Becker's World of the Cell, Books a la Carte Edition (8th Edition) 8th Edition

used book is great condition; good price for the edition

I have owned numerous cell biology textbooks, and this series has always been my favorite. This edition, and the 2 earlier editions of this series that I've owned, strikes a perfect balance between technicalities and general information.One other cell biology text I owned (I suppose graduate level) jumped right into complex material and anyone not already familiar with the basics of cell biology would be completely lost; and it's coverage was extremely technical. Another cell biology text series - of which I owned 2 in the series - had poor diagrams/graphics and was not all that well organized."The World of the Cell" series (which recently changed its name to "Becker's World of the Cell") starts the reader off with the basics, progresses slowly and logically, and has very good diagrams/graphics. And while it does discuss technical details, it is not weighed down by them; and the language used is intermediate - they use cell biology terms but don't cram so many into a single sentence that one has to jump back and forth through the text looking up term after term to figure out what a sentence means.PS: I have both the 7th and 8h editions. I kept notes from the 7th edition and when I look at the same page numbers in the 8th edition, the same noted material is there ... each of the dozen or so pages I checked in the 7th edition maps to the same page in the 8th edition, even up into the page 600's. So if you are not buying this for a class, you might consider buying the 7th edition as it should be cheaper. I don't know what updated information you'd be losing out on, though.

I got this book for an undergraduate Mol & Cell Bio course. It's more in depth than we needed for the class but perfect for reference. I have taken a few biochemistry courses in previous semesters and therefore expected this to have less Math and equations, but I wasn't disappointed. For some reason more mathematical equations help me better visualize the material, probably because I'm a Computer Science major with a biology minor who is more interested in Bioinformatics. Therefore we have equations for calculating Gibb's free energy, and equilibrium reactions (Keq). The book is pretty heavy in biochemistry, but not as heavy as an actual Biochemistry course. I love the Chapter on new lab techniques and Biotechnology (Ch 18), and was happy to see information related to Bioinformatics.

IF you read this book, you won't ever have to worry about being confused in the cellular or molecular discussion in higher level courses. This book is overly detailed, almost to a fault, but that's probably a good thing so as to introduce the reader to as much as possible. Very frequently, this book discusses breakthrough experiments and studies before talking about an idea. This is good because ideas aren't pulled out of thin air. At the same time, they don't waste too much time on it and they get right to the point. This is an exceptional text book.

This book is pretty awesome. Tons of depth for an undergraduate level. I really liked the way it's laid out as well. The one huge downfall is that the "Cell Place" that comes with it totally sucks. It makes it seem like there are tons of great videos, 3D graphics and tutorials, etc....There aren't. What they do have is pretty cheap.

It's what the prof said to order.

Don't get me wrong, this textbook would be great for someone in a graduate level class. Using it for undergrad is really difficult because it goes into so much depth that you end up spending way too much time trying to process the information. You don't actually learn anything because there is just too much information. My classmates used to joke that you shouldn't try to highlight anything because you will end up highlighting the whole book. Even my cell bio professor said that this book was way too extensive for an undergrad class. Still not sure why we used it. If you are using this book for a class, I recommend that you get the solutions manual too. You won't regret it. However, you may regret purchasing this book.

There isn't a way to jump easily from chapter to chapter. This is a serious pain. Unfortunately this digital version isn't efficiently enhanced by links to find specifically what you are looking for.Overall this is a usable e-book for my course, but it poses some hindrances to my studying fluidity.

Great Book! The copy I purchased was used. It had some highlighting and annotations. Still readable, and spine is still in good condition. Insightful text book! Just what I needed for my Cell Biology course!

Fast delivery, met all expectations!

Condition as described, and arrived early!!

It was great.