Heterocyclic compounds play a vital role in the metabolism of living cells. Their practical applications range from extensive clinical use to fields as diverse as agriculture, photography, biocide formulation and polymer science. Written by leading scholars and industry experts, the Handbook of Heterocyclic Chemistry is thoroughly updated with over 50% new content. It has been rewritten with a new expanded author team, who have carefully distilled essential information on the reactivity, structure and synthesis of heterocycles from the 2008 major reference work Comprehensive Heterocyclic Chemistry III. To bring the work up to date the author team have also added new synthetic examples and structures, key applications and new references from 2008-2010. Contains more than 1500 clearly drawn structures and reactions. The highly systematic coverage given to the subject makes this one of the most authoritative single-volume accounts of modern heterocyclic chemistry available and should be useful reference for those teaching a heterocyclic course.-Covers the structure, reactivity and synthesis of all heterocyclic compounds as distilled from the larger 15-volume reference work -Saves researchers time when they require important information on heterocycles--speeding them to thousands of clearly drawn chemical structures and pertinent reviews by leading experts -Features 35% new material to compliment the completely revised text