JANUARY, 1948
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FATTY ACIDS, THEIR CHEMISTRY AND PHYSICAL PROPERTIES
Dare S. Markley, Principal Chemist, Oil, Fat, and Protein Division, Southern Regional Research Laboratory, U. S. Dept. of Agriculture, New Orleans. Interscience Publishers, Inc., New York, 1947. x 668 pp. 81 figs. 15 X 22.5 cm. $10.
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T m s volume presents a comprehensive, thorough, and well organized review of the physical properties and chemical reactions of the fatty acids. Such a reference text hqs Long been needed and it is supplied here in a most satisfying manner. The author has sssembled in convenient form a wealth of general information and numerical data. In addition he has furnished concise introductions to many of the less familiar experimental techniques that have come to he applied to investigations in this field and has discussed at generous lepgth the nature and utility of the results reported. The book will thus he found especially valuable as an index to the very extensive literature on fatty acids and fattyacid derivatives that has accumulated in recent years. There are 163 tables of data, 81 descriptive figures, and over 1500 numhered literature references in the text. A special significance which is attached to the appeaance of this book is worth noting. It is announced as one of a series of monographs on Fats and Oils to be prepared under an editorial board on which the present author is associated with A. E. Bailey, T. P. Hilditch, and H. E. Longenecker. Each of these men has att'ained a position of eminence through his scientific inuestigstions in the field of fats and fat products; each is also widely known ss author or scientific editor of publications that have provided the scientific worker in this field, a t long last, with authoritative modern reference sources. Subsequent volumes in this series will he awaited with comiderable interest. Meanwhile Merkley's "Fatty Acids" will take its place as a fitting companion volume t o A. E. Bailey's excellent treatise on "Industrial Oil and Fat Products" which appeared in 1945. The hook is divided into six sections. The &st is a single brief chapter on the nature and history of fats and waxes. Classification, nomenclature, and structure are reviewed in the second section, over half of which, some thirty-five pages, is devoted to a discussion of types and evidences of isomerism. The next two sections deal with physical properties and chemical reactions. Tagether they make up two-thirds of the entire volume. The final sections discuss the synthesis of fatty scids and their isoletion and identification. The section an physical properties contains five chapters, dividing the subject matter as follows: (1) Crystal Properties, including Crystallography, X-ray Dsraction, Polymorphism, Thermal Prouerties of Crvstalline Fattv Acids and Their Phase ties, Raman Spectra, T~ansitions;' (2) ~ ~ e c t r a f ~ r o ~ e r including Visible Absorption, Infrared and Ultraviolet Spectra; (3) Thermal Properties, including Heats of Formation and Combustion, Vapor Pressure and Related Properties; (4) Solubility and Solution Properties, including Miscible and Immiscible Aqueous Systems and Solutions in Nonaqueous Solvents; and (5) Properties of Fatty Acids in the Liquid State, including Density, Molar
Volume and Dilation, Viscosity, Surface and Interfacial Tension Refractivity and Refractive Index, Specific Conductivity, and Dielectric Constant. Chemical reactions of the fatty acids are considered under the following chapter headings: Salts of Fatty Acids, Esterifioation and Interesterifieation, Alkylstion and Alkoxylation, Pyrolysis, Halogenation, Hydrogenation and Hydrogenolysis, Oxidation and Hydroxylation, Oxidation by Atmospheric Oxygen, Biological Oxidation, Nitrogen Derivatives of Aliphatic Acids, and Sulfur Derivatives of the Fatty Acids. Throughout these chapters the scope is broader than the general heading implies. It embraces not only the reactions of the fatty acids themselves, but also the physical properties, chemical behavior, occurrence, structure, uses, etc., of the derivatives formed. Complete author and subject indexes are provided. Proofreading has obviously been done with exceptional care, and in all its physical features--quality of paper, selection of type, layout, presswork and binding-the publishers have made this a very sttractive and sturdy volume. It is a hook for thelibrary, the plant office, and the research laboratory; hardly for the classroom. The mthor set out to render aservice primarily to "the large and growing body of chemists, physicists, engineers and technologists who are interested in the fatty acids and their numerous products and by-products," and he has succeeded beyond a doubt. I t is not likely that any of these, once t h ~ have y examined this book, will want to be without a copy conveniently a t hand. ROBERT N. WENZEL W n s m m ~ o a s sRESEAROBLABOBATORIBB PITTBBDB~.H, PENNP~V*M*
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SECONDARY SCHOOL SCIENCE TEACHING
Arthur G. Hoff,Associate Professor of Education, University of Redlands, California. The Blakiston Company, Philadelphia, 325 pp. 15 X 2 3 cm. $3.75. 1947. xii
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THISIS a new book on how to teach science in the junior and senior high school by one who has had experience in these areas as well ss in the area of trai6ing science teachers. Every science teacher will welcome a book of this kind for its wealth of functional information. The writer has a. sound philosophy to meet the pnhlmm.: in rlre sricncc classroom a d rhe tcncl.cr's rcspunsiMiry rrlbtivl: 7,) ~uidsneexnd admirrirtrarim. 'There an. five units in ttw rcatt,mk: t l . ~first trentin~the m i & m of sricnce in education; the second, with the contentof the science curriculum in the secondary school; the third, with the function of method in science teaching including a clear and definite plan for unit teaching ss well as other methods of teaching; the fourth, with specific techniques in teaching science hy directed study, field trips, administration of the laboratory, techniques in recording experiments and grading student work; and fifth, with the supplement : q l h t very nwcssary facrws in srirnrc tcachinr tod~\;suchns xcienra clubs, visual aids, rquipmrnt and guidnuur twhniqucs. .&mplv te~tsxccompnnyrlw ttw alor.~:with n sarrlplt. unit in hi'l-
