Principles of Development

“Principles of Development - 5^th Edition”

The publication of the 5^th edition, a hard cover copy of this book that succeeds the 2011 paperback 4^th edition a mere four years later exemplifies the rapid advances that are occurring in this field. The previous edition of 656 pages has been expanded to 720 pages in the new edition, with changes in the number of listed authors from seven to ten, and acknowledgements to 27 reviewers.

New to this edition are animations of key signaling pathways and online movies drawn from real research. Included are new experimental boxes that consider both classic and current experimental research. Most relevant to readers of this journal are “Medical Boxes” that explore developmental diseases and their genetic backgrounds that lead to congenital anomalies. Included are boxes devoted to the fast-expanding fields of preimplantation genetic diagnosis and tissue engineering using stem cells in regenerative medicine.

Each chapter is richly illustrated with summaries of the contents, and end of chapter questions of both long answer nature and multiple choice format that challenges the serious reader. It is a superb pedagogical tool. Additionally, each chapter has a list of selected further readings that are remarkably up-to-date with references as recent as 2014.

This comprehensive encyclopedic compendium of current developmental revelations is to be highly recommended as background and foundational reading for graduate and postgraduate courses in developmental biology [1].