Elemental - ZX Spectrum 2025 edition

A scientific program by Massimiliano Arca - Cagliari (Italy)

An older version Elemental, programmed  in Pascalated Boriel Basic, was submitted to the Pascalated Basic Contest 2024.

Elemental Analysis (EA) is a common microanalysis used to investigate the percentage (%) composition of an analyte in terms of its main elements, typically carbon (C), hydrogen (H), nitrogen (N), and sulfur (S). For example, the formula of glucose is C6H12O6, corresponding C% = 40.0%, H% = 6.7%. This means that in 100 g of sugar, 40 g are due to the carbon content, 6.7 g to the hydrogen content and 53.3 g (the difference to 100 g) to the oxygen content.

It is possible to determine the EA of a chemical compound experimentally: in order to investigate its chemical nature, the experimental values can be compared with those calculated from the formula. From the formula, in turn, it is possible to calculate the molecular mass (MM, i.e. the mass of one mole of the compound).

There are many programs that can evaluate the theoretical elemental analysis from a given formula, typically running on Windows or macOS operating systems. There are also some tools available online, more or less accurate. However, no similar software has ever been developed for the ZX Spectrum to date. 

Entirely programmed in Boriel ZX Basic, Elemental brings a professional research tool for EA calculations to the humble ZX Spectrum! Elemental performs EA and MM calculations, provides the minima formula, and includes very advanced features, not found in any EA calculator on the market. In particular it supports:

• A database of the whole elemental table, including main groups, d-block, and f-block elements
• Unlimited use of nested or non-nested parentheses
• Calculations on the formulae of molecular adducts (with the * separator)
• Solvation (with the * separator)
• Use of fractional stoichiometric coefficients
• Use of common (and less common) solvent acronyms (such as dmf or DMF for N,N-dimethylformammide)
• Use of acronyms for organic substituents (such as iPr for isopropyl or Et for ethyl)
• Use of acronyms for ligands (such as acac for acetylacetonate, or en for ethylenediamine)

 All acronyms are those commonly accepted and reported in the literature. Elemental accepts and correctly processes formulae as complex as:

C6H12O6	glucose
C6H6	benzene
TEACl	tetraethylammonium chloride
CuSO4*5H2O	copper(II) sulfate pentahydrate
bipy*2I2	1:2 Charge-Transfer adduct between bipyridine and two diiodine molecules
Ni(Me2timdt)2	bis(N,N’-dimethylimidazolidine-2-thione-4,5-dithiolato)nickel(II)
(TBA)(Pd(dmit)2)	bis(1,3-dithiole-2-thione-4,5-dithiolate) palladium(II) (tetrabutylammonium)
(Ph4todit)*5/2I2*CHCl3	Fractional adduct between 4,5,6,7-tetrathiocino[1,2-b:3,4-b′]- diimidazolyl-1,3,8,10-tetraphenyl-2,9-dithione and diiodine chloroform solvate

These features render Elemental the most professional, complete, and sophisticated EA calculator available. This tool is particularly useful to chemists and materials scientists, who cope with EA and MM calculations on a daily basis. Worthy of note, a snapshot of Elemental can be easily embedded in a self-running sandbox for Windows, Linux, or MacOS systems adopting a variety of available emulators.

The use of the program is straightforward. The user is prompted to enter the formula in plain text using a special input procedure with a flashing cursor and advanced editing features. The chemical parser identifies the element symbols and their coefficients, transforms symbolic fractions into numbers (for example, 3/2 becomes 1.5), replaces acronyms with the corresponding chemical formulae, identifies the presence of solvent units and eventually simplifies the formula by processing the parentheses. The minimal formula is further reduced, if possible, by calculating the gross common divisor of the stoichiometric coefficients. Finally, the MM and reduced MM are calculated, from which the CHNS elemental content (%C, %H, %N, and %S) is evaluated. All essential information is displayed on the screen. By pressing the E key a further result page is opened showing the content of all elements in the input compound.

Have fun and explore Chemistry with Elemental!

Distribution. Elemental is completely free and can be unreservedly distributed, provided that it is not modified in any way and that the relevant files are accompanied by this text.