The cell cycle: Principles of control (Primers in Biology series)

Abstract

David O. Morgan, New Science Press Ltd, London, UK, 2007 297 pp., ISBN-13 9780953918126, $49.95. Akif Uzman*, * Department of Natural Sciences University of Houston—Downtown Houston, Texas. In 1994, Andrew Murray and Tim Hunt wrote a small guide to the cell cycle in the wake of a flurry of discoveries on the biochemistry and genetics of cyclins and their associated cyclin-dependent kinases in the previous decade (The Cell Cycle: An Introduction). An update has been long overdue, and David Morgan's The Cell Cycle: Principles of Control is a worthy and more complete successor. The Cell Cycle is one of the first three books in the Primer in Biology series developed by New Science Ltd. (http://www.new-science-press.com/primers/) with support from Oxford University Press and Sinauer Associates, Inc. The layout of these books reminds me of detailed historical atlases wherein detailed maps are accompanied by informative text, definitions, timelines, etc. Such atlases have a wealth of information that are often easy to pick up and read from anywhere in the book. Wittingly or not, The Cell Cycle appears to be based on a similar model. The Primer in Biology series of books is described by the publisher in a note at the front of The Cell Cycle as “a series of books constructed on a modular principle that is intended to make them easy to teach from, to learn from, and to use for reference, without sacrificing the synthesis that is essential for any text to be truly constructive.” To the extent that a concise atlas can function as a teaching tool, this book succeeds; however, I do not think that this would be an easy textbook for students “to learn from.” Nonetheless, The Cell Cycle is a marvelous, concise atlas, in which the modular style allows for easy access to information. As an atlas, it provides beautiful detailed figures, which are available to instructors who adopt the book. Anyone teaching a graduate course in the cell cycle or advanced cell biology should recommend this book to their students. Other organizational features provide valuable information to readers. Most pages have a bottom margin wherein important definitions (including acronyms) and references (excellent choices of reviews and primary research) are provided. There is also a final glossary at the back with all the definitions. One almost wishes the publisher would have done the same for the references. The index is excellent, significantly enhancing this book as a resource. The Cell Cycle is very rich in illustrations and tables, in which there is at least one important illustration or table in the margin of nearly every page. The text is well balanced in its visual presentations between clear microphotographs, elegant line drawings, and tables. The line drawings are elegant in a style similar to that used by W.H. Freeman & Co. The figure legends have ample explanation and are usually adjacent to the text wherein its contents are discussed. This short book (less than an 3/4 of an inch in thickness) is remarkably comprehensive in its detailed coverage of the biochemistry of the cell cycle, DNA replication and repair, the cell biology of mitosis and meiosis, and relevant areas of developmental biology and cancer. The control of the cell cycle receives considerable attention in Chapter 3, which examines key conceptual features of cell-cycle control systems, and in Chapters 10–12, which explore the control of cell proliferation and growth, DNA damage responses, and cancer, respectively. Perhaps because I am less familiar with the molecular details of mitosis, meiosis, and cytokinesis, I found the five chapters (Chapters 5–9) devoted to these topics particularly instructive and illuminating. Indeed, the broad range of topics covered and the detail covered in such a small book exceeds my expertise. However, areas wherein I am expert are well presented with no obvious errors. The information presented in The Cell Cycle is fundamentally qualitative. Hence, a graduate-level course that intends to stress quantitative features of the cell cycle will have only a few graphs from which to present quantitative information. I do not think this sufficient for teaching 21st century biology, even at the undergraduate level. Nine years ago, Bruce Alberts called for biologists to embrace quantitative thinking not only in their research but in the classroom. I have yet to see such a book (with the exception of some biochemistry texts); and ironically Alberts et al.'s Molecular Biology of the Cell pays mathematical approaches mere lip service. Given the considerable mathematical and computational work done in cell cycle research, The Cell Cycle misses an important opportunity. Graphs from computational analyses are sporadically and tersely discussed, providing no fundamental mathematical reasoning that would allow a reader a richer appreciation for the utility of modern computational and mathematical approaches. The mathematics underlying switchlike behavior or bistability in positive feedback systems (see Chapter 3) is not difficult and could have been easily introduced in Chapter 3 (with perhaps more mathematical detail in an appendix). Similarly, mathematical and biophysical treatments of chromosome movement and DNA replication have important force components that are only lightly touched upon. Finally, quantitative information on important stoichiometric, thermodynamic, and kinetic features of cell-cycle events is largely ignored. At the beginning of this review I mentioned that this text would not be easy for a student “to learn from.” There are few reasons that make this likely to be true. The writing occasionally slips into lingo and contains confusing passages that will not be easy for novices in the field to understand. The shear density of information, a virtue of this book as a resource, does not allow for sustained reading for more than a few passages at a time. The modular style is helpful in this regard, but real synthesis is not a strength of this text. Too often the transition from the Overview section at the beginning of each chapter is actually too seamless with the body of the more detailed text. For example, in Chapter 7 (Completion of Meiosis), the Overview ends with assertive-statement subtitle “APCCdc20 initiates Cdk inactivation”; however, the next subtitle on the following page is “APCCdc20 activation in early mitosis is essential to occur.” If readers are not paying very close attention to the layout of the text, they will find the transition confusing. Moreover, one naturally expects to return to the last subtitle in the Overview at the end of the chapter with more detail but this does not happen. In other cases, the Overview is too superficial, particularly in the more lengthy chapters such as Chapter 10 (Control of Cell Proliferation and Growth)—oddly this chapter has two Overviews, one embedded in the middle of the chapter though it has little relationship to the rest of the chapter. The Primer in Biology series uses an interesting model for presenting a rich compendium of information. Despite my lengthy criticisms, The Cell Cycle provides an excellent standard for future books in this series and a valuable contribution to biochemistry and cell biology.