By focusing specifically on AM radio, THE SCIENCE OF RADIO offers both a fascinating history of radio as an information and entertainment medium and a practical, applications-oriented introduction to electrical engineering. A number of challenging problems are in the book. It is an excellent text for intermediate engineering students familar with freshman calculus and physics.

Section I Mostly History and a Little Math.- 1 Solution to an Old Problem.- 2 Preradio History of Radio Waves.- 3 Antennas as Launchers and Interceptors of Electromagnetic Waves.- 4 Early Radio.- 5 Receiving Spark Transmitter Signals.- 6 Mathematics of AM Sidebands.- 7 First Continuous Waves, Negative Resistance Oscillators and the Van der Pol Equation, and the Heterodyne Concept.- 8 Birth of Electronics.- Section II Mostly Math and a Little History.- 9 Fourier Series and Their Physical Meaning.- 10 Convergence in Energy of the Fourier Series.- 11 Radio Spectrum of a Spark-Gap Transmitter.- 12 Fourier Integral Theorem and the Continuous Spectrum of a Nonperiodic Time Signal.- 13 Physical Meaning of the Fourier Transform.- 14 Impulse "Functions".- 15 Convolution Theorems, Frequency Shifts, and Causal Time Signals.- Section III Nonlinear Circuits for Multiplication.- 16 Multiplying by Squaring and Filtering.- 17 Squaring and Multiplying with Matched Nonlinearities.- 18 Multiplying by "Sampling and Filtering".- Section IV Mathematics of "Unmultiplying".- 19 Synchronous Demodulation and its Problems.- 20 Analytic Signals and Single-Sideband Radio.- 21 Denouement.- 22 Epilogue.- Technical Appendices.- Appendix A Complex Exponentials.- Appendix B What Is (and Is Not) a Linear Time-Invariant System (Superposition).- Appendix C Two-Terminal Components, Kirchhoff's Circuit Laws, Magnetic Coupling, Complex Impedances, ac Amplitude and Phase Responses, Power, Energy, and Initial Conditions.- Appendix D Thévenin's and Norton's Theorems.- Appendix E Resonance in Electrical Circuits.- Appendix F Differential and Operational Amplifiers.