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DNA for beginners
248
T I B S - May 1984
IFN story in the next chapter, while an overview of current production methods of ct and 13IFN is presented by Ramel et al. They emphasize the role of recombinant DNA technology although they stress possible difficulties in that recombinant unglycosylated IFN may be antigenic in comparison to the natural [3 and ~IFN. However, this drawback may be overcome by using cloned eukaryotic cells. Two chapters summarize what is currently known about the biochemical and immunological actions of IFN. The final three-quarters of the book is devoted to evaluating possible mechanisms of action and therapeutic efficacy of cdFN in experimental animals and in man. Gresser, in describing the anti-tumor effects in mice, enumerates the effects of IFN on tumor cells and the host and intriguingly concludes that probably the most relevant anti-tumoral mechanism has not yet been discovered. The following nine chapters give a detailed and objective evaluation of results obtained on lymphoma, leukemia, myeloma, breast, lung, gastrointestinal cancer,
brain and bone tumors and papillomas. Although one cannot find brand-new data in any of these chapters, the reader has the advantage of getting an overall view of the situation in one afternoon. Many dilemmas remain: in some tumors the antiproliferative action may prevail over the immunomodulatory activity and vice-versa, while in others there is no effect. As IFN is a drug displaying many biological effects, problems related to the optimal route of administration, dosage and schedules remain open. At present results obtained with IFN treatment are hardly superior to other classical treatments, yet IFN can still abate some tumors where all other treatments have failed. Thus, if one considers that there are still many cards to play, such as combination therapy with other interferon types or other treatments and more rational ways of administration, one gets the feeling that, in spite of the existing difficulties, IFN has a chance to acquire a relevant place among anti-tumor drugs. This feeling is reinforced by reading the chapter by Ikic referring to his ex-
C o m i c a l DblA D N A for Beginners
by Israel Rosenfield, Edward Ziff and Borin Van Loon, Writers and Readers Publishing Cooperative, 1983. £2.95/ $6.95 (223 pages) ISBN 0 863 16023 9 It would be nice to think of DNA occupying the intellectual space between Darwin and Freud, as it were, but the map inside the back cover puts it out on a limb beyond the former master. Never mind, for Rosenfield, Ziff and Van Loon have nevertheless achieved a considerable if more conventional success. They manage to be intelligent, funny and true all at the same time; I challenge anyone to open this book at random and not to smile within a page or two. Not to say laugh out loud, for some of the jokes are wonderful, like the one of Friedrich Miescher and the bandages or the X-rated scenes of bacterial sex. But behind the fun is high seriousness, for the authors know their subject from the inside and give a nicely cyclical historical account, begining with those bandages, and ending with cures for genetic diseases. On the way, they pass via Mendel, Haekel, Galton,
perience on intralesional therapy of mucosal and skin tumors with crude ctIFN. Results are almost too good to be true but certainly his approach is worth attention. The chapter on interferon inducers by Levine and Sherwin is the most detailed that I have ever read; so far PolyICLC is the only effective inducer in humans. However, because of hyporesponsiveness and scarce tolerability, the problem is still open and the search for a better inducer should continue. Finally, Smedley and Wheeler point out the toxicity of IFN with particular emphasis to the nervous system made evident during high dose administration of cdFN. It may well turn out that high dosages are not necessarily better and it looks as if we still have a long way to go before learning bow to use IFN profitably. In conclusion, this volume can be useful even though, because of the rapid advancement of this field, its life-time is bound to be short. VELIO BOCCI Institute of General Physiology, Via Laterina 8, Universityof Siena, 53100, Italy.
(see page 63); and since Ziff worked Weismann, Morgan, to Garrod, Beadle, with Sanger back in the early days of Tatum and Avery. Credit is given where DNA sequencing, I assume it comes credit is due. The old familiar stories from the self-deprecating Master himlose nothing in the retelling, and gain self. From Amazing genes in pieces that much in the illustration; Rosy's Talk and the Chinese dinner, Chargaff's jump to Z-DNA; the story goes on but Scorn, Good Friday in the Gibbs Build- tactfully spares the reader the exponentially growing litany of names of the chief ing, Pyjamos and all that stuff. Time out for sex leads on to more protagonists. We glimpse the Biotechrecent and less well charted, or at least nology Bubble, are reminded of The less literarily celebrated events. Arthur Moratorium, get introduced to Selfish Kornberg, Hamilton Smith, Dan DNA, have a taste of Prebiotic Soup, Nathans, Paul Berg and Waily Gilbert and take a Galactic View of DNA. It's all slot into their important roles, but I heady stuff, to be sipped rather than was specially pleased to find Fred downed at a single draught. I enjoyed Sanger almost at the literal centre of the every last drop, right to the very end book, and drawn the kindest too. You where the long-suffering Illustrator Van might think that with two Nobel prizes Loon (who only once admits defeat, in he needed no further public recognition, the Globin Gene Cluster) credits his but it has always seemed to me that sources, from P. Uccello to R. Crumb. Sanger's modesty, and his preference to Whether at £2.95 or $6.95 it's a snip; do something instead of talking about it, and incidentally points the way to a has tended to play down the importance favourite project of mine that someone of his contributions. Even DNA for ought to take on, the Cartoon Book of Beginners doesn't glamorize the voyage The Cell. It can clearly be done, and I to the sequence of lambda, and one day hope DNA for Beginners is indeed just I hope we shall be told How Fred Did for starters. TIM HUNT It. A revealing little story new to me was the origin of the term fingerprint Departmentof Biochemistry, Cambridge, UK.
T I B S - May 1984
IFN story in the next chapter, while an overview of current production methods of ct and 13IFN is presented by Ramel et al. They emphasize the role of recombinant DNA technology although they stress possible difficulties in that recombinant unglycosylated IFN may be antigenic in comparison to the natural [3 and ~IFN. However, this drawback may be overcome by using cloned eukaryotic cells. Two chapters summarize what is currently known about the biochemical and immunological actions of IFN. The final three-quarters of the book is devoted to evaluating possible mechanisms of action and therapeutic efficacy of cdFN in experimental animals and in man. Gresser, in describing the anti-tumor effects in mice, enumerates the effects of IFN on tumor cells and the host and intriguingly concludes that probably the most relevant anti-tumoral mechanism has not yet been discovered. The following nine chapters give a detailed and objective evaluation of results obtained on lymphoma, leukemia, myeloma, breast, lung, gastrointestinal cancer,
brain and bone tumors and papillomas. Although one cannot find brand-new data in any of these chapters, the reader has the advantage of getting an overall view of the situation in one afternoon. Many dilemmas remain: in some tumors the antiproliferative action may prevail over the immunomodulatory activity and vice-versa, while in others there is no effect. As IFN is a drug displaying many biological effects, problems related to the optimal route of administration, dosage and schedules remain open. At present results obtained with IFN treatment are hardly superior to other classical treatments, yet IFN can still abate some tumors where all other treatments have failed. Thus, if one considers that there are still many cards to play, such as combination therapy with other interferon types or other treatments and more rational ways of administration, one gets the feeling that, in spite of the existing difficulties, IFN has a chance to acquire a relevant place among anti-tumor drugs. This feeling is reinforced by reading the chapter by Ikic referring to his ex-
C o m i c a l DblA D N A for Beginners
by Israel Rosenfield, Edward Ziff and Borin Van Loon, Writers and Readers Publishing Cooperative, 1983. £2.95/ $6.95 (223 pages) ISBN 0 863 16023 9 It would be nice to think of DNA occupying the intellectual space between Darwin and Freud, as it were, but the map inside the back cover puts it out on a limb beyond the former master. Never mind, for Rosenfield, Ziff and Van Loon have nevertheless achieved a considerable if more conventional success. They manage to be intelligent, funny and true all at the same time; I challenge anyone to open this book at random and not to smile within a page or two. Not to say laugh out loud, for some of the jokes are wonderful, like the one of Friedrich Miescher and the bandages or the X-rated scenes of bacterial sex. But behind the fun is high seriousness, for the authors know their subject from the inside and give a nicely cyclical historical account, begining with those bandages, and ending with cures for genetic diseases. On the way, they pass via Mendel, Haekel, Galton,
perience on intralesional therapy of mucosal and skin tumors with crude ctIFN. Results are almost too good to be true but certainly his approach is worth attention. The chapter on interferon inducers by Levine and Sherwin is the most detailed that I have ever read; so far PolyICLC is the only effective inducer in humans. However, because of hyporesponsiveness and scarce tolerability, the problem is still open and the search for a better inducer should continue. Finally, Smedley and Wheeler point out the toxicity of IFN with particular emphasis to the nervous system made evident during high dose administration of cdFN. It may well turn out that high dosages are not necessarily better and it looks as if we still have a long way to go before learning bow to use IFN profitably. In conclusion, this volume can be useful even though, because of the rapid advancement of this field, its life-time is bound to be short. VELIO BOCCI Institute of General Physiology, Via Laterina 8, Universityof Siena, 53100, Italy.
(see page 63); and since Ziff worked Weismann, Morgan, to Garrod, Beadle, with Sanger back in the early days of Tatum and Avery. Credit is given where DNA sequencing, I assume it comes credit is due. The old familiar stories from the self-deprecating Master himlose nothing in the retelling, and gain self. From Amazing genes in pieces that much in the illustration; Rosy's Talk and the Chinese dinner, Chargaff's jump to Z-DNA; the story goes on but Scorn, Good Friday in the Gibbs Build- tactfully spares the reader the exponentially growing litany of names of the chief ing, Pyjamos and all that stuff. Time out for sex leads on to more protagonists. We glimpse the Biotechrecent and less well charted, or at least nology Bubble, are reminded of The less literarily celebrated events. Arthur Moratorium, get introduced to Selfish Kornberg, Hamilton Smith, Dan DNA, have a taste of Prebiotic Soup, Nathans, Paul Berg and Waily Gilbert and take a Galactic View of DNA. It's all slot into their important roles, but I heady stuff, to be sipped rather than was specially pleased to find Fred downed at a single draught. I enjoyed Sanger almost at the literal centre of the every last drop, right to the very end book, and drawn the kindest too. You where the long-suffering Illustrator Van might think that with two Nobel prizes Loon (who only once admits defeat, in he needed no further public recognition, the Globin Gene Cluster) credits his but it has always seemed to me that sources, from P. Uccello to R. Crumb. Sanger's modesty, and his preference to Whether at £2.95 or $6.95 it's a snip; do something instead of talking about it, and incidentally points the way to a has tended to play down the importance favourite project of mine that someone of his contributions. Even DNA for ought to take on, the Cartoon Book of Beginners doesn't glamorize the voyage The Cell. It can clearly be done, and I to the sequence of lambda, and one day hope DNA for Beginners is indeed just I hope we shall be told How Fred Did for starters. TIM HUNT It. A revealing little story new to me was the origin of the term fingerprint Departmentof Biochemistry, Cambridge, UK.