Customer Reviews

Adult Neurogenesis: Stem Cells and Neuronal Development in the Adult Brain

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Adult neurogenesis - the generation of new neurons in the adult brain - is one of the most exciting fields of inquiry in the neurosciences. Most people believed it to be impossible until quite recently. Gradually that view gave way to another: that perhaps it could occur under certain special circumstances. Now it has become an accepted part of mammalian neurobiology. While the best evidence for adult neurogenesis is in the olfactory bulb and hippocampus. There are tantalizing clues that it may also occur in other regions of the adult brain.

This is one of the first books in English to provide a comprehensive account of this fascinating field. It is written by Gerd Kempermann, who is Head of the Research Group, Neural Stem Cells, at the Max Delbruck Center for Molecular Medicine in Berlin-Buch in Germany, who is a recognized leader in the field.

The twelve chapters are arranged logically and systematically:
1. Introduction
2. History
3. Neural Stem Cells
4. Neuronal Development
5. Neurogenesis in Adult Olfactory System
6. Adult Hippocampal Neurogenesis
7. Technical Notes
8. Neurogenic and Non-neurogenic Regions
9. Regulation
10. Function
11. Adult Neurogenesis in Different Animal Species
12. Medicine

Beginning with a brief overview and historical background, the book moves on to discuss theories of adult neurogenesis and neural stem cell biology in learning and memory as well as structural plasticity. After describing neurogenesis in the adult hippocampus and olfactory system, Professor Kempermann takes us through the current state of knowledge about the regulation and functions of neurogenesis. I particularly liked the last section where he tries - with some success - to tie failures of adult neurogenesis with some neurological diseases including temporal lobe epilepsy, major depression, some brain tumors and dementias. Some of these ideas have been published in scholarly articles over the last five years, but here the ideas are collected together and developed for the first time.

There is an important point that I could not find in the book: loss of the ability to smell, or to distinguish smells, are common early features of Alzheimer's disease and schizophrenia. In both there may also be pathology in the hippocampus. So the link between loss of olfaction and loss of memory may be impaired neurogenesis in the two sites.

The book is well written, despite English being a second language for the author. The illustrations are well selected and well produced.

At a time when it takes months or even a year or more to publish papers in the scientific literature, it is always difficult to try and keep books up to date. This one has plenty of citations up to the second half of 2004.

Serious students will want to use this book as a starting point and then supplement it with some reviews from the literature. (Interested readers will find regular updates on adult neurogenesis on my blogs.)

This book is an easy read and will be of interest to anyone interested in the brain and the mind, how things can go wrong, and some of the extraordinary promise of adult neurogenesis.

Highly recommended.