By Anton Z Capri
World Scientific
Paperback: £25 $38
When a ship’s surgeon noticed during a routine episode of bloodletting that the sailors’ blood was brighter in the tropics than in the north, he hypothesized that heat was a form of energy. This is just one of the stories covered in this entertaining book that deals with the history of physics from the end of the 19th century to about 1930. This second edition has been revised to include a prologue, epilogue, glossary, chronology and photographs, as well as additional quotes and anecdotes.