Avogadro 1.0.3

Anyone whose occupation is related to chemistry certainly needs an efficient and versatile program for creating models of chemical molecules. Avogadro proves to be an excellent choice here as this is an advanced and open source program for editing three-dimensional molecular models.

It is a cross-platform editor of molecules available for Windows, Linux and Mac OS X, holding the Gnu General Public License. It does not require compiling and is equipped with a comfortable installer, also available in Polish (just like the program’s interface). The editor is designed so as to be highly intuitive and user-friendly. The engine used is very efficient in creating 3D models and it takes a full advantage of the potential offered by multi-core processors. Because the program is based on the Python language, it is very easy to modify by means of user-designed plug-ins which, for instance, add tools that allow us to render molecules, interactive functions, commands and Python scripts. Thanks to the OpenBabel module the program can import files used by professional programs assisting in chemist’s work, create data for calculation packages, crystallography and biomolecules.

The program’s size is only 10 MB and the Polish version is also available. In short, it is an excellent program for some more demanding chemists.