book vontil~uesthe use of "rertrliou roordinate diagrams'' ilk wlrivh the rbsrissa has uu mealliug. The typography seems dear and I found no typogritphieal errors. Tlrp figures are generally well drawn and illumiuating. I found unly one trivial error ill a figure. All iu all, this book should significantly enrich most beginning orgsnir. chemistry courser, alld it should uot he beyowl theabilities of their students. I inlend to use it for my course.
.\I.AI.KICE A l . KHEETDI I'nivrrsil!, of Minncsolrr .Ilinnmpolia
Physical Methods in inorganic Chemistry
Russell S. D m p , 1:niversily of 1llinui.-. Urbarm Reillhold Publishil,g C o q . , New Ywk, I ! . sviii 430 pp. Figs. aid tables. 16 X 2 3 5 rm, 14.50.
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111 a prefatory stat,ement by the ?onculliug editors the reader is reminded that there are numerous books whivh provide the baser for applirstion of physirnl metlrnds to illorgallir. or organic chemistry, hot that, "There are, however, few hooks whirh within a single vnlume, treat the more imporla~tt physiral methods in a. manner which makes it convenient for ihr student or p r a r t i v i ~ qrhemist t o lean, how to use ~ a v hmethod and t h e kind of iuforrnatiuu which can he ohtained h o m each." This book and the course for (or f t ~ m ) whirh i t was prepared are dearly addressed to that admirable goal. It is 1101 usual for many universities to present a raurxe of thii type al present for the seuior 01. first year graduate dudent, hut granted the existewe of such a program, the11 Professor Ilrago's test appears lo be well considered both with respect t o content and to level. There are three int~ndurtot.yrhapters on atomic structure and bondiug, induding inlrodurtiour t o ligand field and molerulrr orbital theory, whirh serve as a basis for the resl of the material. No1.mal1.v the :;tudeota should have been exposed lo wrlr material in the more usual sort of senior or heginning graduate course in inorgmir chemistry, but the iwlusin~lof these chapters would make it possihle to present a self-contained course, with little prior k~mvledgeof illorganic chemistry (aside from a hit of knowledge of some of the farts of inorganic chemistry) being required. The physiral methods whirh are rotrsidered can all be classed xi;spectroscopic methods, including mass spectroscopy. The topic.; are, in order, symmetry, character tables, etc., leading t o a general introduction t o spectroscopy and then t,o electronic spectroscopy (visible and ultraviolet absorption spectrometry), vibrational and rotational (infrared, Raman, and microwave), nuclear magnetic resonance, electron spin resonance, hIBssbauer, and mass speetroscopy.
222
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Journal o f Chemical Education
11, ad, chapter the fundamentel principles are introdured anld then the kiuds of i~lformat,iont o be obtained, the iimiratiow of the method, aud same examples of xppliretions (drawn heavily from Prafessol. Drsgo's own rnwan.11) of each metilad are desrribed. The level a1 whirh the presentation is aimed seems t o be well chosen. The student or rhemict, uninitiated ill a particular mdlrod, ought to benble to reed this text (perhaps eveu ill bed) a ~ i d determine whether a given m ~ t h o dwould be suited t o his needs. FIR n.uuld probably learn enough about the method to read further or ronsult with wme expert and pursue a solution l o hi.; o s u problem. I n gel~eralthe orgallisation and a-riting i . ~good, hut there are places where strings ge, and CARL11. B I L T . B A IJw. ~ ? , paper chrrmntography. The next two d l irhiyan Slate l~nitw..~il!, elmpters rutltni~lexperimenls designed to Easl I.on.sU,q aequaiut the sttldeut with the chemistry of selected elemwts from the periodic tahle. Among the experiments are ornny syntheses, mostly laken from t,he ' I ~ m r g a n i r Syntheses" series, \V. G. Palmer's ''h>xperimental Illorganic Chemistry'' (CamSteady-State Applications in bridge, 1954), strd IT. F. Walton'i "InEnzyme Kinetics organic Pr~pamtions" (Pwutiv-IIdl, 1048). The f i t d frmrteen c1raptel.i are Chnrlo. l,ValtP~.,U~~iversit~y of Tennessee, short expositions of variotw advanced 3lernphis. The Ronald Press Co., techniques s ~ a% ~ infrared h spe~~lroscopy, Sen- york, 1965. vi 263 pp. Figs. high-temperature preparations, vaeuimand talk*. 16 X 24 rm. $12. line preparations, and narr-sq~~eo~ls idvents. Some wdl-rho.ien syutheses are This hook represents a u~tified treatincl~~ded to iIlit*trate these i d ~ n i q u e s , ment of t h r steady-st,at,e equations in h ~ l ti ~ rmmly ra-e.: the directiwr.; are so enzyme kiuetirs. The emphasis is on the abbreviated t h a t most studeuti n-crdd m a t h e m a t i d relabionship between me&-have difficult>-in ohlaining good yieldn. wed rates and kinetic aoust.ants rather The authors lrave not given r d i l to tlran on the vhemistry of enzyme react.ions. The book opens with three introductory all their sources of material. 3lill.h of their disc~~ssion, on pages 25-28, of the vhapters on nomenclature, a stimulating ~chararterisalion of sodium t~~iphasphr~te short historical account and thermaand Lriphosphoric acid has hren lifted dyanmirr. Startiug from Chapter 4, the from pages .5G and 147-148 in my lexl, author gives an admirable disnwsion of "Syuthetic Innrgauir Chemirtv?' (Prew produvt conrentrat,ion as a. funrtiolr of tire-Hdl, 1960). time. Dim!! and Wehh's treat.ment of the Some of the experiments (sllrli as those involving the qualitative study of the chemistry of the elements and the h i nothor's own contributions t o more comrhiometry of reactions) wollld be applex euzyme mechanisms, ordered sepropriate for freshmen. Other esperiquences, and reversible enzyme react,ionr. rnents (mch as the syntheses of the phosThe last rhapt,er gives a brief discosrion of phonitrilic halides and bis(~-eyclnpeotaintegrated rate equations and a list of dienyl)titaoium(IV)dichloride) r o t d d be same useful integrated expressions. appropriate for seniors and graduale Some of the examples could be made studeuts. T h e discusions of synthetic more interest,ing by illustrations s i t h techniques and methods of characlerisaactual experimental data instead of tion are generally too brief to be of much hypothetiral reaction curves. There are use. Thus it is hard to imagine where t,lii.; occasional misprints where equations are
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text might fit into a n American chemistqcurriculum. However, inst,ruet,ors v.hcho are plarming a. lahoratory course in inorganic chemistry will find some value in the selwtion of experiments chosen to illustrate specific techniqnes.
WILLIAML. Jo~i.1Unilrersily of California Berkeley
Radiochemical Survey of the Elements
M . Haissinsky, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Paris, and J . 2 . .4dloJ, Centre de Recherches Nucleaires, Strasbourg-Cronenb
