Chemistry Books

Dr. Kain's science books provide marvelous supplemental activities for children to experience the excitement of science. The activities are great for kids with learning handicaps and offer them the opportunity to enjoy and learn outside of a more rigid curriculum. Children are introduced to the concept of the scientific method in a fun and hands-on fashion. Teachers are given ideas for extending the activities into other academic disciplines. And finally there is a wealth of additional resources available in the back of the teacher's manual for those who wish to expand upon the concepts introduced in the books.

I heartily endorse the use of these books by educators of children in grades K through 5.

Erin E. Flory, 5th Grade Special Education Teacher, California

I have never seen kids look so excited when reading a book as I have when they were reading Surprise Explosions. And all of them wanted to do the experiments. One girl asked me to get her a box of baking soda so she could do more at home! What a great way to combine reading and science!

My children love this book! It's so fun they have asked to get more books from the Science Spiders! We all start laughing when Namila makes a mess. And we found out how easy science can be!

As a second grade teacher at the closing of the school year, I found it difficult to keep my students on task and learning. However, after obtaining two Science Spiders books, I was able to provide the children meaningful and fun activties that kept them engaged and learning. The last week of school, we made salt and flour volcanoes, put in the baking soda, and added red food colored vinegar to watch them erupt (as outlined in "Surprise Explosions"). The children were delighted with their volcanoes and took them home. Then out of the "Secret Tricks" book, we tried to lift a yardstick with a newspaper covering it (broke the yardstick), and the kids just roared as kid after kid and finally me, tried to blow a piece of paper into a bottle. I now plan to purchase the rest of the series for use in September. I'll also be recommending this series to our district science committee.

I picked up this book on whim, having never heard Dr. Schwarcz's radio program or seen him on television. I spent the
next few days completely engrossed in his lively tales on the chemistry involved in our daily lives.

Discussed here is the science behind ice cream, aspartame, wheat, bagels, paprika, beer and yes, cookies. Schwarcz also chimes in on the controversies over dental fillings, botulin, lead paints, DNA manipulation and genetic engineering. He shares fascinating stories about some of history's greatest scientists (of particular interest is the inventor of Nylon, who ended up committing suicide, and the man behind chemical warfare, who also saved millions of lives with his fertilizer experiments). There is also a section devoted to debunking health scams and diffusing unnecessary paranoia.

While I didn't agree with all of Schwarcz's opinions (I think he may be a little naive in regards to the dangers of genetic modification), the breadth of his scientific knowledge is impressive and his enthusiasm for science infectious. "The Way the Cookie Crumbles" is an entertaining and informative read for both the scientifically minded and those just interested in learning how to get ink stains out of their clothes (try using limonene or amyl acetate).
GRADE: A-/B+

Primarily, it's a collection of Schwarcz's rather entertaining columns on chemistry. Focusing mostly on food chemistry, Schwarcz presents bite-sized chapters of the perfect size for commuters. He's a master at breaking down complicated chemistry into understandable pieces for those without a degree in chemical engineering. (Those with such a degree will likely find the book to be child's play...) Plus, he has an eye for history and the most important element in any good writing, human interest.

This book is an outstanding addition to the Dr. Joe books. For scientists AND novices alike, this book will entertain you with well written and down to earth stories about one of the most mystifying and misunderstood fields of study in the world. Best of all, the information in this book is not unreachable...but it is based on items that we encounter in day to day life. An entertaining and stimulating read for the inner curiosity that we all have!

Everything Dr Schwarz writes is a masterpiece. As a professional chemist and longtime host of various radio and television science programs, he is able to explain chemistry to the rest of us. And whats even more important is that the subject never feels dry or academic - he presents great stories first and adds the chemistry lessons once you are hooked.

Very interesting Wish for more chemical structures and references would make it easier to follow up on. Certainly makes the worl of chemical sensing come alive o

This book is an information feast, digestible in small bites but too rich to be downed in a single gulp. It's an incredible collection of stories bound together by the thread of `chemistry in nature.' In fact, one of the stories concerns threads---the ancient Romans used to weave a sheer fabric called `linen mist' from the byssal threads of a large mollusk known as the noble pen shell (`Pinna nobilis').

Many of the lessons in chemical ecology concern ants and their sophisticated use of biochemicals to take slaves, grow crops, and manufacture antibiotics. In another chapter called "Real-World Complexities," the author maps the annual fluctuation of Lyme disease as dependent on the interaction of deer, bacteria-carrying deer ticks, mice, oaks, and gypsy moths. If only we could learn from these chemical interactions, before we destroy their ecology.

The author gives tantalizing glimpses at antibiotics, extremophile enzymes that don't break down when used as catalysts, fishing nets that are made out of spider webs, and many other ways we could capitalize on ecology if we took the time to learn from it.

There are many good science project ideas in "Tales of Chemistry in Nature." The book can be profitably read by adults and young adults. For adults already advancing down their chosen career paths, this book is a fascinating look at what the biochemists and ecologists may be learning from nature.

Protos, Prof. William Agosta's opening chapter explains, have kept Lept slaves from time immemorial. The slaves raise their young, gather food for them and keep their homes clean. The Protos excel only at capturing the Lepts, who are remarkably loyal to their Proto masters, even becoming ferocious participants in slave-raids on their own kind. Both the Protos and Lepts are tiny ants, who live out their inter dependent lives in a world no bigger than a dinner table. They are only one of the many mysteries of nature this fascinating book brings to our attention.

Whereas stick insects use ants to disperse their eggs, the scuttle fly lays its eggs in the heads of the unfortunate ants it preys on. Some wasps lay their eggs within the eggs of stick insects while others fool ants into believing that their offspring are ants. The South American crab spider fools carpenter ants by carrying a dead ant in such a way that it walks, smells and looks like an ant. This neat trick allows the spider ant to capture and kill another dumb ant and repeat its bizarre ritual.

Because some 289,000 species of insects act as pollinators of flowering plan, Agosta's fine book shows how and why a lot of deals are cut for self-survival reasons. A single pound of honey, for example, represents the nectar from about 17,000 foraging trips and entails 7,000 bee-hours of labor. The flowers must have all kinds of sophisticated strategies to ensure the busy bees spread their seed. The rhizanthella gardneri, an Australian orchid, must have a peculiarly singular strategy; this is because it blooms underground and depends on scuttle flies to pollinate it. Chimpanzees and parrots, meanwhile, eat special plants when they are sick and some bacteria contain particles that act as compasses.

Life is strange - especially, as Agosta explains, for flower mites, which hitch rides with migrating hummingbirds, spending their summers on the California coast and winter in west-central Mexico. They do this by climbing into the bird's nostrils and alighting at the right flower to survive. They have less than 5 seconds to alight and achieve their "Mission Impossible". Older female mice, meanwhile, trick younger ones into not procreating, a case perhaps of brains over beauty!

As well as discussing a fascinating number of such examples, Agosta ventures further to show how history has been influenced by the lowliest of creatures. Although we generally loathe flies as disgusting creatures, without them, the author shows how our destiny would have been vastly different. Their diseases decimated Napoleon's Haitian army, forced him to sell Louisiana for a pittance to the United States and to abandon the Americas almost entirely. Malaria caused five times more casualties in the Pacific war than did the combatants. Because it is so lethal to humans and their domesticated animals, the tsetse fly keeps large swathes of Africa relatively underdeveloped. However, we are now using cattle urine to trap and exterminate them.

This is not as novel as it sounds. Agosta explains how our ancestors used the urine of wolves and dogs to trap deer. Prof. Agosta also gives us details of a company that sells over the Internet "100% predator urine" to repel raccoon, deer and other unwanted animals.

We live in a beautiful, complex but delicate ecology, where, as the author maintains, mutually beneficial bargains are done to ensure mutual survival. We have upset this balance immeasurably and, as Prof. Agosta's excellent book makes plain, we better make amends if we want the beautiful paradise of nature we have inherited to continue.

The central message of this gracefully written, highly informative, and refreshingly modest book by Rockefeller University Professor Emeritus William Agosta is that there is a wealth of chemicals produced in nature that humans can effectively use to fight disease, control pests, and facilitate chemical reactions--if only we can find, understand and harvest them.

Agosta begins with a tale about a species of ant that enslaves members of another species using a variety of chemicals. He ends the book with the idea that we might find desperately needed new antibiotics by examining the chemicals made by animals "that form herds or flocks, as well as those that live in organized societies, such as the social insects..." (p. 212) Agosta's rationale is that other social creatures face the same danger that humans face, that of pathogens that rapidly spread in a crowd. Surely they have come up with some chemical defenses we might discover and employ ourselves. He cites ants as a particularly likely prospect for study and gives the example of the bulldog ants of Australia who, when injected with the common human intestinal bacterium, Escherichia coli, manufacture an antibiotic that promptly kills it.

In between the bookend chapters, Agosta spins tales about how microbes and insects, plants and sea creatures, fungi and arachnids attract, repeal, steal from, deceive, enslave, parasitize and kill one another, mainly with chemicals. The world he depicts is largely a world where eyes and ears are secondary to the sense of smell, a bizarre fairy land of complicated arrangements among species and delicate ecologies. A case in point is the in-door farm of the leaf-cutting ant which involves not only the ants and the trees they get the leaves from and the fungus they grow, but also the use of a species of streptomyces to produce an antibiotic to kill a fungal pest in their gardens. In other words, not only are ants farmers, they use pesticides!

Agosta emphasizes that we must understand the interactions of species to appreciate their use of chemicals. He uses the phenomenon of Lyme disease as an example, and how it is affected by the mass fruiting cycle of oak tree acorns which influence the numbers of mice and deer on which the ticks that harbor the Lyme disease parasites live. Two years after a bumper crop of acorns there is a concomitant rise in the number of people who get Lyme disease.

In particular, these are tales of parasite and host. I was startled to learn on page 223 that ticks and mites are so prevalent that they have "parasitized almost every organism larger than themselves." Indeed, something similar can be said of the nematodes (roundworms) who "have parasitized virtually every species larger than themselves." (p. 224) When one thinks about the countless viruses and bacteria that prey on humans and all the other animals and plants, one realizes that we live in a world of parasites.

However, the single most startling and mind-expanding thing I read in this book is the story in Chapter 11, "Real-World Complexity," of a wasp that uses a virus to help it subdue the hornworm caterpillars it deposits its eggs in. This opens up the possibility that we can use viruses to invade and kill microbes and cure disease. Perhaps this is already being done in laboratories somewhere, or at least is in the experimental stage.

All this information is interesting, even exciting, and potentially of great use by humans, but if we are to benefit from the chemical knowledge of microbes, plants and animals, we need to preserve what wild life we have left in the world, in particular that of the rain forests where there is such an incredible variety of life. These myriad creatures have, over the vast eons of time, learned to create and manufacture chemicals that we could never discover on our own. It would be a shame to throw away all this knowledge for a few trillion hamburgers....

I recall some years ago that a major corporation had as its advertising slogan: "Better living through chemistry." I used to always think when I heard that, "but life IS chemistry." This book strongly supports that idea.

For those of us who like to tinker with projects at home, carpentry work can sometimes seem intimidating, that is why I highly recommend this book. This book is easy to read and understand. The author takes you step by step on many home projects such as installing and adjusting doors and windows to constructing a closet, which is what I am working on. There are a lot of detailed illustrations which help you see "all of the pieces" coming together. Great book!

I'm not impressed with the authors ethics, but I will offer a very thorough and honest opinion of his book after another read.

I bought this book because we were going to re-do our master bedroom on our own. I wanted it to be exquisit, and I knew that the trim would give it that elegant look we were going for. The author was very thorough with detail and it was very easy to follow. We are very happy with the end results, and our friends are amazed that we did the job ourself! Now we are going to do the entire house! I will be watching for other books from this author in the future.

I highly recommend this instructional guide for Trim Work. The illustrations and photos are spectacular and provide a clear and concise picture. I found the summary and review questions at the end of each section to be very educational and challenging. This is just the book I was looking for to customize my home.

The unique style of the author explaining basic concepts with everyday problem expamples is what makes this book very absorbing and useful.

As a licensed professional engineer and consultant in the Houston, TX area, I found this to be an excellent and useful book. It simplifies and demystifies fundamental chemical engineering principals and effectively illustrates how theory applies to understanding the root cause/s of real world plant operating problems.

The Lieberman's also do a fine job of making the book interesting to read through the use of non-process plant related anecdotes. These anecdotes help the reader understand the principals presented by drawing upon experiences and situations common to everyday life.

I highly recommend this book to engineers of all experience levels who work in the petroleum refining and chemical process industries.

Boringless, easy to understand and real practical book. Reading this book I have troubleshoot many process problems effectively.
I strongly recommend this fantastic practical book for all levels.
arvind bhagat.

I'm a summer intern in an oil refinery and few of my tasks were to rerate exchangers, fin fan coolers, etc., and I didn't have any experience whatsoever! They don't teach at school how this equipment works in a process context and if you don't have a clue on what you're doing, this is the best book to refer to. It is very elementary, but at the same time, it can be very specific. It goes through fundamental steps for troubleshooting general processes as well as clear explanations of how most of the equipment in the industry work. Highly recommended at any level!

The book offers various worksheets on the most common topics covered in any high school chemistry class. They are a life saver because they save hours of worksheet creation time.

This book of worksheets became the most used book in our high school science department for science classes, 9th grade through chemistry; we were constantly swiping it from each other and finally had to make a rule that it lived on MY desk at all times but could be removed long enough to xerox pages. I handed out the worksheets to my chemistry students with the answers for them to do more drill-and-practice.

This book has wonderful reproducible worksheets. They can be used for general practice. If you have limited copies, you can make great overheads from this book.

Manufacturing is a combination of soft and hard skill. The soft-skill is about people and how to manage them. This skill is obvious in several text and business management book. The hard-skill, however, is quite rare. Fortunately, Wright combines it in nice -easy to read format.
The strong point of this book is "comprehensive". Wright composes his thought of manufacturing system today and projected to the future. All manufacturing processes are seamlessly combined from one chapter to another. The integration of CAD/CAM is also mentioned. In addition, his viewpoint of manufacturing system for biotechnology, nanotechnology and information technology are quite interesting -and practical.
If I have to use one book for manufacturing class, I would use this book for teaching. For anyone new to manufacturing process, this book is a must for your jorney to the manufacturing world.

This book is like a breath of fresh air - A totally new and innovative view of manufacturing. It was very different from the traditional boring and dry manufacturing texts I have been used to reading. The book takes a look not only at manufacturing processes but also other aspects like product development and business plans - parts I have not seen in any other textbook. To sum up, I would definitely recommend the book !

This book provides an excellent overview of manufacturing in the new economy. From the perspective of an entrepreneur in today's internet driven world, all aspects from product design to rapid prototyping and computer manufacturing are discussed in detail and with strong reference to the real world. In addition, conventional manufacturing processes like basic machining and metal forming, as well as fairly new industrial directions like biotechnology are outlined with an emphasis on the strong relationship between engineering and business. The book concludes with a realistic vision for the future of manufacturing, and therefore proves to be a 'must have' in the world of engineering and entrepreneurship.

As a physical chemist/spectroscopist by training who suddenly found myself needing to synthesize & characterize some model compounds for my experiments, I found this book to be a very helpful review of modern synthetic techniques, particularly in regards to purifying starting materials, dealing with air-sensitive compounds, and monitoring the reaction's progress. Definitely a recommended reference for any chemist. It's companion, "Advanced Practical Inorganic and Metalorganic Chemistry", is also highly recommended, though if I had to choose between the two I'd say that "Advanced Practical Organic Chemistry" is most useful.

A wonderful book. Whether you're in need of a nomograph, quick info on your solvents/reagents(as well as some common procedures for certain reagents), or if you're about a senior-undergrad/1st-2nd year grad student working in an organic lab and need a little refresher crash course, this book has it all(in a general sense). Contains a brief, but concise, walkthrough of considerations before starting a desired reaction all the way through the work-up and purification(very, very nice). As the previous reviewer said, and I agree completely, this book is a must-have for any organic chemist.

The book discusses fundamental techniques in organic laboratory. Topics that I found very useful are running the reaction (i.e. air-sensitive and water-sensitive chemistry), monitoring reaction (i.e.thin-layer chromatography), working up reaction (have you wondered why ammonium chloride is a good reagent to work up the reaction? how to efficiently separate layers without emulsions?, etc), purifying compounds (i.e. distillation, recrystallization, determining the sizes of columns, choice of eluting solvents,...) The book should be on the shelf of every chemist.

I have used this book in two separate research presentations and it remains an invaluable library reference. Even the beginning forensic explosives researcher can glean surface information on the categorization and analysis of explosives and residues. The price is indeed steep; obviously, it would best fit into a library utilized by many people.

A person who wants to know about detecting explosive

Who in their right mind would pay that much money for a dumb book

I couldn't praise this little book enough if I wrote another book about its virtues. The only problem with it that I have is that it is over too quick and the fact that this piece is meant to be little more than a coffee table book is to be taken into consideration, but due to the price and the quality of the information I feel confident in my choice to make a glowing review for this book. It is a brilliant summary of the lesser working as Plant Alchemy has been called. Yes there have been more complete introductions to practical Spagyria (Plant Alchemy) and there have been better books written on the theories of alchemy but this book has gems not found in any of the other books I've read on the subject. Need to collect Angel Water (morning dew, especially collected in Spring) for an operation such as distilling the Archeus of water? Turn to page 30 for instructions on how to produce a hygroscopic plant salt from oak bark. Want to know how to make charcoal for heating? Turn to page 52. This little book even has a skeletal description of the process of producing "Bhasmas", an Indian spagyric medicinal product which alchemically bridges the vegetable and mineral kingdoms! This book has all this and is beautifully illustrated to boot. An excellent notebook for beginners, informative and attractive.

These Books would be excellent primers for the aspiring Alchemist:

The Practical Handbook of Plant Alchemy: An Herbalist's Guide to Preparing Medicinal Essences, Tinctures, and Elixirs

Path of Alchemy: Energetic Healing & the World of Natural Magic (Pathways to Enlightenment)

Alchemists Handbook: (Manual for Practical Laboratory Alchemy

This is an excellant little book. Very nice paper and illustrations. It is more of a concise introduction. Would definately consult a chemistry manual if you are planning to conduct any of the distillations. But, all and all very nice. I actually purchased it as a gift for my mother, but I did read it first.

I have most of the books in this series and this is my current favorite. It's filled with interesting information and is a great quick read. Don't be thinking you'll be the next Alchemist on your block, it's more for entertainment than practicality, but it's a fun read none the less.