As the Editor of this encyclopedia states in the preface, this work has a lot to live up to: he writes from Edinburgh, the home of the “greatest encyclopedia of all time”, namely, the Encyclopaedia Britannica. Eric Reeve, Editor of Genetical Research, has grouped together well over 100 contributors to his impressive volume. The problem to be overcome was one of comprehensiveness versus selectivity, keeping the price firmly in view also. At just over £100.00 this aim certainly has been achieved. The encyclopedia is the result of four years’ correspondence with the contributors, all internationally recognised in the field of genetics.
The Editor gets his first contributor to start at the very beginning: “The intention of this chapter is to introduce the subject of genetics to those with little previous experience of the subject.” The articles are of varying lengths covering a large range of topics within the field, all supported by references to further reading. There is an appendix of useful Web addresses as well as a glossary of terms and subject index. Besides the basics, there are chapters on bacteria and viruses, the ubiquitous Drosophila, eukaryotes, the mouse, clinical and non‐clinical human genetics, plants and population genetics. The clinical genetics section covers a wide range of diseases, from Wilms’ tumours, blood disorders, muscular dystrophy and eye disorders through to the more serious disorders such as baldness. More peripheral aspects are also discussed such as ethical and legal problems. There is a particularly important chapter on the current crisis on gene therapy covering the need to ensure public participation, adverse affects reporting and conflicts of interest. The Web addresses are in themselves a mine of information. The subject index contains over 3,000 entries; there are about 250 entries in the Glossary.
Genetics is an area of science which exhibited a rebirth only since the mid‐1960s, despite having been around since the beginning of the twentieth century. The strength of this volume is its value for money covering a huge range of topics within this short history. I can thoroughly recommend this work which should be on the shelves of all special libraries. For the price it is a bargain.
