Molecular driving forces: statistical thermodynamics in chemistry and biology

by Ken A. Dill and Sarina Bromberg. Garland Science (Taylor & Francis Group), New York, 2003. 686 pp. $109

The book "Molecular driving forces: statistical thermodynamics in chemistry and biology" by Ken Dill and Sarina Bromberg, published by the Garland Science publisher in 2003, is the most comprehensive and useful book I have ever read on the the topic of thermodynamics.This book starts from an elementary introduction of probability calculation, and gradually extends to the free energy and entropy concepts, based on which a lot of phenomena are clearly explained (both microscopically and macroscopically),  like surface tension, diffusion, catalysis, phase transition, electrostatics, cooperativity, etc. A special topic on polymer science is also discussed (Dr. Ken. A. Dill used to be a postdoc of  Dr. Paul J. Flory (1, 2)), which is not common for a textbook on this topic.There are several merits that make it a very good textbook. First, the prerequisite requirement is low. All mathematical tools are included in the book chapters or appendixes. Secondly, the authors have a very clear thought on explaining the topic. Each chapter is based on the text in the previous chapters and all of them are well connected. The reader will feel no gap between them. Thirdly, the authors use a very friendly style in discussing the topics. Also, the authors are frank about the knowledge in discussion. No obscure expression (linguistically or mathematically) is used. Everything is expressed in a direct and easy to understand manner. But there are also some flaws of this book. Besides some typos (not intended by the authors), some exercise questions are not well stated. Sometimes the reader has to guess what the authors really want to say. Also, the book does not cover the non-equilibrium thermodynamics, therefore some recent advances in statistical thermodynamics are not discussed. Although with these little flaws, this is really a good book to study if one is interested in learning thermodynamics.

References:

1.The homepage of Ken. A. Dill's group (http://www.dillgroup.ucsf.edu/)

2. Dill and Flory. Molecular organization in micelles and vesicles. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U S A. 1981, 78:676–680.

Steven Wang

e-mail: stevenaura [at] ou.edu

December 17, 2009