group of two or more atoms held together by attractive forces known as chemical bonds; depending on context, the term may or may not include ions which satisfy this criterion. In quantum physics, organic chemistry, and bioche ...

. and was based on the

RasMol RasMol is a computer program written for molecular graphics visualization intended and used mainly to depict and explore biological macromolecule structures, such as those found in the Protein Data Bank. It was originally developed by Roger Sayle ...

code. Chime was used by a wide range of

biochemistry Biochemistry or biological chemistry is the study of chemical processes within and relating to living organisms. A sub-discipline of both chemistry and biology, biochemistry may be divided into three fields: structural biology, enzymology and ...

web sites for the visualization of

macromolecules A macromolecule is a very large molecule important to biophysical processes, such as a protein or nucleic acid. It is composed of thousands of covalently bonded atoms. Many macromolecules are polymers of smaller molecules called monomers. The ...

, many of which were linked to the ''World Index of Molecular Visualization Resources'' MolVisIndex.Org. Chime was also used until 2006 at the

Protein Data Bank The Protein Data Bank (PDB) is a database for the three-dimensional structural data of large biological molecules, such as proteins and nucleic acids. The data, typically obtained by X-ray crystallography, NMR spectroscopy, or, increasingly, cry ...

to examine structures stored there. Although available in 1996 in both

Windows 95 Windows 95 is a consumer-oriented operating system developed by Microsoft as part of its Windows 9x family of operating systems. The first operating system in the 9x family, it is the successor to Windows 3.1x, and was released to manufacturin ...

and

classic Mac OS Mac OS (originally System Software; retronym: Classic Mac OS) is the series of operating systems developed for the Macintosh family of personal computers by Apple Computer from 1984 to 2001, starting with System 1 and ending with Mac OS 9. The ...

versions for both

Netscape Netscape Communications Corporation (originally Mosaic Communications Corporation) was an American independent computer services company with headquarters in Mountain View, California and then Dulles, Virginia. Its Netscape web browser was onc ...

and

Internet Explorer Internet Explorer (formerly Microsoft Internet Explorer and Windows Internet Explorer, commonly abbreviated IE or MSIE) is a series of graphical user interface, graphical web browsers developed by Microsoft which was used in the Microsoft Wind ...

browsers, development of Chime did not follow the move to

Mac OS X macOS (; previously OS X and originally Mac OS X) is a Unix operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc. since 2001. It is the primary operating system for Apple's Mac (computer), Mac computers. Within the market of ...

for the Mac and support for Windows-based browsers other than Internet Explorer was limited (although it works well in

Mozilla Firefox Mozilla Firefox, or simply Firefox, is a free and open-source web browser developed by the Mozilla Foundation and its subsidiary, the Mozilla Corporation. It uses the Gecko rendering engine to display web pages, which implements current and a ...

). One significant feature added in 1997 was the ability to display spectroscopic data in the form of the IUPAC JCAMP-DX protocols. Apart from this, most subsequent updates were for the installation package to follow the development of Windows and Internet Explorer. Accelrys announced in 2012 that Chime was no longer supported and would remain available for download until the end of 2012. Chime was part of the ISIS product line acquired by

Symyx Technologies Symyx Technologies, Inc. was a company that specialized in informatics and automation products. Symyx provided software solutions for scientific research, including Enterprise Laboratory Notebooks and products for combinatorial chemistry. The sof ...

from scientific publisher

Elsevier Elsevier () is a Dutch academic publishing company specializing in scientific, technical, and medical content. Its products include journals such as ''The Lancet'', ''Cell'', the ScienceDirect collection of electronic journals, '' Trends'', th ...

in October 2007. Now Chime is owned by Dassault Systemes BIOVIA (formerly Accelrys), and has been merged into

Discovery Studio Discovery Studio is a suite of software for simulating small molecule and macromolecule systems. It is developed and distributed bDassault Systemes BIOVIA(formerly Accelrys). The product suite has a stronacademic collaboration programme supporting ...

, but no longer exists as a free browser plugin. Chime largely has been superseded by

Jmol Jmol is computer software for molecular modelling chemical structures in 3-dimensions. Jmol returns a 3D representation of a molecule that may be used as a teaching tool, or for research e.g., in chemistry and biochemistry. It is written in the ...

, a non-proprietary

open-source Open source is source code that is made freely available for possible modification and redistribution. Products include permission to use the source code, design documents, or content of the product. The open-source model is a decentralized sof ...

Java molecular visualization application and JavaScript applet that has maintained most Chime command compatibility while adding numerous features.

References

External links

Screen Capture of Chime in Action

Accelrys Chime

Chime Download

RCSB Protein Data Bank

MolviZ.Org: Molecular Visualization Resources
with rich collection of molecules
Dublin City University CHIME and Jmol Pages
Molecular geometry {{science-software-stub

See also

References

External links