Calcium Signalling, 2nd Edition, A Practical Approach

Abstract

Oxford University Press (2000) 230 pages. ISBN 0-19-963847-0 (Pbk) £32.50I have fond memories of the first edition of this book. Alas, they are only memories because, as an anonymous tribute to its usefulness, someone purloined it from my office. However, its loss is now mitigated by the publication of a worthy successor that has all the attributes of a good cookery book, with many well written chapters that include recipes (protocols) and colour plates to whet the appetite. Being greedy I would have liked more, and this volume is rather slim for the price compared with others in the OUP Practical Approach series.The book is divided into three parts, the first containing four chapters covering the techniques of calcium measurement, including the recently developed targeted chimeric cameleons and aequorins. The now conventional fluorescent indicators do not warrant a chapter of their own but are covered implicitly in other chapters, including one specifically devoted to discussing artefacts arising from the presence of transition metals and zinc. Most of the book concentrates on the biological aspects of calcium measurement, and rightly so, but the technical aspect of fluorescence measurement gets its own chapter covering photometry, video imaging, and confocal and multiphoton microscopy. At 25 pages long, this chapter can give only a brief introduction. Although most chapters include some discussion of the instrumentation required, readers looking for in-depth information about instrumentation will need to look elsewhere.The second part covers calcium measurement in different organelles, with chapters on endoplasmic recticulum and the nucleoplasm and its envelope, and an excellent chapter from Michael Duchen’s laboratory on mitochondria, which includes the associated measurement of membrane potential and redox state. Taken in conjunction with the relevant sections on targeted proteins from the first part, the discussion of the rapidly developing field of organellar calcium measurement is one of the main strengths of this book.The third part comprises four chapters on the ‘monitoring of specific calcium reactions’. I suspect this name was invented to avoid a section labelled, ‘chapters that do not fit in to the other two categories’ but nonetheless, it covers important and interesting topics. The first chapter is on controlling cytoplasmic calcium and measuring calcium-dependent gene expression. Here, Dolmetsch and Negulescu describe, in some detail, their calcium clamp apparatus that has been used so successfully to investigate the effect of calcium oscillations on gene expression. The second chapter is from Andrew Thomas’ laboratory, and describes how to measure calcium in an intact liver. This is followed by a chapter from Antony Galione’s laboratory on the use of sea urchin egg homogenates to investigate calcium release mechanisms. The final chapter is from the Editor, Alexei Tepikin, on the droplet technique for measuring calcium extrusion from single cells.One topic that I feel should have been included is the use of caged compounds, a technique that is a natural accompaniment to the fluorescent measurement of calcium, and that has been used successfully to control cytoplasmic calcium. Like the calcium clamp it has provided important data on the calcium regulation of gene expression, and yet it barely warrants a mention. However, despite this reservation, Tepikin and OUP are to be congratulated on bringing together a distinguished collection of world authorities and persuading them to write interesting and authoritative articles. I certainly picked up new ideas, and this is a book that will be compulsory reading for graduate students and postdocs wishing to cook in my calcium kitchen. I am sure that any calcium restaurant successfully using the full gamut of these recipes would warrant three Michelin stars.