This penetrating case study of institution building and entrepreneurship in science shows how a minor medical speciality evolved into a large and powerful academic discipline. Drawing extensively on little-used archival sources, the author analyses in detail how biomedical science became a central part of medical training and practice. The book shows how biochemistry was defined as a distinct discipline by the programmatic vision of individual biochemists and of patrons and competitors in related disciplines. It shows how discipline builders used research programmes as strategies that they adapted to the opportunities offered by changing educational markets and national medical reform movements in the United States, Britain and Germany. The author argues that the priorities and styles of various departments and schools of biochemistry reflect systematic social relationships between that discipline and biology, chemistry and medicine. Science is shaped by its service roles in particular local contexts: This is the central theme. The author's view of the political economy of modern science will be of interest to historians and social scientists, scientific and medical practitioners, and anyone interested in the ecology of knowledge in scientific institutions and professions.

The account in this inaugural volume of the series covers the period 1900 to 1960, but also outlines the principal developments in earlier centuries from which biochemistry emerged. Findings are considered in the light of present knowledge, rather than in a rigid historical framework.

Understanding of biological nitrogen fixation has advanced with impressive rapidity during the last decade. As befits a developing area of Science, these advances have uncovered information and raised questions which will have, and indeed have had, repercussions in numerous other branches of science and its applications. This 'information explosion', to use one of to-day's cant idioms, was initiated by the discovery, by a group of scientists working in the Central Research laboratories of Dupont de Nemours, U. S. A. , of a reproducibly active, cell-free enzyme preparation from a nitrogen fixing bacterium. Full credit is due to them. But subsequent developments, albeit sometimes quite as impressive, have too often been marked by that familiar disorder of a developing field of research-the scramble to publish. It is a scramble which, at its best, may represent a laudable desire to inform colleagues of the latest developments; yet which too easily develops into an undignified rush for priority, wherewith to impress one's Board of Directors or Grant-giving Institution. This, in miniature, is the tragedy of scientific research to-day: desire for credit causes research to be published in little bulletins, notes and preliminary communications, so that only those intimately involved in the field really know what is happening (and even they may well not see the forest for the trees). Those outside the field, or working in peripheral areas, may glean something of what is going on from reviews and fragments presented at meetings, but the broad pattern of development is often elusive.

Essays in Biochemistry, Volume 25 provides information on the developments in the continually changing field of biochemistry. Each chapter of the book is written by an expert on the area of research. The volume contains contributions that deal with such topics as intracellular protein degradation; the metabolic heterogeneity of liver parenchymal cells; and the biochemistry of ethanol metabolism and the pathogenesis of alcoholic liver disease (ALD). Biochemistry and neurochemistry in the 1800 and their origins in comparative animal chemistry is discussed extensively in the final chapter. Biochemists will find the book very informative.

Biochemistry: The Chemical Reactions of Living Cells is a well-integrated, up-to-date reference for basic biochemistry, associated chemistry, and underlying biological phenomena. Biochemistry is a comprehensive account of the chemical basis of life, describing the amazingly complex structures of the compounds that make up cells, the forces that hold them together, and the chemical reactions that allow for recognition, signaling, and movement. This book contains information on the human body, its genome, and the action of muscles, eyes, and the brain. It also features: thousands of literature references that provide introduction to current research as well as historical background; twice the number of chapters of the first edition; and each chapter contains boxes of information on topics of general interest. -- Publisher description.

Bacterial Physiology and Biochemistry provides the most current, authoritative, and relevant presentation of bacterial physiology and biochemistry on subject, chemical composition and functional bacterial cell structure, nutrition and growth, the process of cell differentiation, metabolism and the influence of environmental factors. The book helps the reader learn and obtain modern knowledges on bacterial physiology and biochemistry, including chemical composition and functional cell structures, bacterial nutrition and growth, and the processes of cell differentiation, bacterial metabolism and microbial growth in nature, and the effect of environmental factors on bacterial cells. This book is an educational resource designed for use in advanced bachelor's and master's courses in biology, including microbiology, biochemistry and molecular biology. It contains curriculum taught to biology students specializing in microbiology. - Contains modern original color illustrations of biochemical and metabolic processes - Provides condensed knowledge on microbiology, microbial kinetics and microbial physiology - Includes easy-to-find information on key metabolic pathways in aerobic and anaerobic microorganisms