CPCat: Chemical and Product Categories
CPCat (Chemical and Product Categories) is a database containing information mapping >43,000 chemicals to a set of terms categorizing their usage or function. We have compiled a comprehensive list of chemicals with associated categories of chemical and product use by compiling publically available sources. Sources include, but are not limited to: the Substances in Preparation in Nordic Countries (SPIN) database, information provided by companies, trade associations, and regulatory agencies such as the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the DrugBank database of pharmaceutical products, and information mined from the Aggregated Computational Toxicology Resource (ACToR) database developed by the U.S. EPA. Unique use category taxonomies from each source are mapped onto a single common set of ~800 terms.
The user can search for chemicals by chemical name, Chemical Abstracts Registry Number (CASRN), or by CPCat terms (i.e. category names) associated with chemicals. See Dionisio et al., 2014 for a full description of the database, sources used, interpretation of chemical categories, and potential applications. The .zip file available at the "Download" tab of this website provides a full copy of the database, available for free download, which can be freely searched and sorted for data analysis. The .zip file includes a list of all chemicals included in CPCat. A list of all sources included in CPCat is provided in the table below.
Interpreting CPCat cassettes
To create CPCat, chemical categories and descriptions provided by each data source were mapped to CPCat terms and cassettes. Cassettes are comprised of one or more CPCat terms, separated by spaces; all CPCat terms within a cassette must be interpreted together to reflect the categorical information provided by the original data source. An underscore between two words indicates a compound word, and should be considered the same as a single unique CPCat term. Any combination of CPCat terms can be combined to create a CPCat cassette, however there are some combinations of terms which are more common, and others which never occur. If more than one CPCat cassette (separated by a comma) was mapped to a single original source description, this indicates that there was more than one distinct usage for the chemical reported by the original source description. In this situation each cassette should be interpreted separately to reflect these multiple uses for the chemical. See Dionisio et al., 2014 for examples of interpretation of CPCat cassettes, and potential applications. A description for each unique CPCat term can be found under the "Dictionary" tab of this website.
Search Results
When searching by chemical name or CASRN, two results tables are produced, including the following information.
Table of Use Information
CPCat Description
The "CPCat Description" column indicates the CPCat cassette(s) which were mapped to each original source description.
Source Description
"Source Description" provides the original category names assigned and provided by the source from which the data was obtained. These category names have not been modified, and are indicated as they were by the source. Source Description category names were manually mapped to CPCat cassettes.
ACToR Data Set/List
The "ACToR Data Set/List" column is only populated for entries coming from the "Categories from ACToR Data Sets and Lists" source. This column provides the full name of the assay or list used within the larger ACToR Data Sets and Lists source.
Source
"Source" indicates the name of the source the data was obtained from. See Dionisio et al., 2014 for detailed descriptions of each source.
Class of Chemical Category
The "Class of Chemical Category" column indicates the class of chemical use category provided by the source. Chemical use categories fall into 5 general classes. Note when a chemical has a variety of documented uses and functions, it may be associated with multiple classes, and/or multiple categories within each class.
? General-use: The chemical has a defined use that is not directly tied to its molecular function, with categories defined by this use (e.g., lipstick).
? Product-use: Categories defined by the class of product the chemical is found in (e.g., children's toys).
? Therapeutic-use: The chemical is used as an ingredient in a pharmaceutical, with categories defined by the type of ailment being treated (e.g., anti-acne).
? Functional-use: Categories defined by the chemical's properties, which determine the chemical's use (e.g., a solvent).
? Industrial sector-use: The chemical is used in an industrial sector, with categories defined by the type of industry (e.g., mining).
Table of Product Information
This table provides information on specific products which include the chemical in question. Information in this table has been pulled from the Retail Product Categories source (Goldsmith et al., 2013), a database of chemical information extracted from publically available Material Safety Data Sheets (MSDS) for products sold at Walmart. Products listed in this table are included within the categories in the Use Information Table. Included in the Product Information Table are the name of the product, percent composition (percent of the chemical in question in that particular product), manufacturer of the product, and a link to the MSDS sheet from which the information was mined. Note that all data presented in the Product Information table is presented "as-is," that is as it was obtained directly from the Walmart MSDS sheets. This data has not been reviewed, cleaned, or otherwise modified in any way, and is simply presented for the benefit of the user.
| 1Original data source | 2Class of categories | 3Original categories | CPCat cassettes | Chemicals |
| ACToR Data Sets and Lists | General-use | 137 | 180 | 436,062 |
| ACToR UseDB | General-use | 15 | 15 | 31,622 |
| CDR 2012: | ||||
| Consumer | General-use | 34 | 36 | 3,321 |
| Industrial Function | Functional-use | 34 | 27 | 5,023 |
| Industrial Sector | Industrial sector-use | 42 | 43 | 5,226 |
| DfE | Functional-use | 11 | 9 | 444 |
| Dow | Functional-use | 19 | 18 | 104 |
| DrugBank | Therapeutic-use | 582 | 463 | 1,754 |
| 2006 IUR | General-use | 19 | 24 | 1,152 |
| KemI | Functional-use | 61 | 31 | 876 |
| NICNAS | General-use | 17 | 17 | 177 |
| Retail Product Categories | Product-use | 359 | 191 | 2,778 |
| SPIN: | ||||
| detpcat | General-use | 781 | 284 | 6,491 |
| Industrial Sector | Industrial sector-use | 580 | 221 | 4,603 |
| NACE | Industrial sector-use | 57 | 52 | 7,745 |
| UC62 | General-use | 61 | 59 | 9,059 |
| Toxome | Functional-use | 16 | 16 | 442 |
1Source names listed match source names used in the downloadable CPCat database.
2Class of category used for chemical categorization in the original data source.
3Number of unique chemical categories in the original data source.
4Note that >550,000 chemicals are included in ACToR, but only ~36,000 could be mapped to one or more use categories.
References, Citation, and Contact Information
Dionisio KL, Frame AM, Goldsmith M-R, et al. (2015). "Exploring Consumer Exposure Pathways and Patterns of Use for Chemicals in the Environment." Toxicology Reports 2: 228-237.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2214750014001632#
Goldsmith M-R, Grulke CM, Brooks RD, et al. (2013). "Development of a consumer product ingredient database for chemical exposure screening and prioritization." Food and Chemical Toxicology 65: 269-279.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S027869151300851X
If CPCat is used for future publications, please cite:
"Exploring Consumer Exposure Pathways and Patterns of Use for Chemicals in the Environment." Toxicology Reports 2: 228-237.Curated chemical and product categories data were retrieved from the CPCat Database, U.S. EPA, RTP, NC. World Wide Web (URL: http://actor.epa.gov/cpcat). [Month, year of database release used].
For more information, including how to obtain the complete set of CPCat data, please contact:
Richard Judson
U.S. EPA
919-541-3085
judson.richard@epa.gov
Web Services: http://actorws.epa.gov/actorws/index.html