Book reviews BRITISH PHARMACEUTICAL CODEX 1968. Pp. xxxvii d-151•3. (19138). PharmaceuticalPress, London. f•7. The B.P.C. is so firmly established in Britain and many other countries that this review hardly needs to describe its general character. The 1968 edition differs from its predecessors in comparatively small and subtle ways, rather than in any major respect. Such a statement may not be true when the next edition comes along, for responsibility may then have passed to the Medicines Commission, who could possibly take a different view. At present, the General Medical Council publishes the British Pharmacopoeia in close collaboration with the Pharmaceutical Society, which is responsible for the Codex. Continuity in style and lay-out is a worthwhile attribute to an everyday work of reference. The pace of medical progress has dictated the need to revise the B.P. and B.P.C. every five years, but this creates the hazard that successive revision commit- tees might play havoc with the format to which readers have grown accustomed. On the •vhole, however, the 1968 Codex has maintained its overall style unchanged. Some obsolescent drugs and techniques are discarded to make way for the new, but there is a reasonable balance between fashion and conservatism. Nostalgically, we bid farewell to Buchu, Cinchona, Ipomoea and Valerian . . . hesitating just a little to wonder whether the present generation is any better off with modern tranquillizers than with the earlier placebos that were hopefully designated as "nerve tonics". We should also pause to pay our last respects to the initiator of modern chemotherapy - neoarsphenamine - which also joins the scrap- heap. Monographs of pharmacopoeial authority, including those of the B.P.C., have long proved of considerable use outside the strictly pharmaceutical field and many cosmetic chemists will regret the disappearance of specifications for Light Liquid Paraffin, Shellac and Hard Soap. The more obvious additional monographs that may be useful in the cosmetic field are those for Fractionated Coconut Oil, Dioctyl Sodium Sulphosuccinate, Hypromellose (hydroxy propylmethylcellulose), Polysorbate 20, 60 and 80, Sorbitan monolaurate, - oleate and - stearate. Potassium Sorbate and Sorbic Acid now gain a place and achieve "respectability" as preservatives for nonionic emulsions. There have been some doubts concerning the irritancy of sorbic acid as a preservative for topical applications but the Codex Revision Committee appears to be satisfied that there is no foundation for these fears. At this point, attention might be drawn to the fact that the B.P.C. specifies "action and uses" as well as "undesirable effects" in its monographs, unlike the British Pharmacopoeia the statements given are neces- sarily concise but nevertheless authoritative in terms of present-day knowledge. The Formulary section is not of great interest to the cosmetic formulator directly, though there may well be some helpful analogies to be derived. There are, however, 51

52 JOURNAL OF THE SOCIETY OF COSMETIC CHEMISTS innumerable relevant items dealing with standards, preservation, sterilization, sterility testing and analytical techniques. The long-standing, widespread experience of these matters in the pharmaceutical field and their condensation into relatively foolproof specifications, provides a great xvealth of useful material. No cosmetic chemist can afford to be without a copy of the B.P.C. and preferably the latest edition. N.J. VAN ABBI• SELECTIVE TOXICITY. A. Albert. 4th edn. Pp. xvii + 531 q- Ill. (1968). Methuen, London. •3.50 (70s). This is the fourth edition of a most readable book, the title of which might well mislead those who are not well versed in medicinal chemistry. Toxicology in the usual sense is not the principal subject-matter. The author likes to get down to first princi- ples and, by definition, the purpose of his book is to examine the properties of sub- stances that will harm certain cells without hurting others. This includes selectivity against, for example, bacteria infecting the human host but it also includes the selec- tive action of an anaesthetic on nerve-cells in the human subject. As the Preface points out, pharmacology is certainly concerned with behaviour at the cellular level and increasingly at the molecular level. The book deals with the physical and chemical means by which selective effects are exerted its author, Professor Adrien Albert, enjoys a world-wide reputation as one of the leading authorities on structure-activity relationships. There are two main parts, headed "Topics of general interest" and "The relation- ship between structure and biological activity". The first part guides the reader very gently through the cytology and biochemistry which form the essential basis for understanding the main subjects and explains the general principles of absorption, distribution and excretion. It also offers a comparative outline of chemotherapy and pharmacodynamics (selectivity against invading cells in the former instance and between different host-cells in the latter). The current activities of the medicinal chemist are the main theme of Part 2, such as metabolite analogues, steric influences, ionization, metal-binding, surface pheno- mena and free radicals. Research papers appear at a truly explosive rate in this field but Prof. Albert has selected about 500, of which he has abstracted the essence in model fashion. A textbook based so much on literature references often becomes quite disjointed and difficult to read, but no such criticism can be levelled here. Not sur- prisingly, the author's own researches (notably on the antimicrobial properties and structure/activity relationships in the acridine series) figure strongly in the text this may give a bias, of course, but it also injects authenticity and personal involve- ment into what could otherwise easily become second-hand and dull. There is little room to complain about the book as it stands. It deals with a subject which has been the target for active research for little more than fifty years. It is the fundamental knowledge which tends to be inadequate, rather than the way in which the present author has propounded it. This probably explains why so little attention is given to disease-resistance and the problems of the ageing process, and so much to the largely empirical use of pharmacodynamic agents in modern medicine. However,