Journal of Molecular Structure (Theochem), 279 (1993) 32 1-322 Elsevier Science Publishers B.V., Amsterdam

Book Reviews

321

Mathematical Modeling in Chemistry, Proceedings of the PACIFTCHEM ‘89 Symposium on the Progress in Mathematical Modeling in Chemistry, Honolulu, HI, USA, 17-22 December 1989, edited by P.G. Mezey; VCH, Weinheim, Germany, 1991,386 pp. DM 265.

This book contains a collection of papers based on lectures presented at the PACIFICHEM ‘89 Symposium Progress in Mathematical Modeling in Chemistry. The Symposium was held in Honolulu, HI, USA on 17-22 December, 1989 and was or- ganized by well-known mathematical chemists H. Hosoya (Tokyo), M. RandiC (Des Moines) and P.G. Mezey (Saskatoon). This book was edited by P.G. Mezey and represents the reprint of the special issue of the Journal of Mathematical Chemistry (Vol. 7, No. 1-4, 1991), published by J.C. Baltzer A G, Scientific Publishing Company, Basel, Switzer- land.

The editor has partitioned the book into the following four topics: (i) Stereochemistry and Shape Analysis; (ii) Reactivity and Reaction Modeling; (iii) Chemical Properties and QSAR; and (iv) Algorithmic Approaches and Miscel- laneous topics. Each of the first two groups contains four papers. In the third group there are seven papers and in the last group six contribu- tions. The authors are well-known researchers in the area of mathematical and computational chem- istry from the USA, Russia, Japan, Canada and UK.

This reviewer has found especially useful for his current research interest a collection of papers in the third group reporting the latest developments in modeling the structure-property-activity relation- ships. The authors have discussed a number of novel approaches for mathematical characterisa- tion of chemical structures and several 2-D and 3-D QSAR techniques. Therefore this part, as well as the whole book, will serve, as it might be anticipated,

as a useful reference for all interested in the field of mathematical modeling in chemistry in general and in QSAR in particular. I believe that this was the aim of the editor and he did a good job.

In ending this brief review I note that although topological aspects of some polyhedra have been discussed in several papers, I find amusing that buckminsterfullerene (C,,, carbon cluster whose soccer-ball structure is modeled by a truncated icosahedron) was not referred to by any author in the book.

NT

Quantum Chemistry (Fourth Edition). By Ira i. Levine; Prentice Ha& Englewood Cliffs, NJ 07632, USA, 1991,620 pp.

This is the fourth edition of this well-known text which has received an enthusiastic welcome since its first appearance. The text is directed at advanced undergraduate courses and also for research students commencing their M.Sc. and Ph.D. schemes of study. The text has been expanded and amongst the improvements made are the addition of worked-out examples in the text; the addition of summaries to the first fourteen chapters; answers are included for nearly all the numerical problems found in the text and a great simplification of per- turbation theory included. A great deal of new material is added including a section of Moller- Plesset perturbation theory; the coupled-cluster method; density-functional theory; AM1 and PM3 methods and the important Gauss-Jordan elimina- tion procedure. Important topics which have been expanded include comparisons of different methods; the molecular mechanics method; con- figuration interaction; basis sets and Hartree-Fock method. These changes improve the aim of giving students a basic understanding of quantum