Аs the fifth edition of Molecular Biology of the Gene goes to press, completion of the human genome sequence is no longer news. This was not something that could safely have been
anticipated when the first edition appeared in 1965; even when the fourth edition came out in 1987, few if any foresaw how quickly we would move into a world where whole genomes, not just individual genes, could be visualized and compared. There has been a comparable leap in the elucidation of protein structures as well. Thus, in the last few years, the structures of the huge molecular machines that drive the basic processes discussed in this book-DNA transcription, replication, protein synthesis, and so forth-have largely been solved at the atomic level, and many details of their inner workings revealed.
The new edition of Molecular Biology of the Gene reflects these advances, and many others besides. But when we sat down to plan this latest version, we were all of a mind that much of the organization and scope of the original book should be retained. This was not a matter of convenience-inevitably, in light of the dramatic changes that had taken place since the last edition, the vast bulk of the text had to be completely rewritten anyway, and all the art rendered afresh. No, the reasoning was simply that, more than ever in this genomic era, there seemed a need for a book that explained what genes are and how they work, and this was exactly what Molecular Biology of the Gene had originally been designed to do.