Chemical Education Today
Book & Media Reviews
Introduction to Atmospheric Chemistry by Daniel J. Jacob Princeton University Press: Princeton, NJ, 1999. 266 pp. ISBN 0-691-00185-5. $39.50 (cloth). reviewed by Jonathan P. D. Abbatt
Daniel Jacob’s new textbook, Introduction to Atmospheric Chemistry, is a noteworthy addition to a growing set of atmospheric chemistry texts, filling a niche that was long vacant. While there are a number of books on the market that are used extensively in upper-level atmospheric chemistry classes, Jacob’s offering is unique in presenting the big issues in a concise manner well suited to a one-semester-long course for advanced undergraduates and beginning graduate students. The focus of the book is upon the development of a quantitative framework needed to understand the overall mechanisms of atmospheric chemistry. Jacob is an internationally known modeler of atmospheric chemical processes, with current research interests in the chemistry of the lower atmosphere (the “troposphere”) and the atmospheric impacts of widespread industrialization. This perspective very much characterizes his book. The fundamentals of relevant atmospheric science— pressure, dynamics and radiation—are introduced, along with a description of box models and their utility in assessing the time scales and overall nature of atmospheric processes. Jacob then uses these tools to address the major topics in the field: the greenhouse effect, geochemical cycles, stratospheric ozone, tropospheric and urban ozone, and acid rain. For each subject, the fundamentals are presented in a succinct but accurate manner. Real understanding, however, is achieved by working through numerous problems at the end of each chapter. Many of the problems are superb, having been taken from papers in the recent scientific literature. Jacob leads the student, step by step, through the different aspects of the issue he has distilled from the paper. Students who work through these problems will develop an expertise that they can later
edited by
Jeffrey Kovac University of Tennessee Knoxville, TN 37996-1600
apply to their own research or to similar subjects. It is worthwhile pointing out what Jacob’s book is not. It is not a resource to which one turns for exhaustive references or to study a subject in great detail. Other books, such as those by Finlayson-Pitts and Pitts, Seinfeld and Pandis, and Warneck, serve that role very well. It is not a book that discusses experimental design or details. Nor is it a book that attempts to teach the fundamentals of chemistry. Indeed, the sections on chemical kinetics and photochemistry are written in a bare-bones style, providing just the framework and language necessary to understand the atmospheric chemistry concepts. It is possible that a chemistry faculty member who has no background in atmospheric science, and yet has been given the task of teaching the department’s environmental/atmospheric course, might feel more comfortable with a book that develops these fundamental topics in some detail (I am thinking here of the excellent new edition of Finlayson-Pitts and Pitts‚ Chemistry of the Upper and Lower Atmosphere). How would I teach a course using this text? First, I would change the order of the topics to a small degree. I find it most convenient to work through stratospheric and tropospheric chemistry before discussing topics in global warming and geochemical cycles. For example, it is easier to understand the climatic impact of a sulfate aerosol particle after one understands how and where it is formed. Jacob, on the other hand, places the greenhouse-effect chapter early in the book. Also, I find it valuable to use lots of colorful data figures in my lectures, such as those taken from satellites and field campaigns, and to give an in-depth historical development of the subject. The instructor may want to turn to additional sources for these items. All in all, this is an excellent, approachable text filled with unique, interesting problems and a state-of-the-art description of the science. Jonathan P. D. Abbatt is in the Department of Chemistry, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada;
[email protected].
JChemEd.chem.wisc.edu • Vol. 77 No. 9 September 2000 • Journal of Chemical Education
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