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360
BIOCHEMICAL SOCIETY TRANSACTIONS
Trends in Enzyme Histochemistry and Cytochemistry (CIBA Foundation Symposium 73,
New Series)
Excerpta Medica Amsterdam, 1980, pp. 314, $53.75
Most of the current concepts and practices of enzyme
histochemistry are discussed in this volume. In fact, the full
reports of discussions following the formal presentations are one
of the most useful and interesting elements of the text. These
provide an insight into the types of problems facing histochemists today. This book is not a cook-book; it can be
appreciated fully only with some prior knowledge of histochemistry and its techniques. The biochemist who wishes to
follow up his investigations at a morphological level will find this
a useful text to update the standard histochemical texts. There
are a few minor deficiencies that are inevitable if a symposium is
to be of manageable size, but one of these deficiencies seems
unfortunate. There is no general discussion of tissue proteinases
and the approach to demonstration of enzymes that cannot be
easily demonstrated by traditional histochemical techniques.
Techniques of immunohistochemistry are ,being applied to this
problem and that of differentiating tissue-specific isoenzymes
such as prostatic acid phosphatase. There is one formal
presentation of immunohistochemistry, but not quite enough
discussion in a text concerned with ‘trends’ in enzyme
histochemistry. This illustrates a major problem of conventional
enzyme histochemistry : some of the most interesting enzymes
are difficult to demonstrate definitively by available techniques.
One looks forward to another symposium like this one to discuss
future progress in five to ten years.
J. E. LINDER
The Lymphocyte Cell Surface
P. B. GARLAND and M. J. CRUMPTON (Editors)
The Biochemical Society, London, 1980, pp. 124, El5
It was a good idea for the editors to bring together those
working on the biochemistry of cell surfaces and those studying
the molecular and cellular bases of immune responses. Each of
the eight contributions exemplifies a particular approach. Thus,
when Alan Williams describes how he has used monoclonal
antibodies to analyse the surface of rat lymphocytes, a general
strategy for the analysis of cell-surface antigens emerges.
Likewise, Harvey Lodish discusses mechanisms of synthesis,
glycosylation and membrane insertion of glycoproteins using the
RNA-encoded viruses vesicular stomatitis virus and Sindbis as
model systems. Antigen-recognition molecules on the
lymphocyte surface are obviously of prime importance in
immunology, and the signals they initiate are a source of
fascination. Surface immunoglobulins, which perform this
function on B cells, are known to differ from secretory
immunoglobulins synthesized in the same cell, in possessing a
membrane-insertion peptide at the C-terminal end of the H
chain. The two types of immunoglobulin are shown by Alan
Williamson and his colleagues to be encoded by distinct mRNA
molecules. The results reported here are for immunoglobulin-M
production by a lymphoblastoid cell line, but similar results have
since been obtained for immunoglobulin G. B lymphocytes
normally express two heavy-chain isotypes and probably go
through a stage of triple expression. This has yet to be
accounted for at the mRNA level. There are many other
signal-receiving sites on cells of T and B lineage as they
differentiate from stem cells all the way through to effector cells.
Apart from SmIg’, there are surface Ia molecules and ‘growth
factor’ receptors which, in part, control the antigen-induced
differentiation of B lymphocytes. The way they may do it is
discussed by Fritz Melchers and colleagues. The study of
recognition and effector molecules on T cells is in a much less
mature state, and the editors wisely give little space to this
subject. There is, however, an interesting short article on Thy-I
antigen, showing that it has structural similarities to Ig domains
and comparing it with /3,-microglobulin in function. The mitotic
activation of lymphocytes has been known for over 12 years to
be triggered via cell-surface structures, but the overall biochemical control of mitotic activity is proving an exceedingly
complex puzzle to unravel. One of the favourite candidates for
cytoplasmic regulation of cell growth, namely changes in the
concentration of free Ca2+ in the cytoplasm, is the subject of a
hypothesis developed by lames Metcalfe-and colleagues. Their
review encompasses more generally the interplay of surface
and cytoplasmic changes in cell growth. Two other articles
are concerned with the morphology and movements of live
leucocytes.
Presumably the participants received a lot of beneficial
cross-fertilization in the refreshment intervals. But as far as this
publication is concerned, we have to be content with the placing
together of the several articles in a single volume, and that is of
some considerable value, for all of these papers are of a high
standard, at the forefront of an important and fascinating
subject.
N. R. LING
Abbreviation: Smlg, surface membrane immunoglobulins.
Nucleic Acid-Metal Ion Interactions
THOMAS G. SPIRO (Editor)
John Wiley and Sons,Chichester and New York, 1980, pp. 256,
f 15.55
In the biological sciences over the past decade, perhaps only
molecular genetics has spawned more new journals, textbooks
and symposia than has Bio-Inorganic Chemistry. This is
Volume I in a new review series which will appear intermittently, called ‘Metal Ions in Biology’.
The Editor points out that the chapters are not intended to be
exhaustive reviews, but only readable accounts of the subject.
Even so I still think that it is a bit of a cheat that Chapter 1 is
simply a reprint of an article previously published in a review
journal and written in early 1977. At sixpence per page, I think
we are entitled to better than that.
Chapter 1 is a personal account of the history of the
development of platinum compounds for cancer treatment.
Although entertaining, it is also superficial and it is frustrating to
find a paucity of references-there are only five.
Chapter 2 is very different-80 pages and 2 19 references on
heavy metals and nucleic acids. This is most useful, providing
enough groundwork so that an organic chemist will be able to
1981
BOOK REVIEWS
36 1
appreciate the nucleic acid chemistry, and vice versa. Several
pages are devoted to heavy metals as probes for polynucleotide
structure (in electron microscopy, X-ray diffraction,
fluorescence). The last 20 pages of this chapter give a rather
more objective view of platinum compounds and cancer
treatment than did Chapter 1 . This duplication, however, does
make me wonder whether the Editor actually did any editing at
all.
Chapter 3 is a short but useful account of Metals and Genetic
Miscoding. Since most of the enzymes involved in nucleic acid
metabolism require a bivalent cation (usually magnesium) for
activity, the study of the effects of other cations has given many
useful insights into the mechanisms of these processes.
Chapter 4 is a good, concise account of the three-dimensional
structure of transfer RNA and the binding sites for a wide range
of metals which have been identified.
Chapter 5 is another long one (60 pages, 227 references) on
Structural Principles of Metal Ion-Nucleotide and Nucleic
Acid Interactions. Again the authors have been thorough in
providing sufficient background, but some of this is simply
repetition of Chapter 2. Editor, please note. Over half the chapter
is concerned with metal binding to nucleotide derivatives and the
rest to polynucleotides. Naturally in the latter section great
emphasis is placed on magnesium and manganese, and this
means that overlap with Chapter 2 is fairly small.
Overall a useful book, but with a little effort could have been
shorter (cheaper?) with no loss of information.
A. D. B. MALCOLM
Nucleotide Analogs-Synthesis
K. H. SCHEIT (Editor)
John Wiley and Sons, Chichester and New York,pp. 288,
f16.00
This book achieves half its aim very well and the other half
nothing like so well. It is clearly a chemistry book rather than a
biochemistry book-it is very good on ‘synthesis’, but there are
disappointing omissions from the ‘biological function’.
The book describes in detail, with plenty of diagrams and
copious references, the syntheses of nucleotides altered in base,
sugar and phosphate.
Surely the main interest in such molecules (apart from
admiring the synthetic abilities of organic chemists) is their use
as enzyme substrates and inhibitors (reversible and irreversible),
the information this provides about enzyme mechanisms and the
metabolism of nucleotides and nucleic acids, and finally the
clinical applications of such knowledge. Some of this can be
found in this book, but it is not easy. There are no separate
and Biological Function
sections on biological function, and the index is woefully
inadequate. For example, IMP dehydrogenase does not appear
at all and DNA-dependent RNA polymerase is only listed once,
although there are dozens of references to it in the text. There is
almost no discussion of the possible significance of methylated
bases in nucleic acids.
The use of affinity columns to isolate mercurated or thio
nucleic acids synthesized from modified nucleotides is not
described.
I think it is a pity that the publishers find it necessary to use
numbers in round brackets in four different ways: for references,
for figure numbers, for atom numbering in molecules and for
sub-divisions within a sentence. This makes the book much
harder to use than is necessary.
Overall the book is good and useful, but the title is
misleadingly ambitious.
A. D. B. MALCOLM
Platelets: Cellular Response Mechanisms and their Biological Significance
A. ROTMAN, F. A. MEYER, C. GITLER and A.
SILBERBERG (Editors)
J. Wiley and Sons, Chichester and New York, pp. xii + 327,
f17.50
This book reports the proceedings of an EMBO workshop held
at the Weizmann Institute in April 1980, which brought together
workers from a variety of disciplines with a common interest in
platelet biochemistry, physiology and pharmacology. The book
itself contains sections on platelet function, platelet membrane
structure and receptors, the intracellular platelet response and
platelet pharmacology, as well as a brief summary of the most
salient points raised in the discussions as judged by the Editors.
It is probably true that there have recently been too many
meetings, and their reports, devoted to the blood platelet. What
therefore is contained in this volume which is not available
elsewhere? At the biochemical level the yield seems to be rather
sparse. Some new ideas about labelling of membrane proteins
can be found in the article by Rotman, and that by Detwiler and
Tam provides some insight into the mechanism by which
thrombin acts as an agonist and also illustrates the considerable
difficulties posed by this system. Costa and Murphy provide a
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nice review of the way in which physical techniques such as
nuclear magnetic resonance and electron microprobe X-ray
analysis can be applied to provide insight into the mechanism of
vesicular adenine nucleotide/amine storage, and Holmsen
contributes another of his characteristically stimulating articles
on the mechanisms underlying the platelet secretory response.
Many of the other articles are frankly disappointing, since too
often they describe only methods and/or approaches as applied
to the blood platelet which were originally devised for other
systems or are a re-hash of contributions published elsewhere.
There are also some striking omissions. For example, one might
have expected a much fuller discussion of the possible
importance of membrane phospholipid metabolism to platelet
function, although this is taken up to some extent by Holmsen.
I cannot therefore really see that this book has much to offer
biochemists interested in the blood platelet. More comprehensive
and up-to-date accounts of many of the topics of biochemical
interest are likely to be found in volume 2 of J. L. Gordon’s
‘Platelets in Biolog-v and Pathology’, which should be available
soon.
M. C. SCRUTTON