The study of dielectric properties of biological systems and their components is important not only for fundamental scientific knowledge but also for its applications in medicine, biology, and biotechnology. The associated technique - known as dielectric spectroscopy - has enabled researchers to quickly and accurately acquire time- or frequency-spectra of permittivity and conductivity and permitted the derivation and testing of realistic electrical models for cells and organelles. This text covers the theoretical basis and practical aspects of the study of dielectric properties of biological systems, such as water, electrolyte and polyelectrolytes, solutions of biological macromolecules, cells suspensions and cellular systems. The authors' combined efforts provide a comprehensive and cohesive book that takes advantage of the expertise of multiple scientists involved in cutting-edge research in the specific sub-fields of bio-dielectric spectroscopy while maintaining its self-consistency through numerous discussions. The first six chapters cover theoretical, methodological and experimental aspects of relaxation and dispersion in biological dielectrics at molecular, cellular and cellular aggregate level. Applications are presented in the following chapters which are organized in the order of increased complexity, beginning with pure water, amino acids and proteins, continuing with vesicles and simple cells such as erythrocytes, and then with more complex, organelle-containing cells and cellular aggregates. Due to its broad coverage, the text could be used as a reference book by researchers, and as a textbook for upper-level undergraduate classes and graduate classes in (bio) physics, medical physics, quantitative biology, and engineering.

Biophysics represents perhaps one of the best examples of interdisciplinary research areas, where concepts and methods from disciplines such as physics, biology, b- chemistry, colloid chemistry, and physiology are integrated. It is by no means a new ?eld of study and has actually been around, initially as quantitative physiology and partly as colloid science, for over a hundred years. For a long time, biophysics has been taught and practiced as a research discipline mostly in medical schools and life sciences departments, and excellent biophysics textbooks have been published that are targeted at a biologically literate audience. With a few exceptions, it is only relatively recently that biophysics has started to be recognized as a physical science and integrated into physics departments' curr- ula, sometimes under the new name of biological physics. In this period of cryst- lization and possible rede?nition of biophysics, there still exists some uncertainty as to what biophysics might actually represent. A particular tendency among phy- cists is to associate biophysics research with the development of powerful new te- niques that should eventually be used not by physicists to study physical processes in living matter, but by biologists in their biological investigations. There is value in that judgment, and excellent books have been published that introduce the int- ested reader to the use of physical principles for the development of new methods of investigation in life sciences.

Biophysics represents perhaps one of the best examples of interdisciplinary research areas, where concepts and methods from disciplines such as physics, biology, b- chemistry, colloid chemistry, and physiology are integrated. It is by no means a new ?eld of study and has actually been around, initially as quantitative physiology and partly as colloid science, for over a hundred years. For a long time, biophysics has been taught and practiced as a research discipline mostly in medical schools and life sciences departments, and excellent biophysics textbooks have been published that are targeted at a biologically literate audience. With a few exceptions, it is only relatively recently that biophysics has started to be recognized as a physical science and integrated into physics departments' curr- ula, sometimes under the new name of biological physics. In this period of cryst- lization and possible rede?nition of biophysics, there still exists some uncertainty as to what biophysics might actually represent. A particular tendency among phy- cists is to associate biophysics research with the development of powerful new te- niques that should eventually be used not by physicists to study physical processes in living matter, but by biologists in their biological investigations. There is value in that judgment, and excellent books have been published that introduce the int- ested reader to the use of physical principles for the development of new methods of investigation in life sciences.