Customer Reviews

From Neuron to Brain: A Cellular and Molecular Approach to the Function of the Nervous System, Fourth Edition

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This highly readable textbook is probably the only one that has successfully dealt with the explosive growth of research and discovery in the exciting field of neuroscience. The 4th edition of the classic by Kuffler and Nicholls maintains the clear, logical and coherent presentation of its predecessors while keeping up with the latest work involving a range of techniques, from molecular genetics to functional MRI. The book's emphasis on the experimental and intellectual basis of knowledge in the field makes it ideal for graduate and advanced graduate students, even those with limited scientific background. It is doubtless no accident that the relatively compact new edition has kept the breadth and depth of earlier editions without becoming unwieldy. Its only real shortcoming is its hefty price, although it is still below most of the competition. It would be nice to see a paperback edition.

I am a physics graduate student who happen to become interested in neuroscience. I had been searching for an introductory book when I stumbled upon this one. Although I am only half-way through the book right now, I could already tell that it is exactly what a newcomer to this field would need. With the terminology clearly defined, the book gives a very concise, clear, and logic description on the fundamentals. It further keeps one's interest high by relating the fundamental knowledges to everyday experiences. What I like most about this book is that it does not shy away from pointing out what is not yet known. With the last chapter devoted to "open questions", it presents the real questions to be answered. This book is really perfect. Highly recommended.

This book is similar in format and style to Principles of Neural Science by Kandel, Schwartz, & Jessell. Nicholls book is half the length of Kandel's, yet just as good. Colored drawings & diagrams are laced throughout the text. It is strongest in auditory physiology, synaptic transmission, vision physiology, & neural development. Clear graphs and line-drawings of intracellular and extracellular recordings abound. Give this book its chance. It should be on the reading list for Medical & Graduate School.

This is an outstanding book - comprehensive, clearly written and beautifully produced, with many useful illustrations.
It takes a bottom up approach, starting with the structure of ion channels and their proteins, and moves on to higher levels of structure and function. Because of the current state of knowledge it is necessarily much more detailed regarding the peripheral nervous system and sensory systems than it is regarding most areas of the central nervous system.
You may be interested in "Phantoms in the Brain" by Ramachandran, a popular but very meaty book that takes the complementary top down approach - starting with the mind as we experience it and looking at medical cases to see how it is constructed by the brain.

I'm a 3rd year graduate student in neuroscience, currently studying synaptic transmission with an electrophysiological approach. With biotechnology as an undergrad, let's just say my neurophysiology background was far from being strong. My PI recommended me this book a couple of weeks ago and I'm just loving it. The part on synaptic transmission (chapters 9 to 11) is simply great. I find things that I've read about MANY times before, on books like Kandel's, Fundamental Neuroscience, and many of the classic big textbooks, but none of them deals with this part as this one does. It's kind of the same issues but with a slightly different perspective, a perspective that I think you're able to appreciate more as you gain some experience in the field. Little details, certain experiments that you might have overlooked as a first year student, suddenly make all the sense. I don't think this is an overly simple book. It is really well written, and that's what I think makes it kind of reader-friendly but again, somehow it gets to deal with classical issues and concepts in a much deeper and USEFUL way (particularly for people actually working on this) than the great majority of other textbooks in this area. As I said in the title of my review, I wish I had learned about this book before, and that's the reason I'm writing this. Hope it helps :)

I am a first year graduate student "accidentally" entering the field of neuroscience. I needed a basic text to help me "catch up". This book has been wonderful! The authors' have a great writing style- easy to read. More importantly, the authors are expert at choosing and presenting important, basic aspects of neurobiology to inexperienced neuroscientists without bogging the reader down with unnecessary and confusing detail. In particular, the authors thoroughly discuss ion channels and their role in neuronal communication, presenting electrophysiology as a valuable tool for studying these channels. This text was "just right" for me. However, if you are an advanced "neuroscientist", this text might be a bit on the "simple" side.

For a long time I've been looking for one reference book in Neuroscience, both compact and up-to-date. I finally found it! I am very pleased with this purchase. The book is new (one 3-star review complained about the condition of the book received) and very user-friendly, starting from the compact ~600 pages in high quality print on fine paper. It is very easy to navigate to specific information: the book provides a comprehensive index and each chapter suggests a short list of reviews and another one of original references on the topic. What's more, the references cited within the text are listed along the same page, so it's very easy to quickly spot a specific source. The diagrams are helpful and kept decent with a minimum of color and accompaning text. All in all, a great book to learn from, as well as keep at hand for quick reference.

This book covers the workings of neurophysics from a very functional and clinical standpoint. Great for electrical engineers (or similar) interested in bio-engineering. The content is very informative, well written, well organized, and well presented. One of my favorite text books (and I have many).

"Neuron to Brain" was purely a recommendation for my Synaptic Transmission class at the University of Pittsburgh. I wanted some solid foundation on the physiological makeup of neurons/cells, etc. so I took the book out at my library first and realized I needed to own my own personal copy! The book is wonderful! Everything goes into such depth, and beyond what I needed to know to some extent, but it never hurts to understand the nuts and bolts of a topic, it only helps you to have a firmer grasp of it all. The book is laid out well, great experimental examples, and awesome figures and diagrams that really supplement the written information. I recommend a stronger biology and chemistry background if you want the book to be a faster read though. Overall, one of the better 'outside of the classroom' purchases I have made and because it wasn't recommended a lot of students didn't think to take a look at it for the first exam. Yet during review sessions, those of us who had purchased the book were able to talk in a much greater depth about topics and concepts from the lectures than anyone else, and we then in turn were asked questions, etc. that could have been answered if only they had purchased the book as well! Again, this book is awesome and it will certainly supplement some of the topics I will cover in the future when I attempt to venture off to grad school!

Very good book for general cellular and molecular neuroscience. Nice figures from real data,experimental techniques, some scientists pictures, serious references, etc.