Dennis's new book
November 2010 marked the publication of the second edition of Crystals, X-rays and Proteins, a university-level textbook on X-ray crystallography, the first edition of which was published in 1975 by Longman.
In the early 1970s, Dennis was a graduate student in the Department of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry at Yale University, and – for reasons too long-winded to go into here – sat down and wrote a book designed to help students with a good knowledge of chemistry and biology to get up to speed with the mathematics and physics required to understand how the experimental technique of X-ray diffraction can be used to elucidate the structure of molecules. This is indeed an important subject - more Nobel Prizes, for example, have been awarded in connection with X-ray diffraction studies than any other field of science, including the 1962 prize for Physiology or Medicine to James Watson, Francis Crick and Maurice Wilkins for the discovery of the molecular structure of DNA.
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And so matters remained for the next 30 or so years. Until one day in 2009, when Dennis was contacted by Professor Jon Cooper of University College London, who asked if it might be possible to collaborate on a second edition, so that the now-aged text could be brought right up-to-date with the very significant advances in experimental methods.
And the result is the second edition, published in November 2010 by Oxford University Press! For more information, see the OUP website, and here are some of the reviews:
"This book was like a thriller to me. Even though I knew the answer, I wanted to see how the author would address the next topic and I could not put it down."
(Joseph D. Ferrara, Ph.D, Crystallography Times)
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"This is one of the best crystallography books ever written, and it is with pleasure that I whole-heartedly recommend it."
(Nicholas M. Glykos, Democritus University of Thrace, Greece)
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"In my opinion, this book would be the perfect textbook for a theoretical course on macromolecular crystallography."
(Manfred S. Weiss, Acta Crystallographica Section D)
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"A welcome addition to any structural biology laboratory, and an invaluable reference, answering questions in an accurate and transparent manner."
(Karen McLuskey, Chemistry World )
