Essential Cell Biology: An introducton to the Molecular Biology of the Cell

by Bruce Alberts, Dennis Bray, Alexander Johnson, Julian Lewis, Martin Raff, Keith Robert, Peter Walter, Keith Roberts

Publisher: Garland Pub; 4th Edition
ISBN: 0815344554

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Book Description

Essential Cell Biology provides a readily accessible introduction to the central concepts of cell biology, and its lively, clear writing and exceptional illustrations make it the ideal textbook for a first course in both cell and molecular biology. The text and figures are easy-to-follow, accurate, clear, and engaging for the introductory student. Molecular detail has been kept to a minimum in order to provide the reader with a cohesive conceptual framework for the basic science that underlies our current understanding of all of biology, including the biomedical sciences.

The Fourth Edition has been thoroughly revised, and covers the latest developments in this fast-moving field, yet retains the academic level and length of the previous edition. The book is accompanied by a rich package of online student and instructor resources, including over 130 narrated movies, an expanded and updated “Test Bank,” and new enhanced assessments for students.

Univ. of California, San Francisco. Textbook presenting the essentials of cell biology for firstwith or second-year undergraduates little background in biology. Color illustrations.

Customer Reviews

"Essential Cell Biology" by Bruce Alberts literally saved my 1st semester. The course went hard and the lectures were long and boring. And then - I opened the Essential, started reading, and suddenly things got clear for me. I got an A on the test, and now I know my Cell Biology well - all thanks to this book. Strongly recommended!!!

This book contains essential stuff enough for medical students, although not enough for biochemistry or biology students. But this book is still useful because whenever you read the book, you will be inspired to that particular field. It is written not as tedious and complex as those "big" textbooks. Easy to read. Interesting. I highly recommend this textbook.

But if you are looking for every detail in molecular biology, this book is not satisfactory.

This is a beautifully presented book. My students like it enormously, because of the conversational style, the illustrations, and the overall readibility -and this is perhaps the highest aim a textbook can aspire to achieve.

However, I find that the authors have gone too far in their attempt to abridge and simplify their previous opus -Molecular Biology of the Cell (MBOC): some topics are insufficiently or superficially discussed. Also, the style is slightly verbose at times. Finally, I think that the book could benefit from some reorganization.

The following examples illustrate my point.

• Osmosis is given a very brief mention.(p 382).
• The repulsion for anything mathematic continues the tradition started by MBOC. The Nernst equation, is given just a little box in page 393. The Donnan effect doesn't even have a walk-on part.
• The discussion of action potential contains the usual story of the voltage gated K+ channels, when these channels are not found in myelinated mammalian neurons.
• Myelin itself is not even mentioned.
• The discussion on G protein-linked receptors -a key topic- is very superficial.
• Membrane potential is introduced in a rather convoluted fashion. Furthermore, the concept is used several times before it is finally explained.
• Certain sections may leave the reader confused. For example p53 is described as a gene regulatory protein which arrests the cycle when DNA damage occurs (p 580). But when tumor suppressor genes are discussed, only retinoblastoma is given as an example, which would tend to convey the mistaken idea that p53 is not a tumor suppressor gene.

The book excells in didactic qualities by a systematic evolment of the main topic, by preceding each chapter with a keyword like abstract of the chapter topic, by ending each chapter with a list of the presented key concepts and questions which are propperly answered at the end of the book, by a clear print where text runs down on two thirds of the page while the remainder of the page shows an unbelievable number of color illustrations, and by a readable, understandable and precisely written style. Since the book is an introduction into it's field, it will necessarily not cover too intricate details. And certain things are still under research, even seemingly simple ones like: Does the myosion filament in muscle cells really "float" like on p.539? There was a different picture in the PROCNATL, some time ago.

The chapters are: 1.) Introduction to Cells, 2.) Chemical Components of Cells, 3.) Energy, Catalysis, and Biosynthesis, 4.) How Cells Obtain Energy from Food, 5.) Protein Structure and Function, 6.) DNA, 7.) From DNA to Protein, 8.) Chromosomes and Gene Regulation, 9.) Genetic Variation, 10.) DNA Technology, 11.) Membrane Structure, 12.) Membrane Transport, 13.) Energy Generation in Mitochondria and Chloroplasts, 14.) Intracellular Compartments and Transport, 15.) Cell Communication, 16.) Cytoskeleton, 17.) Cell Division, 18.) Cell-Cycle control and Cell Death, 19.) Tissues.

This is the "Baby Alberts," a condensed version of "Molecular Biology of the Cell by the same authors. It covers the basic premises well and the reader will not get bogged down in details that will only be useful to a senior student or graduate student. The CD that comes with it has some very nice videos and a few good animations of cell processes but it is not anywhere near as useful as the HyperCell 1998 CD, which has animations and explanations of all cell processes (Also from Garland Publishing). If you plan to make cell and molecular biology your major or career, however, you will be much better off buying the more comprehensive book; it has everything that is in this book and way beyond. It may save you money because you will probably buy it in the future anyway!

This book is definitely for students at the undergraduate level. It is easy to understand as the authors provide "real life" examples in each particular section. I kind of make this book analogous to the "Books for Dummies Series" in a positive connotation, mind you, since if you have absolutely no clue about cell biology, you ought to get this book. It also comes with a CD-ROM for the "tech savvy" individuals.

This textbook makes readings really easy for the student. The section headings are very detailed which keeps you from having to skim, read, re-read and highlight! You only have to read each section once for a change!

The "panels" are two page pictoral descriptions of key concepts. I could have done without these panels because I find it hard to sort of bounce around from one square to another, but all in all this textbook is excellent

I used this book as a supplement to a Cell Biology course in medical school (Semmelweis U, Budapest, Hungary). The book takes the "essentials" of cell biology and explains them in a way that is exceptionally clear. Even when I found a section/chapter hard going, just re-reading the section/chapter several times had the effect of clarifying the material. It takes a subject that can be confusing and feeds it to you in bite-size morsels. A phenomenal book - I just wish I could get the CD-Rom for it! You will NOT go wrong with this book. Look at it more like an investment... it's worth every penny. Probably the best $60-odd you'll spend this year!

I have just started my Introduction to Cellular and Molecular Biology course at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, NY, and already I feel supremely confident in my understanding of the material discussed in class. This textbook is extremely easy to follow, combining authoritative text with well-labeled diagrams and photos as supplement. I have encountered no better textbook than this one.

I recently bought the book "Essential Cell Biology: An Introduction to the Molecular Biology of the Cell" and studied it from cover to cover, including all the questions and answers. It was one of the greatest and most well-organized textbooks I have ever encountered. The language was very fluent, and especially some of the example questions were quite entertaining and witty. I haven't had any education neither in biology nor in molecular biology nor in biochemistry (my major is chemical engineering), still I didn't have any difficulties in understanding all the concepts presented in the book. The knowledge I gained from the book was a great help to me during the "GRE Subject Test in Biochemistry, Cell and Molecular Biology" which I took just yesterday. I am applying to graduate schools in the US for a Ph.D. degree in Molecular Biology or Bioengineering, and the test I took yesterday was crucial for my applications, in which (thanks to Essential Cell Biology) I believe I did quite well for a person without a background in the subject except a two-months-long self-study. This is a great and concise introductory textbook to the molecular biology of the cell, and I highly recommend it to anyone who has an interest in this subject with no or little background.