Life Illuminated: Selected Papers from Cold Spring Harbor, Volume 2 (1972-1994) - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0879698047 ISBN 13: 9780879698041

Publisher: Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, 2008

Synopsis

This book is the second volume of an intellectual history of the science done at CSHL (the first volume, Illuminating Life, showed that genetics became the dominant theme of research at CSH by as early as 1904). The appointment of James Watson as Director of the Laboratory in 1968 set off the explosive research development at CSH, as he recruited widely and wisely teams of investigators with diverse scientific interests. From this collection of papers, presented in full on the accompanying CD, several themes emerge: the characterization and exploitation of mobile genetic elements; the mechanics of DNA replication and regulation of the cell cycle; the behavior and internal architecture of cells; how viruses induce tumors; the discovery of cancer genes; the characteristics of neurons; and the invention of techniques that make possible further progress. Each theme is introduced in the context of the science of the time, and each paper has a commentary by, in most cases, one of its authors. Life Illuminated is a story of scientific innovation and achievement, told in the words of the investigators themselves.

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Review

''Perhaps most importantly, this is a volume about life at Cold Spring Harbor. Very few pages pass without a mention of some word or deed by James Watson and the presence of Barbara McClintock is felt throughout the book. There are fascinating descriptions of Watson making his nightly rounds of the research laboratories, and of him wryly reminding a postdoctoral researcher caught building a model of DNA: '[t]hat s been done'. Tim Tully tells an interesting tale of Watson's willingness to support a long and often frustrating assault on the biology of memory. In an early chapter, Bruce Alberts reminds us that 'cells are much smarter than scientists'. True enough, but the denizens of CSHL in the 1970s and 1980s were (and still are) rapidly closing the gap.'' --The Quarterly Review of Biology

About this edition

• Publisher: Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 0879698047
• ISBN 13: 9780879698041
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 242
• Editor: Witkowski Jan A, Gann Alexander, Sambrook Joseph F