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Edwin Hubble. Mariner of the nebulae
particular volcanic IO. There are also some excellent plates and useful appendices. This book cannot be described as ‘a good read’ but that is not its intention. It is a workmanlike and complete reference book that should be available to all those interested in planets in general and Jupiter in particular. An indication of the time it has taken to publish the book is that it refers to the Shoemaker-Levy cometary impact (July 1994) as a future event but the book was not available for review until late 1995! M.M. Woolfson
Molecular Modeling. From Virtual Tools to Real Problems. Edited by Thomas E Kumosinski and Michael N. Liebman. Pp. 520. American Chemical Society, 1994. $119.95. ISBN 0 8412 3042 0. An accurate knowledge of the precise threedimensional structure of a molecule is an essential part in the full understanding of its function. Visualization of either real or modelderived data is a key prerequisite in this process. Since the number of known Biosequences far outnumbers those of known structures, the ability to model a molecular structure and hence make informed decisions relating to structure-function and associated properties is of great importance to structural biologists, good scientists, biophysicists and biotechnologists the world over. This book gives an authoritative view of the full arsenal of techniques available in the fields of X-ray crystallography and NMR, as well as molecular dynamics, CD, FTIR and others. The reader is presented with a balance of well-illustrated experimental examples allied to theoretical techniques with critical evaluation of their use and importance to the field of model-building. This book will be an invaluable resource to anyone working with new proteins, small molecules, polysaccharides and carbohydrates in their endeavour to extract maximal information from known structures and apply this to the systems which they are studying. S.J. Yewdall
The Collected Papers of Albert Einstein, Volume 5. The Swiss Years: Correspondence, 1902-l 914. Translated by Anna Beck. Don Howard, consultant. Pp. 384. Princeton University Press, 1995. Paperback f19.50, $29.95. ISBN 0 691 00099 9. This volume is intended to be used in conjunction with the documentary edition of Volume 5. There, the correspondence from one of the most fruitful periods in Einstein’s extraordinary scientific career is published in its original language (usually German), together with an introduction, editorial notes on various themes, and extensive footnotes. Without the aid of this documentation
the translations of this volume provide a fascinating but necessarily extremely fragmented glimpse into Einstein’s scientific work, the politics of his profession, and his personal life. In 1902 Einstein began work in the Swiss Patent Office; by 1914 he had been appointed to a prestigious position in Berlin. His correspondents range from intimate friends, such as the Habichts and Solovine. to scientific luminaries such as Planck, Wien, Lorentz and Sommerfeld; the letters range in tone from the playful to high seriousness. While testifying to his deep interest in radiation and quantum theory in particular, the sometimes extremely vigorous scientific discussions are most often stimulated by the queries of others or reflect areas already well known to Einstein. Only rarely do they provide new insight into the ways he was approaching the problems in quantum theory or relativity that so absorbed him. Richard Staley
Edwin Hubble. Mariner of the Nebulae. By Gale f. Christianson. Pp. 407. Farrar, Strauss & Giroux, 1995. $27.50. ISBN 0 374 14660 8. Edwin Hubble was a larger-than-life astronomer, and Gale E. Christianson’s is a biography to match. Born in 1889 in a village in Missouri, Hubble was a man of enormous energy. A good athlete, an almost prototype Rhodes Scholar at Oxford (where he read law, having been frightened off mathematics), a Ph.D. at Chicago (on the photographic images of faint nebulae), and an officer in the US army at the end of World War I, he next accepted an earlier invitation to work with the great telescopes at Mount Wilson, California, arriving there just as the great lOO-inch telescope came into service. From his first great discovery, that of a Cepheid variable in the great Andromeda nebula, to his most memorable, that the nebulae appear to be receding from us in a systematic way, Hubble’s strength was not that of a theoretician but of a talented observer with an eye for the unusual. While his biographer’s flights of scientific adulation are often excessive, it has to be said that good use is here made of personal memorabilia, for example of the diaries of Edwin’s wife Grace. The book, in short, is an excellent portrayal of the social existence of an astronomer whose instincts were more imponant than his theoretical knowledge. John North
Carbon Forms and Functions in Forest Soils. Edited by J. M. Kelly and W. W. McFee. Pp. 594. Soil Science Society of America, 1995. $77.00. ISBN 0 89118 818 5. The publications of the Soil Science Society of America are very often excellent value for money, and this volume is no exception.
The text, based upon the proceedings of the 8th North American Forest Soils Conference in 1993, contains 21 contributions from a distinguished international group of scientists, with particularly strong representation from America and Canada. Topic coverage is wide, with particularly noteworthy sections on organic matter characterization, carbon cycle effects on soil formation, effects of management on the carbon cycle, and interactions of the carbon cycle with major nutrient cycles. Contributions range from detailed site studies to more general review papers. The book deserves to be widely read, not just by soil scientists with leanings towards chemistry, pedology and fertility. but also by forest managers and environmentalists with interests in carbon pools from the climate change perspective. Individual sections are generally well written, up-to-date and appropriately referenced, in a style that will appeal at levels from senior undergraduates to seasoned researchers. Either fortuitously or as a consequence of editorial diligence, conclusions are often drawn in a broad rather than a local context, which adds considerably in places to the thought-provoking attributes of the book. Malcolm
Cresser
The Geology of Switzerland. An Introduction to Tectonic Facies. By Kenneth J. Hsii. Pp. 250. Princeton University Press, 1995. f40.00, $55.00. ISBN 0 691 08787 3. The Alps have been an inspiration to geologists, proving fertile ground for the development of many geological ideas. Hsti’s book aims to introduce the geology of Switzerland to students. Swiss geology is reviewed, starting with rocks of the Jura, before tackling more deformed and metamorphosed areas. Much historical detail is presented (no bad thing) and the overall effect is very traditional, based firmly in classical stratigraphy. Despite recent advances, modem structural geology, petrology and sedimentology are absent. No attempt has been made to integrate the results of studies in various disciplines to provide a coherent view of Switzerland’s geology. The last part of the book details Hsti’s Tectonic facies concept, which seems to have been created in ignorance of modern structural geology: it does not belong here. The book does not succeed in its aim. Hsii remarks on the problem of understanding Swiss geology because of the detail included in many papers. He is guilty of the same error - why is the ‘Schams dilemma’ discussed? Students cannot be introduced to Swiss geology with no maps of the country, nor its context in the rest of the Alpine chain. The lack of structural and petrological detail is a further major omission. There is a need for a good overview of Swiss geology, but this book does not provide it. Andrew Barnicoat
45
Molecular Modeling. From Virtual Tools to Real Problems. Edited by Thomas E Kumosinski and Michael N. Liebman. Pp. 520. American Chemical Society, 1994. $119.95. ISBN 0 8412 3042 0. An accurate knowledge of the precise threedimensional structure of a molecule is an essential part in the full understanding of its function. Visualization of either real or modelderived data is a key prerequisite in this process. Since the number of known Biosequences far outnumbers those of known structures, the ability to model a molecular structure and hence make informed decisions relating to structure-function and associated properties is of great importance to structural biologists, good scientists, biophysicists and biotechnologists the world over. This book gives an authoritative view of the full arsenal of techniques available in the fields of X-ray crystallography and NMR, as well as molecular dynamics, CD, FTIR and others. The reader is presented with a balance of well-illustrated experimental examples allied to theoretical techniques with critical evaluation of their use and importance to the field of model-building. This book will be an invaluable resource to anyone working with new proteins, small molecules, polysaccharides and carbohydrates in their endeavour to extract maximal information from known structures and apply this to the systems which they are studying. S.J. Yewdall
The Collected Papers of Albert Einstein, Volume 5. The Swiss Years: Correspondence, 1902-l 914. Translated by Anna Beck. Don Howard, consultant. Pp. 384. Princeton University Press, 1995. Paperback f19.50, $29.95. ISBN 0 691 00099 9. This volume is intended to be used in conjunction with the documentary edition of Volume 5. There, the correspondence from one of the most fruitful periods in Einstein’s extraordinary scientific career is published in its original language (usually German), together with an introduction, editorial notes on various themes, and extensive footnotes. Without the aid of this documentation
the translations of this volume provide a fascinating but necessarily extremely fragmented glimpse into Einstein’s scientific work, the politics of his profession, and his personal life. In 1902 Einstein began work in the Swiss Patent Office; by 1914 he had been appointed to a prestigious position in Berlin. His correspondents range from intimate friends, such as the Habichts and Solovine. to scientific luminaries such as Planck, Wien, Lorentz and Sommerfeld; the letters range in tone from the playful to high seriousness. While testifying to his deep interest in radiation and quantum theory in particular, the sometimes extremely vigorous scientific discussions are most often stimulated by the queries of others or reflect areas already well known to Einstein. Only rarely do they provide new insight into the ways he was approaching the problems in quantum theory or relativity that so absorbed him. Richard Staley
Edwin Hubble. Mariner of the Nebulae. By Gale f. Christianson. Pp. 407. Farrar, Strauss & Giroux, 1995. $27.50. ISBN 0 374 14660 8. Edwin Hubble was a larger-than-life astronomer, and Gale E. Christianson’s is a biography to match. Born in 1889 in a village in Missouri, Hubble was a man of enormous energy. A good athlete, an almost prototype Rhodes Scholar at Oxford (where he read law, having been frightened off mathematics), a Ph.D. at Chicago (on the photographic images of faint nebulae), and an officer in the US army at the end of World War I, he next accepted an earlier invitation to work with the great telescopes at Mount Wilson, California, arriving there just as the great lOO-inch telescope came into service. From his first great discovery, that of a Cepheid variable in the great Andromeda nebula, to his most memorable, that the nebulae appear to be receding from us in a systematic way, Hubble’s strength was not that of a theoretician but of a talented observer with an eye for the unusual. While his biographer’s flights of scientific adulation are often excessive, it has to be said that good use is here made of personal memorabilia, for example of the diaries of Edwin’s wife Grace. The book, in short, is an excellent portrayal of the social existence of an astronomer whose instincts were more imponant than his theoretical knowledge. John North
Carbon Forms and Functions in Forest Soils. Edited by J. M. Kelly and W. W. McFee. Pp. 594. Soil Science Society of America, 1995. $77.00. ISBN 0 89118 818 5. The publications of the Soil Science Society of America are very often excellent value for money, and this volume is no exception.
The text, based upon the proceedings of the 8th North American Forest Soils Conference in 1993, contains 21 contributions from a distinguished international group of scientists, with particularly strong representation from America and Canada. Topic coverage is wide, with particularly noteworthy sections on organic matter characterization, carbon cycle effects on soil formation, effects of management on the carbon cycle, and interactions of the carbon cycle with major nutrient cycles. Contributions range from detailed site studies to more general review papers. The book deserves to be widely read, not just by soil scientists with leanings towards chemistry, pedology and fertility. but also by forest managers and environmentalists with interests in carbon pools from the climate change perspective. Individual sections are generally well written, up-to-date and appropriately referenced, in a style that will appeal at levels from senior undergraduates to seasoned researchers. Either fortuitously or as a consequence of editorial diligence, conclusions are often drawn in a broad rather than a local context, which adds considerably in places to the thought-provoking attributes of the book. Malcolm
Cresser
The Geology of Switzerland. An Introduction to Tectonic Facies. By Kenneth J. Hsii. Pp. 250. Princeton University Press, 1995. f40.00, $55.00. ISBN 0 691 08787 3. The Alps have been an inspiration to geologists, proving fertile ground for the development of many geological ideas. Hsti’s book aims to introduce the geology of Switzerland to students. Swiss geology is reviewed, starting with rocks of the Jura, before tackling more deformed and metamorphosed areas. Much historical detail is presented (no bad thing) and the overall effect is very traditional, based firmly in classical stratigraphy. Despite recent advances, modem structural geology, petrology and sedimentology are absent. No attempt has been made to integrate the results of studies in various disciplines to provide a coherent view of Switzerland’s geology. The last part of the book details Hsti’s Tectonic facies concept, which seems to have been created in ignorance of modern structural geology: it does not belong here. The book does not succeed in its aim. Hsii remarks on the problem of understanding Swiss geology because of the detail included in many papers. He is guilty of the same error - why is the ‘Schams dilemma’ discussed? Students cannot be introduced to Swiss geology with no maps of the country, nor its context in the rest of the Alpine chain. The lack of structural and petrological detail is a further major omission. There is a need for a good overview of Swiss geology, but this book does not provide it. Andrew Barnicoat
45