Abstract
THIS “entirely revised edition” retains many of the features which characterized the earlier editions. The rapid growth of organic chemistry, however, makes the task of the reviser ever more difficult, and although an earnest attempt has undoubtedly been made to bring this 'classic' up to date by the addition of new chapters, after forty years surely nothing less than complete re-writing and the provision of an entirely new set of diagrams can erase the inevitable signs of age. Much material of purely historical significance might have been sacrificed ; petroleum as an illuminant is relatively unimportant compared with its value as a motor fuel. The latter topic receives far too little attention, an omission which is all the more serious in view of the growing importance of the petroleum industry as a source of basic organic chemicals such as olefines, butadiene, isopropyl alcohol and acetone. No mention is made of the direct production of nitroparaffins from hydrocarbons, and subjects such as plastics and catalytic hydrogenation are given inadequate treatment. Greater care might have been taken in ensuring accuracy, particularly in the new chapter on compounds of biological importance ; xanthophyll is not an oxide of carotene, ergosterol has long been known to possess twenty-eight carbon atoms, and different molecular formulae for cholesterol are given on different pages.
Theoretical Organic Chemistry
Dr.
J. B.
Cohen.
Revised edition by Dr. P. C. Austin. Pp. xv+622. (London: Macmillan and Co., Ltd., 1942.) 10s.
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JONES, E. Theoretical Organic Chemistry. Nature 152, 90 (1943). https://doi.org/10.1038/152090c0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/152090c0