Immunology Today, vol. 4, No. 7, 1983

Recent Advances in Mucosal Immunity

edited by Warren Strober, Lars /l. Hanson and Kenneth W. Sell, Raven Press, 1982. $99.20 (xviii + 435 pages) I S B N 0 890 04642 5

The way our sciences keep advancing really is very admirable, as well as being somewhat disquieting for the uniniti- ated. When first I began research even the briefest sojourn in the library induced a twinge of guilt; flanked by serried ranks of books each one of which announced 'Advances' in this, 'Pro- gress' in that, and 'Stupendous Triumphs' in something else, I felt I should rush back immediately to the bench and get on with it while there was still something left to be discovered. Age and experience have bred a certain relaxed cynicism, even though the bookshelves are longer and more popu- lous than ever. For the most part, the 'Advances' turn out to be of the Western Front variety - hard slogs that end up within spitting distance of the start line, with everyone shouting familiar war cries to keep their spirits up. With hindsight, when the discoveries have been made, it is easy to deride this approach. For most of us, though, often there is no alternative and the purpose of these books is really to give a 'situation report' that tells you the state of the art and lets you know what you are up against before you start your own experi- ments. It is in these terms that the present volume must be judged. Does it cover enough of the ground to give a balanced view to the newcomers and yet manage to tell the expert something he did not know? The short answer to this question is 'Yes'. The book, according to the preface, is based on a symposium held on an unspecified date at the National Institutes of Health in Maryland. Some 22 papers were presented and they are arranged in sections on 'Homing of Lymphoid Cells', 'Endotoxin', 'Oral Tolerance', 'T-B Interactions', 'B-Cell Differentiation', 'Mucosal Antigen Exposure', 'IgA Transport ' , 'Intra- epithelial Lymphocytes', 'Mucus, the Attachment of Bacteria', and 'Mammary Secretions'. At the end of each section there is a short discussion and review. The typeface is agreeable and I particularly welcomed the clear and adequately large printing of the legends to tables and figures. On the whole the photomicrographs have repro- duced well and the points made in the text about ultrastructure are discernible in the illustrations. Colour prints have not been included and although this may be a bit disappointing to devotees of

immunofluorescence one cannot really expect them in this sort of publication. The references are well set out and include full tides and inclusive pagina- tion - a useful crib, for the next year or two at any rate. Technically, then, this book is well produced; so it should be, it costs nearly $100. In my opinion this price takes is right out of the personal market; it would be a useful addition to many libraries, though it is not without competitors.

As with all books based on individual contributions to a symposium there are some discordant variations in style and approach. The editors sought to modify this by including presentations from individuals working in 'systemic' immunology. This was a mistake for two reasons: first, because the distinction between systemic and regional immun- ology is a physiological nonsense which derives from the blinkered viewpoint of practitioners of the former; second, because mucosal immunity has severely practical goals which should not be sub- merged by lofty speculations about T-B interactions, etc. These are nearly always couched in future-conditional constructions, for example 'It may well be that . . .' etc. Pigs might indeed fly if they had wings but merely to make the observation does not advance our under- standing either of aerodynamics or of biology. Still, to be fair, the only real howler of a typing error that I found came in a more down-to-earth section.

The real difficulty of presenting the topic of mucosal immunity is not the systemic versus regional business but the great variations which exist even between mammals: an important in- fluence is the transmission of immunity from mother to offspring, and this varies according to placentation, mammary

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function and foetal immunocompetence and creates enormous differences. At the same time the molecules directly involved in the transport of secretory immunoglobulin, IgA and SC, are highly conserved in evolutionary terms so that there is functional homology between those of fowl and man. These facts should make us wary of generaliza- tions; too many of the papers in this book seemed to assume that what happened in the species of animals that they studied had some general significance. This is how unnecessary squabbles arise. Another fault was the support of assertions by unspecified evidence that has been 'submitted for publication': this helps no one; it is the bane of published proceedings, and editors should try and stop it.

From a narrow, chauvinistic view- point I thought that workers from the UK were underrepresented. Naturally, most of the ninety or so contributors were from the host country, thirteen from a single Southern State (Alabama). The Japanese, showing their usual genius for collective enterprise, fielded a team of eleven and presented one paper. A solitary Briton, in concert with an Australian, lectured on mucus. Is it really true that British workers have not made any of the recent advances in mucosal immunity? Evidently the organizers thought so, and I have enough vulgar curiosity to wonder why. Also absent were immunologists who live or work in developing countries; it would be interesting to know what they think constitutes an advance in mucosal immunity.

JOE HALL Joe Hall is in the Chester Beatty Research Institute, Institute of Cancer Research, Royal Cancer Hospital, Belmont, Sutton, Surrey SM2 5 PX, UK.

The Lymphokines - Biochemistry and Biological Activity

edited by John 14(. Hadden and William E. Stewart II, Humana Press, 1981. £40.50 (xv + 437pages) I S B N 0 896 03012 1

Lymphokines by definition are lympho- cyte-derived, pharmacologically active, non-antibody-like products which exert regulator or effector function in specific or unspecific immunity. In this book the term 'lymphokines' is not used in a strict generic sense in that monokines and

other cytokines are also dealt with. The number of lymphokines described in the literature is now so huge (even if some turn out to be identical) that it is almost impossible to be familiar with them all. This book is intended to provide a good overview and succeeds quite well in doing so.

Half the articles have 1981 references, which does credit to the editors and the publisher. The book can be recommended to readers with a general interest in the subject.

PETER ERB

Peter Erb is in the Institut J~r Mikrobiologie and Hygiene der Universitgzt Basel, 4003 Basel, Switzerland.