Customer Reviews

Dynamic Light Scattering: With Applications to Chemistry, Biology, and Physics (Dover Books on Physics)

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Dynamic Light Scattering is a classic text, that presents a comprehensive and in-depth overview of the underlying physics and principles of DLS. The description is developed with the associated mathematics of fluctuations and time correlation functions, as well as various physical aspects of Brownian Motion. Examples drawn from physics, chemistry and biology are used to illustrate the usefullness of DLS in studying a diverse range of problems including cell motility, macromolecular dynamics, dynamics of anisotropics objects (rod-like particles, viruses), electrolytic solutions, etc. The book is ESSENTIAL for everyone with interest in 1) dynamics of complex fluids 2) Brownian Motion of particles and 3) Single Molecule Imaging!

The text is a beautifully written treatise on various applications of DLS, with a very insightful commentary on how various dynamics is detected by light, how underlying structure and relaxations translate to observable, how observables can be deduced by mathematical principles based on statistical mechanics (including non-equilibrium thermodynamics). This is a fairly advanced text, so I would advise someone to get a soft introduction to his/her topic of choice (polymers, gels, rods, colloids, cells, polyelectrolytes, etc.) and basic statistical mechanics before picking this text. Being a Dover publication, the book is priced cheaper than it ought to be:), and hence must make its way to the shelf of people who have any lasting interest in DLS. The book by Wyn Brown is a useful supplementary text (and includes more modern references, but comes at a high price). This book is an exercise in the mathematics of correlation functions, and associated hydrodynamics equations, and definitely requires concerted effort to become beneficial to the reader.

I find that Dover's books are simply excellent and this text is no exception. The order of the material in the book is logical: starting with the basics of autocorrelation to how Maxwell's equations lead to intensity of scattered radiation. Then, that crucial leap from the theory of scattering to how radiation is measured by different detectors is made and what they lead to in terms of correlation functions. The book expands on the basics of ideal, non-interacting isotropic scatters to more complex situations. Many references are provided. Since DLS has applications in protein dynamics, I used this text as background.