Book excerpt: An Introduction to Air Chemistry serves as a textbook on air chemistry and covers topics such as chemical principles, sampling and collection, treatment of data, and special methods of analysis. The atmospheric chemistry of sulfur compounds is also discussed, together with nitrogen compounds and ozone, aerosols, and carbon compounds. This book is comprised of nine chapters and begins with a review of the relevant chemical and meteorological principles. The general methods for obtaining and handling air chemical data are then described, followed by a discussion on three classes of chemical compounds that are important in any consideration of trace constituents of the atmosphere, namely, sulfur compounds, carbon compounds, and nitrogen compounds and ozone. Significant atmospheric reactions, the global budgets, and selected methods of analysis for these compounds are considered. The final chapter examines some of the physical characteristics of aerosols. This monograph will be a valuable resource for upper-level undergraduate and graduate-level students of analytical chemistry, meteorology, oceanography, and civil engineering, as well as for laboratory chemists, meteorologists, physical scientists, and technicians.