Candid Science III: More Conversations with Famous Chemists

by István Hargittai, Magdolna Hargittai (Editor)

In this invaluable book, 36 famous chemists, including 18 Nobel laureates, tell the reader about their lives in science, the beginnings of their careers, their aspirations, and their hardships and triumphs. The reader will learn about their seminal discoveries, and the conversations in the book bring out the humanity of these great scientists. Highlighted in the stories are the discovery of new elements and compounds, the VSEPR model, computational chemistry, organic synthesis, natural products, polysaccharides, supramolecular chemistry, peptide synthesis, combinatorial chemistry, X-ray crystallography, the reaction mechanism and kinetics, electron transfer in small and large systems, non-equilibrium systems, oscillating reactions, atmospheric chemistry, chirality, and the history of chemistry.

520 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2003

About the author

Istvan Hargittai is a University Professor at the Institute of General and Analytical Chemistry, Budapest Technical University. He is also a Research Professor and Head of Department at the Structural Chemistry Research Group of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences at Eötvös University, and is a member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and the Academia Europaea (London).

Reviews

[Aleksandr · Rating 5 out of 5]

The third book of its series (pleasantly featuring several scientists I had a chance to know personally). The author, a famous structural/physical chemist himself, did an excellent job of conserving the personalities and insider stories of other famous scientists for the history, through direct and friendly interviews. This series, with its adopted style, shows the inseparability of scientific discoveries and scientists' lives, presenting the scientific process in the most natural and realistic way possible.