Textbook of Biochemistry

This book was originally written as a biochemistry textbook for medical, dental, agricultural, and general college students. The present edition is a marked improvement over the first in that a number of errors have been corrected and much worthwhile additional material has been included. The book is outstanding in its simplicity. Facts are stated clearly and concisely, with detailed discussion and controversial material, sources of confusion to the student, being practically absent. The book represents, in this respect, one of the best works in fundamental biochemistry. Despite its lack of detailed discussions, this text does not suffer from being too brief. The viewpoint of the author may be criticized as too chemical for a student of medicine, but this may be related to the fact that the author has attempted to write a textbook to meet the needs of all students of biochemistry. It is not surprising, therefore, that this book is not an ideal one for medical students. The physiological and practical aspects of biochemistry receive perhaps too little emphasis. However, this text, when supplemented by lectures as presented in a medical school, will adequately fulfill the biochemical requirements of the medical student. It is somewhat unfortunate that the author has, in some instances, chosen to reproduce rather old data in certain sections of his book, and has not prepared tables which would include recent information and which would therefore be more complete and accurate. For example, on page 51 the table showing the amounts of amino acids isolated from protein could have been made more complete and a number of the values altered to include more recent analytical data. The 'table on page 283, presenting the summary of information on the conversion of amino acids to glucose or to acetoacetic acid, dates back to the investigations of Dakin; and many of these now require alteration and expansion in view of more recent information obtained by subsequent investigators and by other methods of approach. The same criticism can be made of certain of the discussions of the metabolism of the individual amino acids. In these paragraphs the author has ignored changes in information occurring in the past few years. Notwithstanding the above-mentioned criticisms, Dr. Harrow's book presents a good fundamental basis for biochemistry instruction. Its concise-ness and clarity are admirable. A list of references at the end of each chapter guides the student to supplementary reading. Chapters dealing with …