Introduction to molecular immunology

170 JIM03499 Plotkin, S.A., S. Michelson, J.S. Pagano and F. Rapp (eds.), CM V: Pathogenesis and Prevention of Human Infection, 536 pp., illus. Alan R. Liss, New York, 1984. £67.00, ISBN 0-8451-1057-8 This book contains papers presented at an international workshop held in April 1983 at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, PA. The meeting was attended by over 200 scientists from l l countries, concerned about the involvement of human cytomegalovirus infection in different medical situations and interested in the results of attempts to prevent CMV disease. The text opens with a keynote presentation by A.J. Beale reviewing the experience gained during the past 50 years in developing viral vaccines and suggesting the approaches to preparing effective CMV vaccines. The papers that follow are grouped in 5 sections. In section 1 the history of the isolation of CMV and its recognition as the etiologic agent of 'salivary gland virus disease' is described, the cellular responses to CMV infection analyzed, and CMV chemical structure characterized including the genome and the early and late proteins. In section 2 the epidemiology, pathogenesis, and preventive/therapeutic measures are surveyed for congenital and perinatal CMV infections as well as those following renal or marrow transplantation. The sexual transmission, immunosuppressive effects, and oncogenicity of CMV are discussed at length in section 3, partly in the context of AIDS and Kaposi sarcoma. Different aspects of immunization against CMV, from the occurrence and importance of cytotoxic cell responses through clinical data on the use of Towne strain live attenuated vaccine to the trials of subunit vaccines, are reviewed in section 4. The last section contains 2 papers, one dealing with the prevention of CMV infection in bone marrow transplant recipients by hyperimmune anti-CMV globulin administration, and the other with interferon and vidarabine treatments. This is followed by abstracts of other presentations on related topics and a subject index. The editors of this volume conclude that the meeting helped initiate a dialogue between basic and clinical virologists that eventually should provide means of controlling CMV infection. Thus the contents of the book deserves to be studied by both professional groups. F. BOREK

JIM03502 Nisonoff, A., Introduction to Molecular Immunology', 2nd edition, ix + 236 pp. Sinauer Associates, Sunderland, MA, 1984. £12.80, ISBN 0-87893-595-9 This is the second edition of Professor Nisonoff's introductory text on the molecular aspects of immunology and its appearance, a mere two years after publication of the first edition, is an indication that some major advances have occurred during that time. In 1982 the book was, predictably, largely concerned with 0022-1759/85/$03.30 © 1985 Elsevier Science Publishers B.V. (Biomedical Division)

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the structure, function, allotypes and idiotypes of the immunoglobulins and this is still true for the second edition. Much of this, of course, remains unchanged, but a completely new treatment of ' t h e organization of genes controlling immunoglobulins' is now presented and includes the major discoveries published up to the end of 1983. The dissection of the molecular mechanisms underlying complement activation and, more particularly, the striking advances in our understanding of the proteins encoded by the major histocompatibility complex were the other reasons which made a second edition urgently necessary. The essential features of the mouse and human Class I and Class II molecules (again as determined up to late 1983) are now included. The up-dating in the second edition will ensure that this text will continue to be useful for those taking introductory courses in Molecular Immunology, as well as providing supplementary reading for those pursuing more general courses in Immunology. Nonetheless, the recent elucidation of the molecular structure of the T-cell receptor (which came too late for this edition) and the anticipated molecular characterization of a whole host of regulatory factors involved in cellular immune responses suggests that the author should already be contemplating a third edition. The book is written in a readable style and is tolerably well illustrated. Some of the fine detail on amino acid sequences is, sensibly, gathered into a series of Appendices. There is a reasonable index and each chapter ends with a short list of suggestions for further reading. M.W. TuRNER