Customer Reviews

The Physics and Chemistry of Color: The Fifteen Causes of Color

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The book goes through the causes of color in a very well organized manner. The author discusses incandescence, fluorescence, phosphorescence, ligand field theory and all other causes of color. It is written so that any reader with a bachelors degree in chemistry or physics could easily understand it. It contains very informative appendices. I highly recommend the book to science types who are interested in color and its causes.

What I like about this book is the relation between the practical and intuitive side of color (e.g. color perception, minerals, art preservation, everyday objects) and the scientific and technical side (e.g. electronics and vibrational interactions, classical and quantum physical phenomena, chemistry). The topics in this book tie loose ends of knowledge together and makes you go "Ahhhh! I guess I _knew_ that, but I was never able to tie them together before!". You're guaranteed to learn or relearn several new things every time you read the book. I have had several inquires about selling the book, but have always turned them down. This is one of the few books which inspire you to be curious about the world.

Nassau succeeds in presenting a very readable treatment on the causes of color in natural and synthetic materials. He strikes a good balance between technical detail and ease of digestion, and leaves the more complex material for appendices.

The volume is enlightening, informative, fairly complete and enjoyable reading, even for those casually interested in the subject.

If you want to get a good understanding from where all the colors you see
do come from, and you have some undergraduate level knowledge in basic
chemistry (elements, crystal structure, ions, etc.) and quantum mechanics
(blackbody radiation, energy levels in an atom, etc.), then this book
must be your place to start! You will be amazed how many different
mechanisms create the sensation, which we call color! The book is just
right for this: not too overwhelming with details, yet giving a fairly
good *basic* understanding about all the ways the Nature creates colors.
It also contains references to lots of other books in case you would like
to understand some of these mechanisms deeper. What is especially
amazing is that we still don't completely understand, at least at the
quantitative level, how many of these mechanisms exactly work!

Discusses a number of topics in a short and clear way. Of course more topics could be discussed and more in depth, but Nassau does a good job keeping the book small and pleasantly readable. After reading it you will have gained a fair insight in the diversity of colour generation. Photo's could be better.