Physical Organic Chemistry

Abstract

IN the preface to this volume Prof. Hammett truly says: “It is one of the commonest occurrences in the development of science that the necessary subdivision of the subject leads to a temporary neglect of phenomena lying on the borders between specialised fields.” Fortunately, both in Great Britain and in the United States this extreme specialization has not prevented chemists from recognizing that fundamental physical theories are quite as applicable to problems in organic chemistry as they are to studies of the simpler inorganic compounds. Chemical studies of reaction mechanisms can have little value unless they are developed from basic theories of molecular structure and statistical thermodynamics. These have been summarized logically in the first third of this volume and thereafter have been applied to the quantitative consideration of the majority of the well-known reactions of organic chemistry.

Physical Organic Chemistry:

Reaction Rates, Equilibria and Mechanisms. By Prof. Louis P. Hammett. (International Chemical Series.) Pp. x + 404. (New York and London: McGraw-Hill Book Co., Inc., 1940.) 26s.