Vol. 3  Iss. 5  The Chemical Educator  © 1998 Springer-Verlag New York, Inc.

ISSN 1430-4171 http://journals.springer-ny.com /chedr S 1430-4171 (98) 05242-4

Modern Liquid Phase Kinetics by B. G. Cox. Oxford University Press, 1994. 92 pp. ISBN 0-19-855744-2. $12.95.

This little volume contains some novel aspects: the chapter on solvent effects is especially pleasing and the last chapter on two-phase liquid systems, while regrettably brief, is a most welcome inclusion. The two references to nonlinear least squares fitting of data to models is welcome, but the hawking of a selected commercial product seems inappropriate.

Nonetheless, I would be reluctant to adopt it for my classes. The writing, while refreshingly correct grammatically and syntactically, is often vague logically. It is difficult enough to get the modern student to read anything, without having unclear writing. Lack of clarity discourages the sort of close reading we want of our students.

The positioning of the sidebars is not always well thought-out (pp 5–6) and the quality of the graphics is sometimes (pp 26, 28-29. Fig 3.2 - 3.4) so poor as to make one or more of the traces unreadable.

For two chapters, 4 and 6, no problems are included.

Other questions, to my mind, include:

• Is the half-life method of order determination (p 11) used by anyone these days? Similarly is the CSTR method (p 19) used for kinetic investigations? Or is the method mentioned for the benefit of pilot-plant engineers?
• I have never seen k-T data sufficiently precise to enable the experimental determination of the order, n, (p 20) of the nonexponential temperature dependence of a rate parameter.
• Two different situations, pre-equilibria and steady formation of an intermediate, result in additive denominator terms in rate laws. If I were a student reading the treatment given here (p 31), I would be uncertain how to distinguish them.
• Fig. 1 (p 42) gives the wrong impression for solutions: collisions are not intermittent, rather new encounters are.
• Table 4.12, the properties of solvents would be far better positioned at the beginning of the chapter before terms such as polarity are introduced.
• Although the last sidebar (p 45) is correct in stating the activation parameters are "standard states", it is unclear what the mandate to define them clearly is intended to convey to the student.
• The dielectric constant (p 54) is called the relative permittivity (p 59); the latter of course is more modern but the two terms are bound to confuse some students.