Agricultural Meteorology, 19(1978) 59--63 © Elsevier Scientific Publishing Company, Amsterdam-Printed in The Netherlands

Book Reviews

Mathematical Models in Plant Physiology: A Quantitative Approach to Problems in Plant and Crop Physiology. J. H. M. Thornley. Experimental Botany, Vol. 8, Academic Press, LondOn, 1976, 318 pp., £9.80.

Let me first make it perfectly clear that I believe this book to be out- standing in character. It contains a large amount of excellent material spanning a good range of problems associated with plant physiology. After introducing his subject with two opening chapters on basic techniques of mathematical modeling and an overview of some topics of general physiological importance, Thornley takes up the t reatment of light interception by plants and crops, photosynthesis, growth, transport, partitioning, storage, senescense, bio- chemical switches, flower initiation, phyllotaxis, and visible aspects of the form of external structure of plants and crops. Each topic is treated in some depth with actual modeling examples taken from the recent literature -- much of it Thornley's own work.

My only reservations stem, not from the specific nature of this particular book, but from the general nature of the subject treated, which rears its head repeatedly throughout the text. Just how good and of what use is the modeling approach? A few quotat ions from the book illuminate the reasons for my question: "Many people will find my t reatment inadequate." " . . . none of the mechanistic models of leaf photosynthesis should be taken very seriously." "Although real plants are far from simple, the models described h e r e . . . are greatly simplified to bring out the general principles." "Although in some respects the model makes useful and realistic predictions about plant growth and response, in others the behavior is clearly nonphysiological." "The models developed in Chapters 8 and 9 have ignored all but the grossest details of real plants."

Perhaps the most revealing statements are contained in the first pages of each of the last three chapters. Chapter 12: "Although the model is physio- logically unrealistic in some respects, and is difficult to test experimentally, it has certain useful features. For example . . . . solution of the equations is straightforward." -- Is the modeler here the blind slave of his tool? Chapter 13: "The functional p r o b l e m . . , may be at tacked using the methods of Chapters 3 and 14, although no satisfactory solution ye t exists." -- An exercise in futility? Chapter 14: "I t would be sanguine to hope that the

present a t tempt can do more than scratch the surface of what is a difficult task; however, it is important to know to what extent the problem is soluble in principle, even if th~ methods that suggest themselves do not encourage actual solution or application to particular cases.' ..... ???

In this same spirit, 1 heartily recommend this book to all students of plant physiology. Even if one can never make use of its mathematical approach in describing real-life phenomena; " the solution of the equations is straightforward,"

SHERWOOD B. IDSO (Phoenix, Ariz. )

Climates of Central and South America -- World Survey o f Climatology, Vol. 12. W. Schwerdtfeger (Editor}, H. E. Landsberg (Editor in Chief}. Elsevier, Amsterdam, 1976, 532 pp., 106 illus., 264 tables, Dfl. 2 3 0 . .

Volume 12 of the World Survey of Climatology has just been issued. This volume has been edited by Professor Werner Schwerdtfeger, meteorolo- gist f rom the school of Leipzig, former professor at the University of Buenos Aires and at present professor at Wisconsin University, in the U.S.A. The volume is a new contribution to the valuable World Survey directed by Prof. H. E. Landsberg, and partly fulfills the expectation created by the announced volumes not yet published.

The great importance of this work is obvious since in spite of its economic potentialities, Central and South America still remains the most unknown continent of the Earth. Notwithstanding some pioneering works such as those of Humboldt , De Moussy, Codazzi and Pittier, and some relevant contributions made after the time that meteorological services were set up, the greater part of the climatological data still remains in the archives and is neither published nor processed for immediate use. The works by Knoch and Sapper included in an earlier and similar survey, edited by KSppen and Geiger some 50 years ago, was the ~nly source until now of global climatological information on this part of the Western Hemisphere. This work was a good precedent for the first four chapters of the volume being reviewed and its climatological data have been reproduced in some cases.

The volume is made up of eight chapters and three indexes (authors, geo- graphical and subject indexes). Chapter 1, by W. Schwerdtfeger, in the fashion of an introduction, presents a clear and objective synthesis of the general circulation of the atmosphere over the continent and surrounding oceans on the basis of existing upper-air observations. The seasonal location of the southern jet stream, the tropospheric circulation and its conclusive influence on precipitation {snow line) in the Andes cordillera as well as the seasonal