Principles of Neural Science

Rating:
Summary: A Comprehensive Reference
Review: A great book for those really interested in the neurosciences. This is a bit too detailed for the average medical student, but a great source of information for those truly interested in the neurosciences. I have often found it useful as a reference.

Rating:
Summary: Outdated and Dense
Review: As a medical student taking a basic neuroscience course, save your money. I found the text to be generally low yield for USMLE preparation. In all fairness however, this text is (or was) the "gold standard" - but that doesn't necessarily make it a good text for medical students.

Rating:
Summary: keep looking
Review: As a neuroscience graduate student, I was extremely excited to read this book and to keep it as a reference but unfortunately, it did not meet my expectations for either task. Given Kandel's outstanding contributions to our understanding of learning, I hoped his book would have similar standards. Most notable of several flaws is that the individual chapters, each being individually authored, were poorly edited and did not provide an integrated picture of the field. Further, some graphs were mislabeled, and in several chapters, this text engaged in the annoying practice of introducing and using new terminology early on and then defining this jargon at the end of the chapter. The material on vision was thorough but audition and the vestibulochlear systems were very skimpy. If you are interested in learning anything about motor systems, I'd recommend you pass this book up for Michael Zigmond's Fundamentals of Neuroscience.

Rating:
Summary: Great book of neural science for students of medicine
Review: Detailed, yet easy to read. Authoritative. The authors succeed in explaining complex concepts in simple language with reference to specific and easy-to-relate-to examples. Clever and appropriate summarisation of ideas by good diagrams. I am thinking of purchasing this book.

Rating:
Summary: great way to learn
Review: During early 99 I had de chance to use the text in English, but in 2.000 the university I'm working for the last 18 year, bought the text in Spanish, it was a real success for the pre-grade Psychology student, at Universidad Central de Chile. The clear development of subjects, and the good writing (small ??) in some translation of ideas to spanish, but it worth the task of working with the text Congratulation mr. Kandell and co-auther

Rating:
Summary: Excellent for physiological psychology students
Review: I found this text very useful while conducting research in behavioral pharmacology. This text is the bible of neural science. I WOULD STRONGLY ADVISE THE PURCHASING OF THIS TEXT.

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Summary: Neuroscience classic
Review: I read this book in medical school. Although I would agree that it is probably to basic science oriented for a medical school neuroscience course, it was enjoyable, thorough, and inspirational. There are few books in my life that took as complex a topic as how the brain works and made it comprehensible. It is not a crib sheet for passing medical school exams. It is the first book I would recommend for anyone seriously interested in an understanding of the brain, sensory processes, etc... For anyone for whom a fundamental grounding in neuroscience is important this is the book.

Rating:
Summary: Introduction to Neurosciences
Review: I used this in medical school, then graduate school, finding the length and quality improve with succeeding editions of the volume. Very well known chapter editors create a 'Scientific American-like' view of the Basic Neurosciences. This book is grossly inadequate if you want to pass medical and graduate school exams. It's like a "candy-coated" atlas of neuroscience. There are not many rigorous equations to learn in the book. For that you will need From Neuron to Brain or even a higher book such as Theoretical Neuroscience. The strength of this book is the beautiful color illustrations. Its weakness is that it does not cover "hard-core" electrophysiology. Ohm's Law and the cable theory of the squid giant axon are covered, but where is Heisenberg-James' Theory of the quantum vesicle, and Boolean algebra. No mention. Also, where is Bayes Theorem and a discussion of probabilistic Populations of Neurons. Entropy is not discussed. Ballistic, and Biofeedback are not discussed. Magnetic Stimulation and fMRI are alluded to but not incorporated as valid tools in the study of the Nervous System. I have not really used this book since graduate school.

Rating:
Summary: A thorough text
Review: I was impressed by Kandel's text. It provided a current, thorough coverage of the topic areas. No other textbook I came across could even compare!

Rating:
Summary: Excellent reference text
Review: In my undergraduate neural science class we used the essentials of neural science - an abridged version of this text. The shortened version provides plenty of information for an undergraduate level course and perhaps even for medical school. In medical school, however, I used this text, The Principles, and was pleasantly surprised that was no more difficult to follow that the "simplified" version that I had used previously. I really enjoy this book and plan to use it for many years as a reference. It is truly unfortunate, however, that Prof. Ron Calabrese did not have the opportunity to infuse this text with a little of his own personal flavor!