ChemTube3D vs MoluCAD

ChemTube3D is a free chemistry learning resource with interactive three-dimensional structures, animations, and supporting information. It covers organic mechanisms, organic structure and bonding, inorganic chemistry, polymers, and A-level chemistry for students, lecturers, and practising chemists. In a web browser, the JSmol viewer lets users manipulate animated structures. Organic reaction schemes show bond breaking and forming, charges, and lone pairs. Learning designs guide activities built around these visual models. Pages can be embedded in a learning management system or virtual learning environment through LTI; the site reports testing with Canvas and Blackboard, with the LTI tool supplied through OpenOChem. Free iOS and Android apps are available, with the iOS app offering selected Organic Chemistry and Structure and Bonding material. Selected transition-state models can be downloaded in STL and X3D formats for 3D printing. ChemTube3D also provides virtual labs, molecular modeling, and reaction simulation.

MoluCAD is a free Windows desktop application for molecular modeling and visualization, designed for chemistry students and originally conceived for organic chemistry study. Users can construct molecular structures in true 3D and inspect them from any viewpoint. The software creates reaction animations and includes more than 170 sample structures and animations that can be opened, viewed, and modified. Built-in MM2 energy minimization supports the modeling workflow, alongside an interactive periodic table and HTML-based help. MoluCAD imports and exports PDB, ENT, MOL, and MM3 files, and generates BMP, JPEG, and AVI files. New River Kinematics offers it as a free download through a Windows executable. The product originated in a three-year National Institutes of Health biomedical technology research project intended to produce low-cost chemistry education software. New River Kinematics, founded in 1994 and based in Williamsburg, Virginia, describes itself as an engineering company developing and supporting portable metrology software solutions.