ABSTRACT
Viewed in this light, the various kinds of mathematics that have flourished in the past, and that might conceivably be developed in the future, can be regarded as potential starting points for construction of all the different possible sciences. The scientist thus plays the key role of establishing isomorphic relations between areas of mathematics and branches of science. This is usually accomplished by selecting appropriate structures from the mathematical storehouse and identifying them with scientific concepts. Relationships which are verified in the one domain then become of immediate applicability in the other domain. Results obtained or insights gained in the one system can thus be assumed to be directly transferable to the other. A classic example of this concordance of mathematics and science forms the subject matter of this chapter. We shall examine here the manifold interactions of the mathematical discipline of graph theory with the sdence of chemistry. In particular, we shall be tracing the origins of the interaction and focus on the early historical development of the field which has become widely known today as chemical graph theory.
