Product review: Chirys Draw

An isomer of thioridazine, drawn with Chirys Draw

I don't plan on doing product reviews, but this is such an irresistable mix of #chemjobs, alternative careers and software development (really!)

I've had the opportunity to review with a really neat app called Chirys Draw; it's from Integrated Chemistry Design, a company started by a former coworker of mine, M. Catherine Johnson. Before she started her own consulting firm and software design company, she was a long-time medicinal chemist and chemical informatics expert at Pfizer. Catherine offered me the opportunity to play with the program, if I could find an iPad to download it and try it out.*

With complimentary download code and borrowed iPad in hand, I was able to play around with the software for an hour or two. After watching the YouTube tutorial and a little bit of messing around, I was quickly drawing structures. It's a lot of fun to be able to draw with a touch of the finger. Drawing cyclic structures just takes a circular motion with a finger; aromatic structures take two fingers, something that I think it's both intuitive and really cool. There's a "Sprout" feature that allows you to easily extend chains off a selected carbon; interestingly, it allows you to extend chains off two atoms (or more?) at a time, which makes drawing symmetrical molecules that much faster.

Echinopine A

I've shown some of the molecules that I was able to draw with ease. Obviously, both pharmaceutically-related molecules and natural products are both within reach of Chirys Draw. Elapsed time for drawing both molecules? Less than 2 minutes each. Moving the molecules are a simple matter of highlighting and dragging. Having grown up with CambridgeSoft's ChemDraw, I do miss the "clean" function. Even without it, the molecules look pretty darn good on the screen.

If you're an iPad user, you can generate a little bit of jealousy (from me, anyway) by just pulling it out of your bag or briefcase. Now with Chirys Draw, you can impress your coworkers and make them just a little bit greener with envy.

Best wishes to Catherine and her company! To download Chirys Draw for both the iPhone and the iPad, visit the App Store. ($)

*I have to take a moment to confess that I'm not an iPhone user/owner, nor an iPad user/owner. However, just about everyone around me is, so I've gotten fairly familiar with their use. (I like to borrow neat gadgets -- thanks to those who know who they are.) 

**I selected the molecules by going to In the Pipeline and BRSM blog and picking the first reasonable molecule that I came across. All errors in structures are mine. 

Note: Other than free download codes for coworkers' iPads (for the review process), Chemjobber has received and will receive no financial incentive for writing this review.

Obligatory Nanoputian