Book Review

Principles of Cellular and Molecular Immunology

N Engl J Med 1995; 333:262-263July 27, 1995

Article

Principles of Cellular and Molecular Immunology
By Jonathan M. Austyn and Kathryn J. Wood. 735 pp. New York, Oxford University Press, 1994. $42.50. ISBN: 0-19-854297-6

In 1933 the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory on Long Island, New York, became the site of an annual meeting on a topic of interest in biology. The subject of the 1966 meeting was the genetic code; the following year's meeting, devoted to antibodies, attempted to build on the previous symposium by bringing the precepts of molecular biology to immunology. A great deal had been learned about the structure of immunoglobulins, thanks to new methods for sequencing proteins, but in 1967 the genetic basis of antibody diversity remained as mysterious as ever. Indeed, it was not until 1976, almost a decade after that historic Cold Spring Harbor meeting, that the molecular mechanism of immunoglobulin-gene assembly was discovered. Even so, Niels Jerne — who was to receive the Nobel prize in 1984 for his seminal contributions to immunology — was not deterred from entitling his essay for the 1966 symposium “Waiting for the End” and declaring that “the definitive solution of the antibody problem is approaching” (N.K. Jerne. “Waiting for the End.” Symposium on Quantitative Biology 1967;32:591-603). Perhaps the main lesson of the 32nd Cold Spring Harbor Symposium is the difficulty of predicting definitive solutions, or the “end” of a scientific endeavor.

It is thus of more than passing interest that for the 1989 Cold Spring Harbor Symposium, Charles Janeway, the coauthor of one of the handsome new books under review, entitled his summary of the then-current state of immunology “Reaching the Asymptote?” The end of Janeway's essay, which calls for more symposiums on unsolved problems in immunology, does not share the ambiguity of its title's question mark. Nor does his and Paul Travers's book, Immunobiology, which treats the subject of immunology with freshness and vigor and the enthusiasm expected for a field that is far from its asymptote. Immunobiology and Principles of Cellular and Molecular Immunology target the same audience: readers with little or no background in immunology. However, these two books are not interchangeable. Each has its own style and distinctive point of view. Immunobiology covers virtually the whole field of immunology, from clonal selection, antigen presentation, and immunoglobulin genes to immunopathology, autoimmunity, and vaccine production. Principles of Cellu-lar and Molecular Immunology, by contrast, makes no attempt to delve into clinically related matters such as autoimmunity or immunopathology. It confines its material largely to the fundamentals, with strong emphasis on molecular and structural biology.

Immunobiology is didactic, abundantly illustrated with four-color illustrations, and logically organized. The text contains no bibliographic citations, but selected references appear at the end of each section. Immunobiology is as up to date as a textbook can be these days. The authors promise an annual revision, but will the publishers give owners of the 1994 edition a break on subsequent versions? Readers familiar with another publication from Current Biology, the journal Current Opinion in Immunology, will recognize the lavish use of illustrative tools in Immunobiology: there is a diagram or a table, and sometimes both, on almost every page. Some of these visual aids are vivid to the point of distraction. Two appendixes, one listing almost 150 CD (leukocyte surface) antigens, the other all the known cytokines and their receptors, are invaluable. Useful summaries abound.

In general, Immunobiology is clearly written and complete. If there is a fault worth mentioning, it is the inadequate historical perspective of the book. Nowhere, for example, could I find the stories of the discoveries of major histocompatibility complex restriction or the function of the thymus, both turning points in the history of immunology. Indeed, such history as the authors do give contains errors. It is unlikely that James Gowans would agree with the claim that he “identified lymphocytes as the cells responsible for generating immune responses”; nor is it correct that “the importance of the thymus in T cell development was first discovered through observations on immunodeficient children.”

Immunobiology, like Principles of Cellular and Molecular Immunology, overstresses clonal deletion as a mechanism of maintaining tolerance to self antigens. T cells with the capacity to respond to autoantigens are an integral part of the immune repertoire, as are B cells that can produce autoantibodies. Indeed, it is highly likely that the entire repertoire of the germ-line immunoglobulin variable region (V) gene is anti-self. Clonal deletion is by no means a negligible mechanism, but peripheral control elements such as costimulatory cytokines and adhesion molecules are probably of greater importance, both theoretically and practically. Manipulation of clonal deletion offers little promise to drug developers, whereas ways of dealing with the adhesion molecules that regulate lymphocyte activation are already on the drawing board or in the laboratory.

Principles of Cellular and Molecular Immunology is also a handsome book. Its abundant illustrations are less colorful, and to my eye less distracting, than those of Immunobiology. It contains far more detail on basic matters than Immunobiology; indeed, so rich is the material that the authors suggest that readers may want to skip certain sections, which they have set against a gray background. Unlike Immunobiology, this book cites references to specific points, which the reference list supplements with review articles. Throughout, the results of experiments, usually in mice, form the backbone of the presentation. Indeed, the appendix is a summary of techniques in cellular and molecular immunology. The coverage of some topics is exceptionally detailed, but there are surprising lapses, such as the single page on somatic mutation of immunoglobulin V genes, the brief discussion of the repertoire of these genes (which misstates the number of human heavy-chain V genes), and the out-of-date section on lymphokines.

These two books have a great advantage over the standard in the field, Fundamental Immunology (William E. Paul, ed. Third edition. New York: Raven Press, 1993), with its 59 authors and thus its inevitable repetitions, disagreements, and variable quality: each of the new books has only two authors. They therefore have a pleasing consistency of style, layout, and point of view. I can find no reason to compare them point by point because they differ so considerably. For a generally excellent, timely, and broad review, the choice would be Im-munobiology. But for detailed information and the experimental background for all major elements of preclinical immunology, Principles of Cellular and Molecular Immunology is a good selection. It would be better (and cheaper) to own the two of them than Fundamental Immunology.

Robert S. Schwartz, M.D.