American h/b edition. American p/b.
From the original jacket for the American hardback edition:
Could microbes feed the starving? banish pollution?preserve health? end the energy crisis?
Brian Ford thinks they could, and tells how in this easy-to-understand exploration of the teeming world of one-celled organisms.
Since Pasteur proclaimed his germ theory, all microbes have been regarded with suspicion. Brian Ford shows that the vast majority of microbes are health-promoting, energy-supplying organisms vital to our existence. We know our very bread depends upon the work of microbes, as well as beer, cheese, linen and leather. How many of us realize that laundry powder enzymes are made by bacteria, and that many cosmetics are processed by microbes?
And we've only just begun to tap their infinite potential, says Ford. There are endless exciting possibilities riding on their future development. Microbes can produce insecticides that are completely harmless to man, birds, and animals. They can process raw materials at a rate that puts modern technology to shame, and they are self-fueling. They can recycle garbage, attack oil spillages, purify heavily contaminated rivers and lakes. They can produce food at incredible speeds --in an area no larger than London, turned into a "microbe farm," they can supply food for ten times the present world population! Microbes can do all these things and more, if we learn to accept them as essentially beneficial forms of life, and put them to work for us.
Microbe Power is a book of solutions, not problems. It tells us that tomorrow need not be today with its troubles compounded, that there is a way not only to survival, but to a life that's better. It presents a case for man's revaluation of the microbe-and of his own prejudices--that no one who cares about the future can afford to ignore.
Brian Ford, a research scientist whose papers have been published
in many languages and whose books on microbiology are highly
respected by the scientific community, is also that rare
scientist who can make his subject clear to the layman. This
unusual talent, coupled with a desire to share his convictions
with a wider audience, led to this hope-filled book.
Jacket design: J. Caroff. STEIN AND DAY/ Publishers, Scarborough House, Briarcliff Manor, New York 10510.
"An extraordinary scientific adventure
which will interest everyone concerned
with energy and the environment."
from Publishers Weekly.