Product Description

What are things made of? 'Everything is composed of small mollycules of itself, and they are flying around in concentric circles and arcs and segments,' explains Sergeant Fottrell in Flann O'Brien's The Dalkey Archive. Philip Ball shows that the world of the molecule is indeed a dynamic place. Using the chemistry of life as a springboard, he provides a new perspective on modern chemical science as a whole. Living cells are full of molecules in motion, communication, cooperation, and competition. Molecular scientists are now starting to capture the same dynamism in synthetic molecular systems, promising to reinvent chemistry as the central creative science of the new century.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1874784 in Books
• Published on: 2003-02-18
• Released on: 2003-02-18
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 224 pages

From Amazon.co.uk
"Molecules", Philip Ball writes in Stories of the Invisible, "are the smallest units of meaning in chemistry", the words, if you will, made up of atomic letters. In this lively essay, full of such useful metaphors, Ball shares his longstanding fascination with the unseen world once again, explaining some of the issues that guide modern biochemistry.

Consider a sheep, Ball offers, a congeries of "millions of little bits of sheepness". That animal is a blend of molecules, tens of thousands of varieties of them, many of them found in the grass, sky and water that make up the sheep's environment, many of them shared with other animals and humans. It has been the task of modern chemistry to dissect matter, to tease out underlying structures and commonalities--and, Ball adds, to learn how to make of its constituent elements things that do things, "such as cure viral infections or store information or hold bridges together". How chemistry has done so, making body armour of spider silk and modelling computer networks on "molecular logic", drives Ball's discursive, entertaining, and eminently practical survey.

A trustworthy explainer of scientific matters to lay readers, Ball writes with clarity and grace--and the more difficult the concept, it seems, the better. --Gregory McNamee

From Publishers Weekly
"Kevlar [a DuPont product] is one of the best candidates... for tethering a space platform.... But gram for gram, silk is stronger still," explains Philip Ball (H2O: A Biography of Water) in Stories of the Invisible: A Guided Tour of Molecules. Thus does this Nature magazine writer and editor render practical and navigable the abstractions of invisible science. "Our metabolic processes are primarily about making molecules. Cells cannot survive without constantly reinventing themselves: making new amino acids for proteins, new lipids for membranes." But Ball's biological explanation for life, thought and action is no dry, joyless drone: "That a conspiracy of molecules might have created King Lear... makes the world seem an enchanted place." Pop-science enthusiasts will eat it up. Illus.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
A consultant editor for Nature, Ball uses the same refreshing style evident in his previous books (e.g., Life's Matrix: A Biography of Water) to bring the world of chemistry to the lay reader. This latest work tackles the world of molecules, explaining topics such as bioengineered materials, nanotechnology, intra- and intercellular communication, and molecular or DNA computing. Along the way, the reader receives short courses in genetics, biochemistry, and organic synthesis, getting just enough background to grasp the cutting-edge research that Ball introduces. Indeed, this book is a veritable tour of the late 20th-century Nobel prizes in chemistry and medicine, conveying the hope and excitement of modern-day chemistry, or, as Ball would have it, molecular science. Related books, none more than a decade old, are suggested for further reading. Recommended for public and college libraries. Wade M. Lee, Univ. of Toledo Libs., OH
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.