PREFAG E 



With the ever-increasing degree of specialization in scientific 

 research and with the terrifying rate of growth of technical nomen- 

 clature, men of science are literally compelled to know more and 

 more about less and less. The scientific literature furthers this trend, 

 since journals, textbooks (apart from those for students), and review 

 articles are written primarily for the specialist. There is an acute 

 need for stripping complex subjects and getting at the simple, essential 

 concepts which are basic to their appreciation. After all, the same 

 scientific principles are applicable to all fields of inquiry. The art 

 of presentation consists in the elimination of the barriers of terminology 

 which effectively conceal these fundamental principles. Currents in 

 Biochemical Research represents an attempt by some thirty research 

 workers to describe in as simple language as possible the important 

 developments in their own fields and to speculate a little on the most 

 likely paths of future progress. The aim of these essays has been to 

 excite the imagination and to provide glimpses of some of the fas- 

 cinating horizons of biochemical research. However, no populari- 

 zations were intended. The various contributors were asked to write 

 simply and provocatively but without sacrifice of scholarship. Dealing 

 as they do on the one hand with pharmacology, chemotherapy, public 

 health, genetics, photosynthesis, and agriculture and on the other 

 with considerations of organic, analytical, and physical chemistry, 

 they emphasize the focal position of biochemical research in biology, 

 chemistry, and medicine. It is hoped that this survey from so many 

 different points of view may assist biochemists, chemists, and medical 

 doctors in seeing biochemistry in clearer perspective and in its proper 

 relation to other fields of inquiry. 



David E. Green 



March, 1946 



