Plant cell biology on DVD

Abstract

For readers of a certain age their initiation into the art of botanical electron microscopy was probably aided by Gunning and Steer's (1975) collection of TEM images. I well remember the hours I spent poring over its beautiful illustrations, which acted as sirens tempting me into the hidden world of plant cell ultrastructure. Now those days can not only be revisited in a suitably modern electronic way with Brian Gunning's Plant cell biology on DVD (hereafter referred to as PCB), but a new generation can be inspired by the joys of cells. PCB certainly delivers what it promises – the whole of plant cell biology on one DVD. But, although there will be few surprises with its contents – e.g. survey of cell types, plastids, ER, Golgi, cytoskeleton, mitochondria (plant cell contents are, after all, reasonably well catalogued) – this DVD is much more than just a digital version of Gunning and Steer's (1975) black-and-white image collection (although PCB boasts approx. 2000 of those!). One of the great strengths of PCB is its wealth of >240 moving images that bring alive the dynamic nature of plant cells in a way that no static image can. Another strength is the impressive number of colourful fluorescence studies, which really impress upon the viewer the truly wonderful world of plant cell structure and ultrastructure that is still to be fully explored. In browsing PCB you run out of superlatives to describe the wonders within; whilst many of the images will be familiar to users of Gunning & Steer's hard copy publication, many more are new and often provided by some of the world's leading exponents of plant cell biology. The large number in colour serves to dramatically update Gunning & Steer's largely conventional TEM images of 1975 with the intervening >30 years of developments in molecular biology, particularly its use of fluorescent reporter genes. Although PCB is firmly rooted in the TEM world, almost all of the movie sequences are at the LM level, which latter serve both to bridge the structural and ultrastructural levels and dramatically demonstrate structure-and-function aspects of plant cell biology. Probably unusual for a cerebral, academic publication, PCB truly is a labour of love. However, lest we be too readily seduced by the beauty of the images into accepting that seeing is believing, PCB provides an excellent opportunity to present information on the techniques used to generate the images, particularly comparing various TEM preparation procedures. Although this has been done to some extent in the Golgi ‘chapter’ where CTEM, freeze-etching, HP freezing and tomography are ‘compared’, I feel a separate section devoted to this could have been very instructive (perhaps something for a future revised edition?). A most useful feature that is present is the 11-image sequence of the same cell showing different degrees of information revealed by different optical/staining techniques in LM. Computer skills are needed to use the DVD, but not of a very high order; most people should be able to make use of PCB with little trouble. Consequently, whilst a period of practice with the disk and its various functions is advisable to get the fullest benefit, it can be used immediately with just the basic screen copy function. Although the built-in facility to make your own customized recordings of selected images is useful, I suspect many users – like me – will simply want to liberate the beautiful images and use their own favourite presentation programs for teaching purposes. Competition for PCB? I'm not aware of anything that comes close! Although Donaldson and Bond's (2005) DVD is a super collection of images and techniques, it concentrates specifically on the fluorescence microscopy of wood anatomy and can't compete with the sheer range of PCB. The publisher tell us that PCB has been written (strange emphasis for such a visual feast) for a wide audience, including lecturers, researchers and students in plant cell biology, but also with school-teachers in mind. This latter group can be very influential in opening the eyes of the young to the wonders of plants, and if showing off PCB's movies to that audience can help to dispel the myth that plants ‘don't do anything’ that would be great. And if that inspires a new generation to become botanists, that would be an added bonus! So, Plant cell biology on DVD, what's not to like? Professor Gunning is to be congratulated on making this amazing collection of images – and movies – available to a wide audience. And at approx. £0·025 per image/movie, PCB is also excellent value. Unlike many rental DVDs, this is definitely one to buy, and watch time and again!