Customer Reviews

Genes VII

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Lewin's Genes series has dominated the market in Molecular Biology textbooks ... Unfortunately, its monopoly status seems to have insulated Lewin, his illustrators, and his editors from the corrective influences of a competitive market...so far.

I am in my second year of teaching from this book and I find it very frustrating. Lewin's writing style is unclear, difficult and distracting. Tangential ideas and subjects appear out of nowhere in the middle of chapters for no logical reason. As I write this, I should be preparing my lecture for Chapter 26 (Signal transduction). Why does this chapter start with a discussion of transporters? Later parts contain sentences that are almost unreadable and way too much detail about the alphabet soup of different kinases.

Although it is much better than some earlier editions, Genes VII still contains a variety of major and minor errors, including serious problems in explaining how lagging strand DNA synthesis is coordinated in the replication fork - several experts tell me that the model in figure 13.16 is simply wrong. The holoenyme does not lose one of its catalytic subunits with each cycle of Okazaki fragment synthesis. The clamp simply lets go and the clamp loader grabs the next fragment with a new clamp. I realized this semester that I had been ignoring the book and teaching what I knew from seminars.

Even when the content they describe is basically correct, figures in Genes VII can be astonishingly bad. Homologous recombination is illustrated with DNA strands that are only color coded and where the 5' and 3' ends are not labeled (Chapter 14). Unlabeled spliceosomal proteins change their color codes in the middle of the pathway - transesterification to form the lariat also seems to change U2 into U1 (Figure 22.10).

I am hoping that one of the newer competitors for Genes VII will prove to be a suitable replacement. I am examining Robert Weaver's Molecular Biology - I like what I've read so far - and should get a review copy of T.A. Brown's Genomes soon. ...Disclaimer - I have no financial interest in the success of any of these. All of them are available on Amazon.

By the way, I do have a Ph.D. in Molecular Biology. I'm not an expert in all of the material covered by Genes VII, but I was trained in labs whose work is cited in Genes VII.

I was keen to see this new edition with its supposed emphasis on the characterization of eukaryotic genes. However, I am extremely disappointed with the changes. In fact, on comparing with the previous editions I have, the eukaryotic sections are little more than a rehash. The sections on genome analysis are also little more than a re-write of earlier editions: chapter 3 includes several pages on Cot Analysis - does anyone still do this? One other major concern is the lack of new material/new research -almost all the 'further reading' sections refer to papers pre-1990! Genes was once the best advanced genetics text on the market - I sadly feel that Genes VII no longer holds that position.

I must speculate that some reviewers have yet to receive their PhD or otherwise do not have a full understanding of molecular biology. Part of the genius of this new edition is that it presents the same material in a more concise fashion, without losing its specificity. The Lodish book, on the other hand, is rather clusmy both in its presentation and analysis, and is frequently confused on the intricacies of this field. For a serious student who wishes to really learn this material, this book is certainly the most logical and suitable choice.

I have a chance to read this new edition of the Genes. It is obviously thinner than the previous edition. The materials presented are roughly the same with some new figures (most of them crystal structure). The drawing figures shown throughout the text are still pretty poor and ugly. They are somehow difficult to understand. The references given are not very up-to-date and most of them come from "Cell" where the author himself is the editor. Well, generally this edition is little bit better than the previous edition in term of modern idea of the field but not that obvious. Try the new edition of Lodish et al., you will see the difference.

In this edition, the author dramatically departs from the last one, both in content and order of presentation, and in the author's enthusiasm. He is clearly very excited about the developments in genetics that have taken place in the last decade, and this shows up everywhere in his writing. The book would be of interest to anyone interested in genetics, whether they are students, curious laymen, or mathematicians or physicists interested in the molecular biology behind genetics. The only minus to the book is the lack of exercises, the absence of which makes the understanding of the material more time consuming. A good background in biochemistry would be very helpful in the reading of the book.

The book is a sizable one, and space does not permit a detailed review, but there are some areas in the book that stand out as being exceptionally well-written, thought-provoking, or helpful. As someone interested in bioinformatics, mathematical genetics, and mathematical modeling of metabolic processes, I read this book from the standpoint of these interests. With this in mind, some of the more interesting discussions in the book include: 1. The author constantly asks questions throughout the book, which help to clarify the issues and motivate the concepts in the book. He also points out the questions that are unanswered up to the date of publication, giving the research-oriented reader opportunities for further investigation. 2. The discussion on mutations, with the author pointing out the difference between point mutations and insertions/deletions, the role of revertants, and the occurrence of silent mutations. I wish he would have elaborated in more detail on the experiments that identified the mutations responsible for Mendel's famous wrinkled-pea mutants, i.e. the inactivation of the gene for a starch branching enzyme. 3. The discussion on the C-value paradox and the presence of large amounts of noncoding DNA in the larger genomes. This is an interesting problem for optimization theory. 4. The discussion on the mechanisms for gene reorganization. Again, this is an interesting question in optimization theory, especially the divergence between introns as a stabilizing factor that suppresses the occurrence of unequal crossing-over. The author gives examples of the effects of unequal crossing-over, such as human globin gene clusters. 5. The crossover fixation model and the time scales needed relative to mutation. 6. Satellite DNAs and their role in DNA fingerprinting. From an information theory standpoint, satellite DNAs are interesting since they are essentially long strings of DNA of low complexity. 7. The life cycle of mRNA and the neat electron micrograph illustrating beautifully the dynamics of gene expression. 8. The accuracy of translation; the author outlining the critical stages at which errors can be made. 9. The discussion on phage strategies. The dynamics of phages is very amenable to mathematical modeling. 10. They topological manipulation of DNA. Some results from the mathematical theory of knots, such as the writhing and twisting numbers, are playing a role here. 11. The discussion on transposons. The author speaks of the mobility of transposons, and the physical mechanisms employed for their transfer are elaborated on in detail. The theory of transposons has to rank as one of the most fascinating in all of genetics. 12. DNA rearrangements and their consequence, such as the creation of new genes and the switching of expression of one gene to another. The discussion on Crown gall disease is particularly interesting. 13. The discussion on the visualization of genes during transcription and the differences in the experimental results. 14. The regulation of transcription and the control mechanisms for eukaryotes. 15. RNA editing and how information is extracted from various sources. 16. The discussion on the development process in Drosophila. This chapter should begin to satisfy the reader who is curious about the molecular basis of development.

Because of its high quality, this book will no doubt continue to be one of the canonical texts in genetics to be used now and in the future to prepare students and researchers in genetics. The career opportunities opening up in bioinformatics and genetic engineering have mushroomed in recent years, a lot of this driven by the needs of drug discovery and development. In this connection, the author asks the following question in the book: "If we could read out the entire sequence of DNA comprising the genome of some organism and interpret it in terms of proteins and regulatory regions, could we then construct an organism by controlled expression of the proper genes?" One can only hope that the answer to this question will be yes, as this will create one of the most exciting of all professions in the 21st century: the genetic designer.

This book is useful but if your new to genetics and want a nice reference book that is easy to read I recommend "Concepts of Genetics" by Klug and Cummings. I have the 6th version and even though it is not as popular as Lewin's texts it reads well and has great pictures.

This book is good for beginners in molecular biology. The books primary goal seems to be to lay out the fundamentals of this wonderful subject. It doesn't contain all the latest research, but that is why we have scientific journals(e.g. CELL, SCIENCE and NATURE). The core fundamenals to this subject don't change much and the author does a decent job explaining them.

There are some weaknesses to this book. The illustrations in this book are horrendous - the worst of any biology text I have ever seen ! At times they can be rather confusing to the reader. It also doesn't give me a lot of confidence in the proofreading and editing of this book when an errata sheet falls out of it. Textbooks are expensive and this kind of shotty work is unacceptable !

This book, despite its flaws, will give you the fundamentals of molecular biology.

Lewin has excellent figures and gives you the basics in Genes VII. Recently he's gotten into this pay for info on his website. Buy the book but don't get involved in his website.

This book is the classic usually used for Genetics and Molecular biology. It provide basic concept of nearly every aspects. However, there are two drawbacks:
1. The objects in the pictures is not carefully arranged. Sometimes it may be confusing.
2. The order of chapters is strange, so you had better read in another order.In my opinion, the order is Part1, Part4, Chapter 18-22, Part3, Part2, Part6.

By the way, there are many small errors. For example, in figure 29.28 "Hg" should be "Hh" which stand for Hedgehog.In page 592, the experiment data in figure 19.38 disappear.

In all, though it is not the best, but still have the reason to exist at the market

I am using this book to prepare for the GRE Subject test in cell and molecular biology and also as a foundation before starting graduate studies. I find that the book offers a broad scope of facts relating to the subject, more specialized than Lodish or Ablerts, neither text can be a substitute. The problem I am encountering is that it does not present many details involved in fact presenting appearently on the assumption that readers have the appropriate background knowlege which takes away greatly from the potential benefit of the book. A suggestion for future editions is to provide some details about the molecular methods involved whenever pertinent.