Practical In Situ Hybridization.

Trude Schwarzacher and Pat Heslop-Harrison. BIOS Scientific Publishers, Oxford. 2000. Pp. 203. Price £21.95, paperback. ISBN 1 85996 138 X.

If you want a gripping read I suggest you go out and buy The Beach by Alex Garland, but if you want to set up in situ hybridization, and particularly fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH), in your laboratory, then this is the book for you. When you work in a department where FISH analysis is performed routinely, as I did, you can become blasé about this powerful technique. Moving to a department where the technology is absent soon reminds one of how certain questions, such as ‘which chromosome does this clone map to?’ can be answered relatively quickly, and how publication quality data can be generated, using this approach. This book has convinced me to set up this technique again and although no money fell out when I opened it to start me on my way, it does provide a comprehensive list of the equipment and type of set-up required. The appendix contains a helpful list of suppliers, both of reagents and equipment.

In the preface to the book the authors state that ‘we have aimed to distil the key techniques to an organised, uniformly presented, efficient and effective series of protocols… that a new user in either a molecular biology or cytogenetics laboratory can get to work’. They have definitely succeeded in the first part of their ‘mission statement’. The book is well laid out and each chapter contains background and theory before presenting the clear and easy to follow protocols. The location of each protocol is conveniently marked on the edge of the page where it is to be found, although my suggestion would be to mark the start of each chapter in this way and then have a summary of the protocols contained therein.

There are several reasons for recommending this book, including the veritable smorgasbord of protocols it contains. The section on troubleshooting and frequently asked questions is as comprehensive as it could be without the authors coming to your laboratory to diagnose the problem themselves. The chapter on stringency and kinetics is a valuable addition and a really useful teaching aid for an often misunderstood concept. It should be compulsory reading for all molecular genetics graduate students, as well as their supervisors!

The main strengths of the book, not surprisingly, are the strengths of the authors, with their years of experience of FISH and cytogenetics quite evident. It may not be a gripping read but it is certainly a book you will refer to over and over again.