references following a table and pick out the most recent entries, a procedure that can occupy several minutes for some of the considerable re4eareh in and which play? a longer tables. major role in the preparation and inA spot check by the reviewer of several vestigation of inorganic compounds. All tables showed that very few important contributions are generally readable. The references had been missed, although there format and printing show good quality, were a few con~picuousomissions. For instance, the conductance data for KCI, and there are very few typographical NaC1, LiC1, and K I of Van Artsdalen and errors. Yaffe ( J . Phys. Chem., 59, 118 (1955)) are This book will appeal primarily to rereferenced in the tables of single salt melt search chemists, but will also be usefd as a conductances, hut the conductances of reference text in advanced or specialired mixtures of these salts reported in the same chemistry courses. article are not cited in the table of binary JOHN S. THAYBR system conductances. University of Cincinnati In spite of the minor deficiencies in Cincinnati, Ohio "Molten Salts Handbook," this reviewer very strongly recommends its acquisition by anyone actively pursuing research in this area. He has had it on hand in his Molten Salts Handbook own laboratory for several months and has found it to be tremendously useful as a George J . Janz, Renssels~rPolytechnic quick and convenient reference source Institute. Academic Press, New York, both for data and for literature references. 1967. 588 pp. Figs. and tables. $25. Professor Janz and, his group are to. he congratulated for the excellent job they This volume is the culmination of have done in this ambitious undertaking. several year's work by Professor Janz It is hoped they will continue with this and a large number of his graduate stuwork and issue revisions or supplements dents and pos&doctoral associates. It st regular intervals. attempts to provide for the reader a fairly complete tabulation of all data. CORNELIUS T. MOYNIHAN collected for molten salt systems up to the California State College mid-1960's and summarizes or cites at Los Angeles several thousand literature publications. The information in the book has been organized into five main elrtssifieations: Experimental Electronics. An Physical Properties, Thermodynamic Introductory Laboratory Manual for Properties; Electrochemical Properties, Physical Scientists Spectroscopy and Structure, and Practical Features. A sixth sect,ion is devoted to Richard J . Higgins, University of experimental techniques and includes Oregon, Eugene. McGraw-Hill Book illustrations of typical fused salt apparatus 186 pp. Co., New York, 1968. xvii and s. bibliography of source papers on Figs. and tables. 21.5 X 28 em. $4.50. the subject. Each of the five main secThe challenges of preparing our students tions consists of tables containing varito intelligently select and critically use the ously raw data, smoothed data. in equation products of a continuing instrumentation form, qualitative descriptions of results, revolution persist, as the variety and or merely a note that t~heproperty has been investigated for a particular system. complexity of available instruments and The original lit,erat,ure references are methods grow. Although a, bdanced response to these challenges requires an given in all cases. instructor to proceed well beyond the conA critical assessment of avdable data fines of s brief introduction to electronics, has been performed and "best value" an approach to "chemical instrnmentaequations comput,ed for density, viscosity, tion" from the perspective of electronics is surface tension, refractive index, and more than superficially attractive. An electrical conductance of single salt melts increasing number of "Electronics for . . as a frmdion of temperature. Other texts are available to provide a. foundation data are taken directly from the literature. for this approach; however, despite a Many of the data tables have been barrowed from other review sources. In consensus view that some sort of laborathese cases results reported suhsequent to tory experience is a necessary connterthe original compilation are given in point to a textbook introduction to elecseparate, supplementary tables. Contronics, there has been a dearth of collected experiments to accompany the ~equentlyin searching for a piece of information the reader may have to consult. newer texts. Higgins' "Experimental Electronics" is all of the tables in a given section, an obvious inconvenience. Data. retrieval is a welcome collection of 32 emeriments in facilitated, however, by a complete listing instrumentation electronics. The topics of d l tables in the table of contents and investigated are: dc measurements, inhy a chemicd compound index at the end cluding a Thevenin "black box" and the of the hook. pntentiometer (in a 3 experiments); Depending upon the property under ac measurements, including resonant circonsideration, the literature survey tercuits and transient response (3 experiminates in most cases anywhere between ments); diode charaeteristirs, rectification 1964 and 1966. I t would have been helpand filtering in power supplies, modulation ful if the dates of termination of the literaand detection (4 experiments); vacuum ture surveys had been listed with each triode amplifiers, both inverter and foltable; at the moment the only way to lower configurations (2 experiments); transistor characteristics and transistor estimate this is to scan through the list of
book reviews
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Journol of Chemical Edumtion
amplifiers, including a dc differential amplifier, B power amplifier, and s. lock-in amplifier (5 experiments), the SCR (1 experiment); aperntional amplifiers, including basic operilbions, analog simulation of a damped harmonic oscillator, and OA voltage regulation (4 experiments); oscillators (3 experiments); digital circuits, operations, and instruments (6 experiments); and last,, transmission lines (1 experiment). Each of t,he experiments requires between one and t,hree hours of work in the laboratory. The level of understanding and capacity for analysis demanded of the student are consistently high, yet not excessive; to encourage development of the student's initiabive and judgment, the author provides much less detailed outlines of approaches and techniques for later experiments than for the introductory ones. The reviewer's students (juniors in chemistry), who have done fifteen of these experiments, inter alia, in their inqtrumentation course this year, have responded very frtvorably to IIiggins' style and approach. The experiments offered by the author are designed to accompany J. J. Brophy's "Basic Electronics for Scientists'' (reviewed March, 1967, in THIS JOURNAL); Higgins' study problems (there are two t,o five for each experiment) are keyed to this t e x t , and frequent references to it appear. The experiments themselves m e of course compatible with other texts which offer comparahly analytical t,reatments of the same topics. With the exception of the operational amplifier and digital operations experiments, Higgins' manual is not tied to the test instruments or breadboard scheme of a specified manufacturer, although it might be noted that Hickoek Teaching Systems, Inc. of Cambridge, Mass., has developed a complete set of labborntory equipment to implement this collection of experiments. To provide a modular approach to OA and digital instrumentation, however, the author has written these sections specifically for use with Philbrick's IZP manifold and either the IIickock Logic Trainer or the Digital Equipment Corporrttion Logic Laboratory. Higgins notes that other choices are possible; the instructor exercising this option (choosing perhaps the lower-cost DEC "Computer Lab" far the digital experiments) will probably prefer use of the manufacturer's suggested experiments to the task of revising Higgins. An instructor's guide, containing detailed component and instrument reeommendations, many suggestions for modification of experiments or their adaptation to a. demonstrittian format, and teaching hints from the author's experience, accompanies the manual. I t should be particularly useful to an instructor approaching the problems of laonching an electronics laboratory for the first time, and even old hands will find something new in this supplement. This collection of experiments should interest all who seek to teach instrumentation electronics; in its coverage, its depth, and its style, it is an excellent contribution. Instrumentation practice in chemistry is well beyond its scope, hut instructors should find that experiments selected from it provide a solid foundation
enormous; Davy quotes him frequently, snd even Faraday. . .refers again and a g a i n t o his w o r v The purpose of t,his WILLIAMD. WEIR book is to bring Ritter and his accomplishReed College ments to the attention of a wider presentPortland, Oregon day audience and so arouse an sppreoie, tion and understsnding of his place in the history of science, and in particular to call Die Begriindung der Elektrochemie und attention to his pioneer and significant Entdeekung der Ultravioletten Stmhlen role in the founding of what is now elecvon Johann Wilhelm Ritter. Eine trochemistry. Auswahl auz den SchriHen des roThe author has supplied an excellent mantiachen Phyaiker biogmphy of Ritter (15 pages). H e then takes up in detail R.itter's work on galAusegewahlt und kommentiert, von vanism, electrolysis, electrolytic decomArmin Hermann, Instibut fiir Geschiehte position, the derivation of the law of der Nsturwissenschaften der Unielectric potentials, the discovery of the versit,it Miinchen. Akademische Verultraviolet portions of the solar spectrum, lagsgesellschaft,, Frankfurt am Main, t h e discovery of t h e dry cell, the discovery 1968. 105 pp. Figs. 12 X 19.5 em. of the "Ladungssiule" (the precorsor of DM 14 (53.50). t h e storage batt,ery), the role of a voltaic pile included in an electrical circuit, the This very welcome book is Volume 2 so-called Kirehhoff Stromversweigung of the new series of the venerable Ost(branching of currents). He gives appowald's Klassiker der exakten Wisen site excerpt,^ from Ritter's writings toSchaften that was foimded in 1880 by gether with comments by himself and Wilhelm Ostwald and carried on by his son others. A full s e t of footnotes, literature Wolfgang Ostwald. The present series references, etc., renders the volume still was st,arted in 1065; the competent edimore useful. Obviously a large amount torial staff is made op of German and of t,ime, reading, and careful planning Swiss scholars. have gone into the composition of t,his Johann Wilhelm Ritt,er, German physsmall hut ent,ertaining and ed~reat,ional icist, was born in 1776 and died in 1810 and so had a short life. He was an i m ~ o r - work. A good reading knowledge of German is tant figure in his day but most of today's required, a. skill that unfortunately is not scient,ists have never even heard of him. common ampng students or even their He carried on a wide correspondence. elders t h a e days. Therefore, no analysis To quote L. Pearce Willimns: "His of the content,^ of the varions sections of influence on Hans Christian Oersted was
for the overlay of a critical perspective on the problems of chemical measurement.
the book will be attempted here. Howl ever, the moderate price of the volume makes it a.very goad b$for the relat,ively s m d l fraction who can read German. RALPHE. OI:SPICR Lrniuersity of Cincinnati Cincinnati, Ohio
Materials, A Scientific American Book
Edited b y . Dennis Flanagin W. 'H. Freeman and Co., San Francisco, 1967. 210 pp. Illnstreted. 15 X 22 vii cm. Clothbound, $5; paperbound, 82.50.
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The thirteen "chapters" ,.in t b k book are the text of t,he single-topic issue of the Scientific American for September, 1967. Each has a fronticepiece photograph (black and white) and many of the original illustmt,ians. The authors' names are almost synonymow with, the fields about. which they write; Mott on Solid State, Mark on Polymers, for example. The d y l e is typical Seientifi American; no mathematics, but a vocabulary a t the "meanXree-pat.h2' level of saphist,icstion is almost required. The fascinating coming together of theory and empiricism in this realm of applied physical science is a story that needs telling. This hook does so-and both teachers and students should listen.
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46, Number 8, August 1969
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