J.D.EBERT and T.S.OKADA, eds. 1979. MECHANISMS OF CELL CHANGE 



Wiley, New York, etc. XIV, 343 pp., 153 figs., 35 tabs., subject index. 



$ 46.00, E 24.00 



Contributors: Brown, Clayton, Dan, Eguchi, Epel, Gerisch, Gurdon, Hotta, 

 Ikawa, Kanatani, Kawachi, Le Douarin, McLaren, Mahowald, Mintz, Okada 

 Pagano, Roth, Schneiderman, Wilt 



Although this book is in a rather grand format, it betrays its origin from 

 a symposium in that the contributions are unequal in quality and scope. The 

 symposium was part of the I.S.D.B. Congress held in Tokyo in August/September 

 1977 but the editors have solicited several other contributions to achieve a 

 better balance. Of the 20 chapters most are reviews ranging in length from 6 

 to 40 pages, while some are little more than research reports and seem to be 

 included almost by chance. Together they provide an interesting sampling (but 

 not much more than that) of a number of focal areas of research dealing with 

 transitions from one developmental state to another, at various levels of 

 biological organisation and in a great variety of systems. It must be said, 

 however, that many of the reviews are of top quality. 



The chapters are arranged in five sections containing four papers each: 

 Maturation and early development; Regulation of gene expression: the molec- 

 ular approach; Regulation of gene expression: the cellular approach; The 

 role of the cell surface; Rise of diversity of cell type. The references 

 cited only occasionally go beyond 1977. 



The volume is well produced and has beautiful illustrations, but it shows 

 some signs of hasty composition. 



THEORETICAL AND MATHEMATICAL DEVELOPMENTAL BIOLOGY (see also 1,99) 



Monographs 



9. 



F.L.BOOKSTEIN. 1978. THE MEASUREMENT OF BIOLOGICAL SHAPE AND SHAPE CHANGE 

 Springer, Berlin, etc. Lecture Notes in Biomathematics vol.24. VIII, 191 pp., 

 50 figs. DM 20.00, $ 10.00 (paper) 



The author of this essay starts by pointing out that the insights of mod- 

 ern, post-Cartesian geometry have so far not benefitted the science of 

 morphometries. His intention is "a thoroughgoing redefinition and reconstruc- 

 tion of morphometries as a branch of applied modern geometry". 



The first part of the essay deals with the measurement of biological shape. 

 Of more direct interest to our readers is the second part, dealing with the 

 measurement of changes in shape. Here the author points out that he, like 

 all his predecessors in this century, had to start where D'Arcy Thompson left 

 off. Indeed, on the basis of a review of the literature until 1977 he con- 

 cludes that no really new start has been made at all. His answer is an orig- 

 inal method called the "method of biorthogonal grids". This is set out in 

 detail and followed by a computer implementation and two worked examples re- 

 lating to Thompson's well-known Diodon transformation and to the phylogeny 

 and ontogeny of primate crania. 



In the last chapter he discusses future directions for transformation anal- 

 ysis, devoting some space to possible applications in developmental biology. 

 In particular, he suggests that the directional growth gradients reconstruc- 

 ted by his method may serve as a model for actual morphogenetic gradients, 

 and contrasts his own method with the model for neural plate morphogenesis 

 proposed by Jacobson and Gordon. 



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