The Beauty of Chemistry: Art, Wonder, and Science

The Beauty of Chemistry: Art, Wonder, and Science

The Beauty of Chemistry: Art, Wonder, and Science

The Beauty of Chemistry: Art, Wonder, and Science

Hardcover

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Overview

Images and text capture the astonishing beauty of the chemical processes that create snowflakes, bubbles, flames, and other wonders of nature.

Chemistry is not just about microscopic atoms doing inscrutable things; it is the process that makes flowers and galaxies. We rely on it for bread-baking, vegetable-growing, and producing the materials of daily life. In stunning images and illuminating text, this book captures chemistry as it unfolds. Using such techniques as microphotography, time-lapse photography, and infrared thermal imaging, The Beauty of Chemistry shows us how chemistry underpins the formation of snowflakes, the science of champagne, the colors of flowers, and other wonders of nature and technology. We see the marvelous configurations of chemical gardens; the amazing transformations of evaporation, distillation, and precipitation; heat made visible; and more.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780262044417
Publisher: MIT Press
Publication date: 05/11/2021
Pages: 392
Sales rank: 499,515
Product dimensions: 8.10(w) x 9.10(h) x 1.20(d)

About the Author

Philip Ball is the author of many critically acclaimed books of popular science, including Critical Mass: How One Thing Leads to Another, The Elements: A Very Short Introduction, and Beyond Weird: Why Everything You Thought You Knew about Quantum Physics Is Different. Wenting Zhu is an artist, designer, and photographer. Yan Liang is Associate Professor at the University of Science and Technology of China and the founder and producer of the educational brand Beauty of Science. He has worked as a science animator and illustrator.

Table of Contents

ELEMENTAL: THE CHARISMA OF CHEMISTRY
1 EFFERVESCENT: THE BEAUTY OF BUBBLES 
2 ORDERLY: THE CHARM OF CRYSTALS 
3 INSOLUBLE: THE POWER OF PRECIPITATION 
4 EXUBERANT: THE DELIGHT OF DENDRITIC GROWTH 
5 INCENDIARY: THE FASCINATION OF FLAMES
6 GALVANIZING: THE ENCHANTMENT OF ELECTROCHEMISTRY
7 CHROMATIC: THE CURIOSITY OF COLOR CHANGES IN PLANTS
8 CALESCENT: THE HELPFULNESS OF HEAT
9 ORGANIC: THE CONTORTIONS OF CHEMICAL GARDENS
10 CREATIVE: THE PROFUSION OF PATTERNS
POSTSCRIPT: ART, WONDER, AND SCIENCE
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
APPENDIX: MOLECULES AND STRUCTURES
GLOSSARY
SOURCES OF QUOTATIONS
INDEX

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"With atomic clarity, science writer Philip Ball narrates this visual tour through the under-appreciated chemical beauty that surrounds us..." — WIRED

"Ball’s scintillating book is a paean to chemical beauty in nature and laboratories, with lavish images created by Wenting Zhu, Yan Liang and the Chinese Chemical Society..." — Nature

"Far from portraying a routine lab procedure, this collection showcases chemistry's excitement and aesthetic allure." — Scientific American

“Philip Ball is a serendipitous writer, pursuing adventurous science. He loves to persuade and enchant his readers to celebrate the uncanny beauty of chemistry.”
Dudley Herschbach, Nobel Laureate in Chemistry, Harvard University

“This book combines rich descriptions of chemical phenomena with stunning photography of them as they happen. As a child, I was drawn to chemistry by the wonders of precipitating powders, fizzy water, and other ever-present phenomena. The Beauty of Chemistry took me back to those times.”
Alán Aspuru-Guzik, Professor of Chemistry and Computer Science, University of Toronto

Ousiophiles unite! This book is a sensory feast that truly brings to life the ‘chemical sublime,’ presenting it joyfully, with scintillating images. Using remarkably concise language, Ball pleasingly telescopes in scale from the visible to the subatomic level, giving a rich dimensional exploration of the elements and their properties. This book sparkles, bubbles, and bursts with the activity of all that surrounds us. It is curiosity-igniting, deeply satisfying, and a must for anyone who delights in ‘stuff.’” 
Martha Willette Lewis, Visual Artist in Residence, The Yale Quantum Institute

“Philip Ball offers a lively illustrated conversation centered on the beauty of chemistry rather than its oft-examined utility. His observations meander gracefully through bubbles, flames, plant pigments, and much more, and will both captivate a wide audience and provide a refreshingly upbeat boost for the most jaded professional.”
Hagan Bayley, Professor of Chemical Biology, University of Oxford
 
“This book captures the aesthetics, not the mess, the mystery, not the complexity, and most of all the fundamental importance of chemistry to our everyday lives. It shows why chemists are really the musicians of matter.”
Leroy Cronin, Regius Professor of Chemistry at the University of Glasgow

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