Crystals and Life

by Cele Abad-Zapatero, International University Line, 2002

The book that I published in 2002 by International University Line, Crystals and Life, subtitled ‘A Personal Journey’. This was my first attempt to communicate to a lay audience the basis of Macromolecular Crystallography from a personal perspective. The book is not, and never was intended to be, a textbook. Its purpose is to introduce the basis of crystallography using images and metaphors from the Arts. This I do believe firmly: the Sciences and the Arts are two critical components of the human endeavor through the ages and should be considered jointly. I do believe that these two components should be part of human culture on an equal basis. Granted that the sciences might be more difficult to grasp than the Arts for the non-scientist but nonetheless, I believe that an ‘educated’ person should be a person with knowledge in the two branches. This is what I intended to do with my modest book in the domain of macromolecular crystallography and structural biology. If you are interested in these themes, please, do read Crystals and Life, I would greatly appreciate your comments, suggestions and viewpoints if you care to send them to me using the e-mail addresses indicated in the contact info below.

[Amazon Link]