Reviews

Abstract

This is a German book about the role of radioactivity in the Earth sciences, but most of the text is in English. It starts with a Vorwort written in smooth academic German and follows with a Preface in a not‐so‐smooth English translation. “Um der Originalitat der Beiträge willen wurde auch Zweisprachigkeit angestrebt.”1 (Page v.)The book is a symposium of 12 articles by 15 authors, with a brief introduction by Robley D. Evans. In the first article, ‘Radioactivity of the Lithosphere,’ J. A. S. Adams discusses the abundance, the distribution, and the effects of radioactive isotopes in the Earth's crust. His summary suffers from too much reliance on previously published summaries; Rankama (1054), for instance, is invoked 14 times. Natural and artificial radioactivity of the oceans and its implications for oceanography are knowledgeably covered by F. F. Koczy and J. N. Rosholt in a long article with the basic data neatly summarized at the end. Next, Erik Eriksson gives a brief review of the radioactivity of groundwaters and the use of radioactive tracers in studies of groundwater movement. W. R. Eckelmann attempts to summarize the fundamentals, methods, and salient results of nuclear age determination in 12 pages and necessarily leaves much unsaid. There follows a chapter in German by H. Israël, discussing radon in the soil and in the atmosphere, often making good use of mathematics, and briefly considering atmospheric radioactivity contributed by nuclear bomb tests. O. Haxel and G. Schumann give a clear and critical discussion, in German, of cosmic‐ray‐produced radioactive isotopes in the atmosphere, at the Earth's surface, and in meteorites. Then Bert Bolin, in English again, outlines the application of radioactive isotopes to the study of the motion of the atmosphere. He emphasizes theoretical considerations, wending his way nimbly through a difficult field. The deposition of radioactive isotopes on atmospheric aerosols and the behavior of these aerosols are discussed in a lengthy and thorough German article by Christian E. Junge. (The interested student may prefer to read Junge's book Air Chemistry and Radioactivity, 1963, in English.) In the article ‘Radioactive Precipitations and Fall Out,’ L. Facy covers essentially the same topic in English, but from a French physicist's point of view. He has apparently labored without the benefit of an English‐speaking editor. There follows a long chapter by A. T. Krebs and N. G. Stewart on the biological effects of radioactivity, in English with German overtones. This reviewer is not qualified to weigh the biological contents of the article, but the style is rough. It was startling to learn from Figure 2, page 250, that an unspecified ‘Anti‐Nausea‐Mittel’ is about 10,000 times more alpha active than ‘Schmutz von einem Londoner Dach.’ (Is radioactivity good for mal de mer? We'll take the dirt on London roofs.) G. Schumann's chapter, entitled ‘Meßmethoden,’ gives a thorough basic coverage of the techniques and methods of radioactivity measurement, but has a list of references which is typographically forbidding. The final article, by A. Ehmert, covers geophysical aspects of cosmic radiation, its intensity, and its interaction with the Earth's magnetic field thoroughly and clearly in German. It is, perhaps, the most readable of all the chapters. The book closes with a brief appendix giving the radioactive series of uranium and thorium, a Namenverzeichnis, a Sachverzeichnis (Deutsch‐Englisch), and a Subject Index (English‐German). ” … a subject index in the two languages will facilitate the study of the book.“ (Page vii.)