Optical Society of America: Washington, DC; and International Society for Optical Engineering: Bellingham, WA, 2000. 282 pp. ISBN 1-55752-650-8. $25.00.

Anyone who likes to do classroom demonstrations on the stage of an overhead projector would probably be interested in this book. It describes dozens of classroom demonstrations relating to optics and the use of the overhead projector. Each demonstration is well illustrated and easy to follow. The book contains more than a hundred line drawings and diagrams and is written in oversized print. The book is also spiral bound, so it lies flat when it is open. In addition, a video tape that comes with the book indicates how some of the demonstrations should look.

The demonstrations pertain mainly to optics, as the title suggests. There are demonstrations of phenomena such as light scattering, fluorescence, birefringence, dispersion, radiometry, spectroscopy, and linear and circular polarization. Some of the demonstrations use optical devices, such as prisms, polarizers, diffusers, 2-way mirrors, gratings, photodetectors, color filters, or radiometers. A number of fascinating demonstrations involve moire patterns, materials for which are included in the printed text for easy copying onto transparency sheets. Aberrations such as astigmatism and keystone distortion are also discussed and demonstrated.

Although most of the demonstrations have to do with optics, there are also some that have chemical significance. For example, in the section on optical activity, there is a demonstration of optical rotatory dispersion. It involves placing a beaker filled with white corn syrup on top of a sheet of Polaroid film, and then placing a second Polaroid sheet on top of the beaker and slowly rotating the top sheet to produce all the colors in the spectrum.

The book does have one confusing feature. The page numbering begins anew with each new section. Since there are about 15 sections, the same page numbers keep recurring. On the other hand, the name of the section appears at the bottom of every page. So one needs first to locate the desired section and then to look for the right page number.

This book can be ordered directly from the Director of Publications, Optical Society of America, 2010 Massachusetts Avenue NW, Washington, DC 20036-1023.