Germ warfare: Breakthrough in immunology

Germ warfare: breakthrough in immunology A. Baxter. St. Leonards, NSW: Allen and Unwin. ISBN 1-86508-070 5. $21.91. 220pp.

This book by Alan Baxter, head of the Autoimmunity Group at the Century Institute in Sydney, Australia, initially outlines developments in immunology through recognition of the immune system's role in defence against infection - hence the title. The author then presents some of the milestones in the development of our knowledge of the immune system. This book is presented in an anecdotal rather than academic format and highlights, in particular, the important role that Australians such as MacFarlane Burnet and others at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute, Melbourne, played in unravelling the mysteries of the immune system.

The story begins with an outline of the Ebola virus outbreak in Zaire in 1995, then moves back in time to the conflicting findings of Metchnikoff and Bordet on the relative roles of phagocytosis and complement in the innate defence system-a conflict resolved finally by Almroth Wright, a graduate of Trinity College, Dublin, who established the role of complement as an opsonin that aids phagocytosis.

The discovery, by Alexander Fleming, of the action of lysozyme on bacteria is alleged to have occurred because a drop of mucous secretion from Fleming's nose dropped onto a culture plate, and he observed a consequent inhibition of growth. Whatever the truth, the work of purification and characterisation was to be achieved by Florey and Chain, who performed a similar task in later years by purifying penicillin.

From this point, the book highlights the main developments in immunology, commencing with the work of James Gowan on the role of lymphocytes, and the pioneering work of Peter Medawer on transplantation and that of MacFarlane Burnet on immunological tolerance and the clonal selection theory, for which these last two received the Noble prize. Background to the collaboration of Ivan Roitt and Deborah Doniach, which led to the discovery that Hashimoto's thyroiditis is an autoimmune disease, presents an example of the contribution of serendipity to the informed mind, and paved the way for the significant work of both in the field of autoimmunity. The contribution of George Snell, Peter Gorer and Peter Doherty to our understanding of MHC class restriction and T-cell recognition systems is presented.

The latter stages of the book deal, in the main, with developments in transplantation science and the controversy over Summerlin's work at the Sloan Kettering Institute on skin grafting in mice. Finally, the contribution that molecular genetics can make is presented, and the limitations of the earlier, more phenotypic methods in unravelling the complex interactive processes of the immune system is highlighted.

Whilst this book is not a detailed presentation of the development of immunology in an academic sense, it does illustrate the impact that the human dimension has, both for good and ill, on the pursuit of science. As such, it is a useful contribution to the history of immunology.

T. Scott