PRELTMIXARY XOTE
334 I
T_
~MEMIYA
AISD
H.
HIRATA.
chromizrm, paper presented her. 1963.
2 N.
??Ah’AKA
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K_
OGI~O.
3 x_ -~F&SAKA, ;K. KxTO 4 G. SCHWARZENB~CH.
Received
January
_~X-D
Base
at
the
Bz&_
R_
for
Am-ma1
Symposium.
c?ze??z.
sot.
T_er_4arrrs~r.
fk?
sgzrare-wave
Sddimts
on
~obYographic
Po!arography.
determittatio>r
Nagoya.
of
Ko\,ern-
34 (x96x) logo. Cfienz. SOG. fapan, 31 (r95S) 1S3_ Titmtion. Ferdinand E&e, Stuttgart. 1gs.7~ ]aparz,
BdL
Die kornple.rotnctrischP
rqth, 1964
Book
Reviews
The Agar Preciifiitation Technique aztd its A;b#katiox as a Diagnostic arm? AmzLyytical Tool, by F. PEETOOX, Charles C. Thomas, Springfield, Illinois, and Oliver Sr Boyd, Edinburgh, 116 pages, 35s.
technique This book describes a development of i!l e Ouchterlony agar-precipitation fo;. the study of antigen-antibody reactions. The immuno-electrophoresis method consists of agar thin-layer electrophoresis of antigens, followed by diffusion of antibody into the gel. With suitable geometry, field strength, etc., the resulting and can yield useful diagnostic precipitatior?. patterns are often characteristic, information concerning abnormal serum conditions. The book contains useful practical information and mai@ hitherto unpublished results on variuus blood conditions and as such will be us@ful to diagnostic biochemists and serologists_ The book is, however, a very indiffere& translation into English. The style is jerky, and many sentences &re either ungrammatical or very 0”DSCUre. For example, the opening sentence is rather fascinating, azxd one on p_ 27 can be unravelled after some guessxyork. There.are niany typographical errors (a temperature on page g is given as & 8o”C, for example). The chapters dealing with experimental results record many inconclusive and incompletely analysed experiments. Phrases such as, ‘In some cases together the_.line is slightly thickened . _ _ _ . but in general distinctly weakened’, with.phrases such as ‘on a few occasions’, ‘is rarely as great as’, ‘often lowered’, etc., are indicative of the: lack pf diagnostic precision that the technique gives in many situations. This state of affairs arises partly from biological variability, but a more rigorous approach to much of the data would have been better. B. A. PETHICA, Unilever Research Laboratory Port Sunlight, Cheshire J_ EZeciroannL CBenz., 7 (1964) 334
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by V. G. LEVICK, Prentice-Hal&
1962,
700 pages,
BOOK
335
REVIEWS
and this is a translation of the revised edition of xg5g_ In the last few years several attempts at the formidable task of translation have foundered. Consequently, it is greatly to the credit of Professor SCRKVEX and Scri@z Te&nicu that they have succeeded in producing such an excellently clear and readable text. Very few errors have been noted and most of these are likely to be obvious to the reader even without referring to the Russian text, e.g., page 3. first line ‘not’ is omitted; page IO, the lrst line refers to rot v not to the velocity; page 305. line 9, ‘regeneration’ shoulri be ‘reduction’; page 560. in the sentence below equation (IIO.XS) the phrase ‘number of cations transferred’ should read ‘transport number of the cations’_ Professor LEVICH'S book is concerned with the region between physics, chemistry and engineering which is accurately described by this title. Most of the important subjects covered are those in which he has made outstanding contributions leading to his world-wide reputation, and the book provides ample evidence of his skill as a theoretician with the gift of physical insight. The book beg-ins with a summary of the theory of hydrodynamics on which the rest of the book is based. Electrochemists who have not access to the original papers in Acfa F~z..sicoc~rinl-icn will be particularly glad to have the full discussion of the rotating disc electrode_ They will also, no doubt, find much to interest them in the chapter on irreversible electrolytic processes, electrophoresis, the precipitation of disperse systems in flowin, c media and the theory of polarography (especially of the polarographic maximum). In the first of these the more experimentally inclined reader may find it helpful to start with the comparison with experiment beginning on page 301, rather with the theoretical treatment which lo&cally precedes it. Much of the material in these chapters is closely related to the remaining chapters on heat transfer, motion induced by capillarity and waves on liquid surfaces so that the whole book is of great interest to the theoretical electrochemist. The book is well produced with clear type and only the occasional misprint. Most of the equations (and there is a great number) have been photocopied from the original so that no errors have been introduced here. Like the original, the translation has no index, but there is a detailed contents list_ The price is very much more reasonable than some other translations of less importance_ ROGER
PARSONS,
University
of Bristol