(1) Practical Physiological Chemistry (2) Biological Chemistry (3) An Introduction to Biophysics

Abstract

THE curricula of most universities represent Natural Science as being made up of a number of subjects: geology, mineralogy, chemistry, physics, zoology, botany, human anatomy, and physiology, astronomy being grouped rather with mathematics than with natural science. Twenty years ago such a classification represented not only the scaffold on which the staniiard of departmental teaching and examination was erected, but it also represented the current conception of the limits between subject and subject. Where will these limits be twenty years hence? Everywhere the boundaries are disappearing; the physicist has made far-reaching additions to the basal conceptions of chemistry, the zoologist has largely forsaken animal morphology for fatherless frogs and the inheritance of sex characteristics. Of no department of science have the boundaries become less distinct than they have of physiology. One phase of the change which is taking place is emphasised by the publication of the three books, the titles of which stand at the head of the present article.

(1) Practical Physiological Chemistry.

By Dr. J. A. Milroy Prof. J. H. Milroy. Third edition. Pp.ix+449+ii pls. (Edinburgh: W. Green and Sons, Ltd., 1921.) 21s. net.

(2) Biological Chemistry.

By Dr. H. E. Roaf. Pp.xvi+216. (London: Methuen and Co., Ltd., 1921.) 10s. 6d. net.

(3) An Introduction to Biophysics.

By Dr. D. Burns. Pp. xiii+435. (London: J. and A. Churchill, 1921.) 21s. net.