- Email: [email protected]
Generation of aerosols and facilities for exposure experiments
Book Reviews The Handbook of Variables for Environmental Impact As~~ment. on the other hand, does have an index. It is a substantial book, albeit produced by offset from typed copy. It comprises an attempt to gather together in virtually schematic form a checklist of factors to be considered in the preparation of an environmen~l impact assessment document. A brief iutr~uction explains how the book was put together and, to some degree, how to use it. Everything thereafter is bits and pieces. Out of a shopping fist of almost 200 possible environmental aspects, the authors have selected 62 as the key variables, and have assigned to each some sort of weighting scale, leading to a value of that variable between zero and one, in the order of increasing acceptability. Each variable is defined and a very sketchy description given for the technique for measuring it; brief guidance is given as to the means of predicting the impacts, and remarks are then appended. Finally, bibliographical resources are cited. Generally speaking, each separate variable rates about 1 to 3 pages of material. In view of the route of development of environmental impact assessment in the U.S., it is fascinating that the authors considered but rejected the question of species extinction as an important variable. It is rather too bad. Among atmospheric variables, carbon monoxide, hydrocarbons, oxides of nitrogen, particulate matter and diffusion were selected. Ironically, neither sulfur oxides nor visibility were thought important enough to select. though they were present in the original fist considered. Substantial sections of the discussions of the 4 air pollutant variables are identical in wording, with the blanks simply filled with the name of the pollutant under discussion. Proof reading is careless; the secondary standards for particulate matter are certainly in error. The EPA party line has been accepted without question; we are told, for example, that “adverse health effects have been observed with carbon monoxide concentrations of 12-17mgm-3 for 8 h”. Concentrations of 40 ppm are characterized as “toxic levels”. In a word, this is a good try, and undoubtedly a useful and
Effectsof Acid ~~ipi~t~n on Terrestrial Ecosystems, edited by T. C. Hutchinson and M. Havas, NATO Conference Series I : Ecology, Plenum Publishing Corp., 227 W. 17th St., New York, N.Y. 10011, 1980. xi + 653 pp. Price $49.50. Generation of Aerosols and Facilities for Exposure Experiments, edited by Klaus Wifleke, Ann Arbor Science Publishers, Inc.,.P.O. Box 1425, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48106, 1980. ix + 597 pp. Price $33.95. These two Proceedings volumes arrived on my desk within a few days of each other. The former volume is the Proceedings ofa conference held in Toronto in May of 1978; the fatter ofa symposium held as part of a rather chaotic American Chemical Society meeting in Hawaii in April of 1979. Despite the diversity of subject matter, these two Proceedings volumes have important similarities and differences that are worth exploring, and it therefore seems reasonable to review them together. I have commented previously on the dilemma of the symposium editor; it simply takes a great deal more time to produce a heavily edited, error-free, aesthetic volume with a good index than to compromise all down the line in the interest ofgetting thevolume out whifeit isstilfrecent enough to be interesting. Very well now, students, which volume is produced by offset from typed copy, with the greatest number of typographical errors, and the less satisfactory index? Needless to say, it is the volume on acid precipitation, almost a year longer in the preparation than the other.
1213
important exercise. However, those actually performing environmental impact assessments will consider it as definitive at their own peril. The final volume here is, in contrast to the others, a textbook, arising from the author’s teaching experience at the University of Chicago. The subject matter is sufficiently specialized that it is obviously pointed at the advanced student. My own examination of the book was conditioned by the fact that I had read Lovelock’s volume, Gaia only a short while before.Thecontrast between Schopf’s dry and objective presentation, and Lovelock’s near mysticism, finally left me a trifle exasperated with both. For example, Lovefock makes a major case out ofa possible feedback loop that controls ocean salinity through a biological route involving the isolation of blocks of seawater by coral growth, and the laying down of evaporite deposits. Schopf remarks in passing that evaporite formation probably had something to do with maintaining ocean salinity, and then sails on without further remark on the subject. I wound up feeling that, given the opportunity, I should introduce the two gentlemen and then sit back and watch the resulting ~nversationaf ping-pong. Taking the author at face value, this appears the only volume of its kind presently in existence. Accordingly, those concerned with the evolution of the paleoenvironment should undoubtedly welcome the book, which is well anotated and decently indexed. It is mathematically very simple indeed, but assumes a rather thorough knowledge of the geological vocabulary. To sum up all five books, it is well to know that they exist. None can be recommended for the entire cross-section of readership of this Journal. Any of them could contain an odd fact that some reader would need to know, and there are undoubtedly a few persons who will need acutely to own one of the books. It boggles the mind to consider that any reader might need two of them. JAMESP. LODGE,JR.
That is not to say that either volume is without the kind of faults that arise from hurried preparation. Both are reporting on international symposia, and both had English as the official language. Unless an editor has a great deal of time to spare, the resulting papers will to some extent reflect the fact that the authors’ best languages were not English. Both sport subject indices that appear to have been compiled without the full text in hand; Willeke’s book also has an author index with somewhat the same problem (but it has an author index!). What I mean to say here is that, where figures appear on different pages from the descriptive text, subject matter and references cited in the figures and their captions are not entered in the index. In addition, the Hutchinson/Havas volume is only infrequently indexed in its discussion report sections. Since the acid pr~ipitation volume is addressed in considerable measure to biologists, there is, in addition to the subject index, an index by species. However, as nearly as one can tell this seems to have been compiled by leafing through the book and spotting species names by the fact that they are underlined; a subsequent discussion of the same species, using a common name, will not be entered in the species index. Annoy~gly, from the standpoint of the non-biologist, the authors who throw species names around, and the species index itself, appear to assume that they will have no readers who are not skilled biologists; nowhere is there a glossary, footnote, or even mention in the text of common names in immediate juxtaposition to systematic names. Overall, then. despite a longer publication fag, the acid precipitation volume
1214
Book Reviews
gives the appearance of a more hurried preparation than the one on aerosols. However, what about the meat? Here it must be admitted that both represent excellent symposia, well planned, and attracting a cross-section of the leading workers in the respective fields. If the final conclusions of the HutchinsoniHavas volume are less definite than those of Willeke’s book. it is because of the relative maturity of the two fields. There was another basic structural difference between the two symposia; the former had both plenary and submitted papers, while the latter was entirely invited to give a precisely balanced cov’erage. The latter does not preserve discussion of individual papers: in fact. if memory serves me correctly, there was little. The former used the somewhat unusual device of a rapporteur for each general topic. who made notes and then produced a summary of both the papers themselves and the ensuingdiscussi~~l~s. The result IS somewhat intermediate between an ‘executive summary“ and a “workshop report”. For some reason that is not altogether clear. it appears that the papers were given in somewhat different order than they appear in the book. This sometimes makes it difficuit to turn back and forth between the rapporteur’s summary and the actual papers, In addition, although there is no indication of it otherwise, there were ;t few ppefS presented that appareut~y are not included here. It would have been helpful if there had been some sort offlag to indicate papers presented but not submitted for publication in the volume. During the last few days, my reading has brought me face to face with a number of very interesting assertions, For example, one writer of presumably impeccable technical training made the Rat assertion that rt may take a major revolution in western countries to halt the present epidemic spread of environmentally induced cancer. Now, students, you will not get the answer to this one from either of these books, but I ask you. is that statement true or false? Well. as a matter of fact. it is neither: simply meaningless by virtue of proceeding from an incorrect premise. You cannot stop something with or without a revolution when that something is not happening. The fact is that there has been some mcreasc in iung cancer attributable to increased cigarette smoking, but that agccorrected Cancer incidence has been stable for years. With
some other causes of death removed. and a decreasing birth rate, a larger percentage of the population is surviving long enough to die of cancer. Well, that was perhaps a slightly unfair question. Let us get on to the one that pertains to the first of the volumes under review. Only today 1 read. in the writing of a presumed environmental expert, that acid rainfall is causing widespread denudation of land. True or false? In fact, this volume, after all of its great thickness, concludes that there is not a single provable case. This is not true of aquatic environments, Claims that some lakes have been virtually sterilized by acid rain seem unfortunately) to be quite true. However. where land denudation has occurred, it is invariably attributable to the direct effects of gaseous pollutants. In fact, some species were so uncooperative as to grow better after being heavily dosed with real or simulated actd rain! This is not tosay that the volumeconcludes that acid r-air1is demonstrably innocuous or positively beneficial. Quite properly, the conclusion at this point is the Scottish verdict of “not proven’.. It is not possible to extract such tantalizing pteces of information/misinformation out of the other book; whatever our states of ignorance may be, the technology of dosing ammals and people with known amounts of aerosols IS in reasonable shape. The questions arise after the exposure, tn the interpretation of the measured presence or absence of physiological response. in all seriousness, both of these volumes cover their chosen subject matter admirably. Their internal organization. with the exceptions noted above, is logical and comprehensive. Hut~h~nson and Havas’ volume is targeted squarely at the biotogist interested in its subject matter, and is moderately difficult reading for even those in reasonably adjacent fields. Willeke’s book, covering basic principles, generation and monitoring in addition to actual exposure facilities, 3s probably accessible to a broader spectrum of readership, at least for part of its total length. Both represent good reports of the state of their respective arts.
Ion Chromatographic Analysis of Environmental Pollutants, Vol. 2, edited by J. D. Mulik and E. Sawicki, Ann Arbor Science Publishers, Inc., Ann Arbor. MI 48106.1979, xi + 435 pp. Price $37.50.
mare, since it would make him somewhat redundant. t Now, in solemn truth, the job demand for analytical chemists has never been better. The countercurrent distribution apparatus is generally relegated to the back corners of the laboratory, gathering dust. The atomic absorption apparatus is used heavily, and for good reason ; however. there must be easily Ifxxt papers in the literature on ckver techniques for overcoming matrix effects in the beast. There are probably an equal number of papers on ways to get around the assorted shortcomings of gas chromatography. Picking up another strand of thought, I have commented in the past on the problems of pubhshing symposia. However, I probably gave too little notice to the problems that arise when highly specialized symposia move into print without the involvement of a nonspecialist, or at least of somebody who was not present at the symposium. The editor was sitting there when the slides appeared on the screen, and all of the ambiguity was removed by the speaker with his pointer. The editor is himself totaify immersed in the subject matter. and fails to recognize that papers are presented in a jargon so dense as to be incomprehensible to anyone who is even a few ~llimeters outside the immediate group of believers. The editor heard the oral presentations and remembers them, and fails to spot the typographical errors in the manuscripts. Put these two thoughts together, and you have a reasonably good cba~c~r~~t~on of the present volume. Jt
At about the time that I tinished graduate school, a separation technique cailed countercurrent distribution had just come into vogue. It was almost standard for chemists, on their qualifying examinations, to be asked a couple of questions about the separation of closely related compounds. All you had to do was answer. “I would separate them by countercurrent distribution.” It really did not matter whether you had ever seen the hardware involved, or had the foggiest notion what pair of solvents would be suitable for the separation. You were simply up to the minute if you knew that this was the universal technique for separating difficult mixtures. Older chemists with good memories will also recall the loud proclamations of atomic absorption spectroscopy as an analytical method totally free of matrix effects, and of gas chromatography as the ultimate technique for analyzing almost everything. I am sure that nearly all analytical chemists have fantasies of an uhimate “everything analyzer”: a black box with a trapdoor at oneend into which any sample whatever can be fed, and with a slot at the other end out of which the typed analytical answers would be ejected. (Alternatively, the analytical chemist may regard this as a night-
.l \MFS P. t..oin,t, JR.
Effectsof Acid ~~ipi~t~n on Terrestrial Ecosystems, edited by T. C. Hutchinson and M. Havas, NATO Conference Series I : Ecology, Plenum Publishing Corp., 227 W. 17th St., New York, N.Y. 10011, 1980. xi + 653 pp. Price $49.50. Generation of Aerosols and Facilities for Exposure Experiments, edited by Klaus Wifleke, Ann Arbor Science Publishers, Inc.,.P.O. Box 1425, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48106, 1980. ix + 597 pp. Price $33.95. These two Proceedings volumes arrived on my desk within a few days of each other. The former volume is the Proceedings ofa conference held in Toronto in May of 1978; the fatter ofa symposium held as part of a rather chaotic American Chemical Society meeting in Hawaii in April of 1979. Despite the diversity of subject matter, these two Proceedings volumes have important similarities and differences that are worth exploring, and it therefore seems reasonable to review them together. I have commented previously on the dilemma of the symposium editor; it simply takes a great deal more time to produce a heavily edited, error-free, aesthetic volume with a good index than to compromise all down the line in the interest ofgetting thevolume out whifeit isstilfrecent enough to be interesting. Very well now, students, which volume is produced by offset from typed copy, with the greatest number of typographical errors, and the less satisfactory index? Needless to say, it is the volume on acid precipitation, almost a year longer in the preparation than the other.
1213
important exercise. However, those actually performing environmental impact assessments will consider it as definitive at their own peril. The final volume here is, in contrast to the others, a textbook, arising from the author’s teaching experience at the University of Chicago. The subject matter is sufficiently specialized that it is obviously pointed at the advanced student. My own examination of the book was conditioned by the fact that I had read Lovelock’s volume, Gaia only a short while before.Thecontrast between Schopf’s dry and objective presentation, and Lovelock’s near mysticism, finally left me a trifle exasperated with both. For example, Lovefock makes a major case out ofa possible feedback loop that controls ocean salinity through a biological route involving the isolation of blocks of seawater by coral growth, and the laying down of evaporite deposits. Schopf remarks in passing that evaporite formation probably had something to do with maintaining ocean salinity, and then sails on without further remark on the subject. I wound up feeling that, given the opportunity, I should introduce the two gentlemen and then sit back and watch the resulting ~nversationaf ping-pong. Taking the author at face value, this appears the only volume of its kind presently in existence. Accordingly, those concerned with the evolution of the paleoenvironment should undoubtedly welcome the book, which is well anotated and decently indexed. It is mathematically very simple indeed, but assumes a rather thorough knowledge of the geological vocabulary. To sum up all five books, it is well to know that they exist. None can be recommended for the entire cross-section of readership of this Journal. Any of them could contain an odd fact that some reader would need to know, and there are undoubtedly a few persons who will need acutely to own one of the books. It boggles the mind to consider that any reader might need two of them. JAMESP. LODGE,JR.
That is not to say that either volume is without the kind of faults that arise from hurried preparation. Both are reporting on international symposia, and both had English as the official language. Unless an editor has a great deal of time to spare, the resulting papers will to some extent reflect the fact that the authors’ best languages were not English. Both sport subject indices that appear to have been compiled without the full text in hand; Willeke’s book also has an author index with somewhat the same problem (but it has an author index!). What I mean to say here is that, where figures appear on different pages from the descriptive text, subject matter and references cited in the figures and their captions are not entered in the index. In addition, the Hutchinson/Havas volume is only infrequently indexed in its discussion report sections. Since the acid pr~ipitation volume is addressed in considerable measure to biologists, there is, in addition to the subject index, an index by species. However, as nearly as one can tell this seems to have been compiled by leafing through the book and spotting species names by the fact that they are underlined; a subsequent discussion of the same species, using a common name, will not be entered in the species index. Annoy~gly, from the standpoint of the non-biologist, the authors who throw species names around, and the species index itself, appear to assume that they will have no readers who are not skilled biologists; nowhere is there a glossary, footnote, or even mention in the text of common names in immediate juxtaposition to systematic names. Overall, then. despite a longer publication fag, the acid precipitation volume
1214
Book Reviews
gives the appearance of a more hurried preparation than the one on aerosols. However, what about the meat? Here it must be admitted that both represent excellent symposia, well planned, and attracting a cross-section of the leading workers in the respective fields. If the final conclusions of the HutchinsoniHavas volume are less definite than those of Willeke’s book. it is because of the relative maturity of the two fields. There was another basic structural difference between the two symposia; the former had both plenary and submitted papers, while the latter was entirely invited to give a precisely balanced cov’erage. The latter does not preserve discussion of individual papers: in fact. if memory serves me correctly, there was little. The former used the somewhat unusual device of a rapporteur for each general topic. who made notes and then produced a summary of both the papers themselves and the ensuingdiscussi~~l~s. The result IS somewhat intermediate between an ‘executive summary“ and a “workshop report”. For some reason that is not altogether clear. it appears that the papers were given in somewhat different order than they appear in the book. This sometimes makes it difficuit to turn back and forth between the rapporteur’s summary and the actual papers, In addition, although there is no indication of it otherwise, there were ;t few ppefS presented that appareut~y are not included here. It would have been helpful if there had been some sort offlag to indicate papers presented but not submitted for publication in the volume. During the last few days, my reading has brought me face to face with a number of very interesting assertions, For example, one writer of presumably impeccable technical training made the Rat assertion that rt may take a major revolution in western countries to halt the present epidemic spread of environmentally induced cancer. Now, students, you will not get the answer to this one from either of these books, but I ask you. is that statement true or false? Well. as a matter of fact. it is neither: simply meaningless by virtue of proceeding from an incorrect premise. You cannot stop something with or without a revolution when that something is not happening. The fact is that there has been some mcreasc in iung cancer attributable to increased cigarette smoking, but that agccorrected Cancer incidence has been stable for years. With
some other causes of death removed. and a decreasing birth rate, a larger percentage of the population is surviving long enough to die of cancer. Well, that was perhaps a slightly unfair question. Let us get on to the one that pertains to the first of the volumes under review. Only today 1 read. in the writing of a presumed environmental expert, that acid rainfall is causing widespread denudation of land. True or false? In fact, this volume, after all of its great thickness, concludes that there is not a single provable case. This is not true of aquatic environments, Claims that some lakes have been virtually sterilized by acid rain seem unfortunately) to be quite true. However. where land denudation has occurred, it is invariably attributable to the direct effects of gaseous pollutants. In fact, some species were so uncooperative as to grow better after being heavily dosed with real or simulated actd rain! This is not tosay that the volumeconcludes that acid r-air1is demonstrably innocuous or positively beneficial. Quite properly, the conclusion at this point is the Scottish verdict of “not proven’.. It is not possible to extract such tantalizing pteces of information/misinformation out of the other book; whatever our states of ignorance may be, the technology of dosing ammals and people with known amounts of aerosols IS in reasonable shape. The questions arise after the exposure, tn the interpretation of the measured presence or absence of physiological response. in all seriousness, both of these volumes cover their chosen subject matter admirably. Their internal organization. with the exceptions noted above, is logical and comprehensive. Hut~h~nson and Havas’ volume is targeted squarely at the biotogist interested in its subject matter, and is moderately difficult reading for even those in reasonably adjacent fields. Willeke’s book, covering basic principles, generation and monitoring in addition to actual exposure facilities, 3s probably accessible to a broader spectrum of readership, at least for part of its total length. Both represent good reports of the state of their respective arts.
Ion Chromatographic Analysis of Environmental Pollutants, Vol. 2, edited by J. D. Mulik and E. Sawicki, Ann Arbor Science Publishers, Inc., Ann Arbor. MI 48106.1979, xi + 435 pp. Price $37.50.
mare, since it would make him somewhat redundant. t Now, in solemn truth, the job demand for analytical chemists has never been better. The countercurrent distribution apparatus is generally relegated to the back corners of the laboratory, gathering dust. The atomic absorption apparatus is used heavily, and for good reason ; however. there must be easily Ifxxt papers in the literature on ckver techniques for overcoming matrix effects in the beast. There are probably an equal number of papers on ways to get around the assorted shortcomings of gas chromatography. Picking up another strand of thought, I have commented in the past on the problems of pubhshing symposia. However, I probably gave too little notice to the problems that arise when highly specialized symposia move into print without the involvement of a nonspecialist, or at least of somebody who was not present at the symposium. The editor was sitting there when the slides appeared on the screen, and all of the ambiguity was removed by the speaker with his pointer. The editor is himself totaify immersed in the subject matter. and fails to recognize that papers are presented in a jargon so dense as to be incomprehensible to anyone who is even a few ~llimeters outside the immediate group of believers. The editor heard the oral presentations and remembers them, and fails to spot the typographical errors in the manuscripts. Put these two thoughts together, and you have a reasonably good cba~c~r~~t~on of the present volume. Jt
At about the time that I tinished graduate school, a separation technique cailed countercurrent distribution had just come into vogue. It was almost standard for chemists, on their qualifying examinations, to be asked a couple of questions about the separation of closely related compounds. All you had to do was answer. “I would separate them by countercurrent distribution.” It really did not matter whether you had ever seen the hardware involved, or had the foggiest notion what pair of solvents would be suitable for the separation. You were simply up to the minute if you knew that this was the universal technique for separating difficult mixtures. Older chemists with good memories will also recall the loud proclamations of atomic absorption spectroscopy as an analytical method totally free of matrix effects, and of gas chromatography as the ultimate technique for analyzing almost everything. I am sure that nearly all analytical chemists have fantasies of an uhimate “everything analyzer”: a black box with a trapdoor at oneend into which any sample whatever can be fed, and with a slot at the other end out of which the typed analytical answers would be ejected. (Alternatively, the analytical chemist may regard this as a night-
.l \MFS P. t..oin,t, JR.