| HOME | HELP | FEEDBACK | SUBSCRIPTIONS | ARCHIVE | SEARCH | TABLE OF CONTENTS |
|
|
|
|||||||
|
|||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Department of Agronomy University of Kentucky Lexington, KY 40546-0091
(mark.coyne{at}uky.edu)
Edited by A. Violante, P.M. Huang, J.-M. Bollag, and L. Gianfreda, Elsevier Science, Sara Burgerhartstraat 25, P.O. Box 2118, 1000 A.E. Amsterdam, the Netherlands. 2002. 456 p. $150 hardcover. ISBN 0-444-51039-7.
This book represents Volume 28B in the "Developments in Soil Science" series and is the second of two volumes presenting papers from the third symposium on "Soil Mineral-Organic Matter-Microorganisms Interactions and Ecosystem Health," held in Naples-Capri in 2001. The 31 articles of this volume include studies on Bacillus thuringiensis toxins (three articles), unique soil/mineral environments (three), ecosystem assessment (five), ecophysiological and anthropogenic interactions (six), bioremediation (six), heavy metal effects (five), two articles on Salmonella detection and humic acid formation, respectively, and a summary chapter.
As in Volume 28A, the editors and publisher provide ample grounds for criticizing the preparation of their book. There are some significant structural weaknesses including poor editing, broken paragraphs, and a non-inclusive index; the price ($150) is excessive considering how much of the book an individual might actually use; and the work rarely presents cutting-edge research that is prospective in respect to the book's overall theme. My major criticism is that the articles are poorly organized: similar themes are often widely separated, and some articles have no obvious reason for inclusion in the scope of this volume. Unlike Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz, the readers are given no obvious road to follow.
This lack of direction is unfortunate, because many of the articles are quite good, and I wish that the impressions made at the beginning of the book had been maintained throughout the rest of the text. The opening article by Stotzky on the effects that clays and humic acids have on B. thuringiensis toxin activity, for example, is a model for students on how to write a concise review. I would highly recommend that any graduate student contemplating the literature review for their thesis or dissertation read the chapter before they start. Likewise, articles on biofilms, the rhizosphere, and phytoremediation, though retrospective, are lucid overviews of each topic. Tate and Rogers provide a cogent assessment of various methods to assess ecosystem diversity and the limitations of population studies. Ruggiero et al. do an excellent job reviewing the mechanisms of xenobiotic binding and aging.
The remaining topics explored in Volume 28B are soil processes and measures of ecosystem health as affected by interactions of one or more factors—sometimes clay minerals, sometimes organic matter, sometimes xenobiotics and heavy metals—although some articles, unfortunately, seemed wholly unrelated to the book's theme. Most of the articles were of some interest to a soil microbiologist or biochemist. However, I could not discern how each simultaneously addressed the ecological significance of clay, organic matter, and soil biota interactions, as the book's title implied. Indeed, most articles did not attempt to do so, which diminished their usefulness.
Ultimately, although this book has useful information, I found that there was too little that was truly unique to recommend an individual purchase. And in an environment of declining library resources, this volume and its companion might be a hard sell to a book acquisitions department.
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| HOME | HELP | FEEDBACK | SUBSCRIPTIONS | ARCHIVE | SEARCH | TABLE OF CONTENTS |
