NATURE|Vol 453|5 June 2008 OPINION

as places where motorists unquestionably in mobility has reduced the monopoly power about the ‘dusk of the motor age’ as strong belonged.” of city-centre landlords, allowing better and environmental, economic, social and politi- My only reservations about this excellent cheaper housing in the suburbs. At the same cal pressures increasingly threaten motorists’ book are its over-reliance on sociological jar- time, the monopoly power of central busi- freedom. ■ gon and that there is not enough discussion ness has been reduced by the competition Marcial Echenique is professor of land use of the economic benefits that made the car offered by out-of-town retailers. These ben- and transport studies at the Department of so successful. In most advanced economies, efits have improved economic efficiency, but Architecture, University of Cambridge, 1–5 motor vehicles account for more than 70% of at a considerable environmental cost. Maybe Scroope Terrace, Cambridge CB2 1PX, UK. He and passenger and freight mobility. The increase the author should consider writing a sequel Andrew Saint edited Cities for the New Millennium. In Retrospect: The trail A new translation of Theodor Boveri’s 1914 monograph brings the early origins of contemporary research to a wider readership, contends Robert A. Weinberg.

Concerning the Origin of Malignant often seen in cancer cells are the basis of these the rediscovery in 1900 of Gregor Mendel’s Tumours cells’ aberrant behaviour. In truth, much of the all-but-forgotten research into inherited traits. by Theodor Boveri. Translated and credit for this prescient suggestion should go to Soon after the rediscovery, several scientists annotated by Henry Harris the pathologist David von Hansemann, who, noted the striking parallels between Mendel’s Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press: 2008. beginning in 1890, published a series of papers genetic determinants and the behaviour of 82 pp. on the subject. Von Hansemann noted the tight — by then known to be present association between abnormal numbers of in pairs in ordinary cells, and only singly in Theodor Boveri (1862–1915) was a towering chromosomes () and malignant tis- sperm and eggs. None of these insights features figure in biology and cancer research sues (neoplasias), but he did not conclude that in the 1914 monograph. during the early twentieth century. Trained one invariably causes the other. Boveri notes He also studied the two poles that appear as a zoologist, he probed the workings of the von Hansemann’s contribution in passing and at the opposite ends of a cell that is about nucleus and cytoplasm of cells by perturbing presents evidence for just that conclusion. to divide. These poles anchor and organize them in invertebrate embryos. He was par- To this day, von Hansemann’s work remains the spindle fibres that pull apart two sets of ticularly interested in the contributions of relatively unknown. He lacked a doting widow chromosomes during cell division, ensuring chromosomes to cell behaviour. His specula- to translate his own body of work. And Boveri each daughter cell receives one complete set. tive monograph on the connection between was a more dominating personality — an oth- Boveri’s focus on the spindles that arise in cells chromosomal anomalies and their role in can- erwise uncritical student described him as a with four poles, rather than the usual two, as cer, published in German in 1914, sealed his “vehement, inflexible and relentless assailant”. the main source of abnormal chromosome scientific reputation. Boveri’s eclipsing of von Hansemann is remi- numbers now seems simplistic. But it was a This monograph, an important source of niscent of how Rudolf Virchow, widely cred- good start given the limited experimental tools the origins of contemporary cancer research, ited with the dictum that all cells arise from at his disposal. has now been translated into English for the the division of pre-existing cells, lifted the idea What makes Boveri’s writing worth read- second time by Henry Harris, a pioneer in from the less well-connected Robert Remak, a ing almost a century later is his ability to distil the discovery of tumour-suppressor genes. neurologist who repeatedly reported this find- complex information, including the ideas and Boveri’s widow and co-worker, Marcella ing in the years before Virchow’s famous 1858 observations of others, into brilliant, incisive O’Grady Boveri, published the first translation paper. syntheses. For those biologists among us who in 1929. Realizing that German biomedical Boveri manipulated sea-urchin eggs and are interested in how we got to where we are, research had begun to lose its dominance embryos. He stripped eggs of their nuclei or this book makes fascinating reading, even if it worldwide and that German was no longer fertilized them with multiple sperm. By so doing, does not lay down an accurate trail of previous the sole language of science, she undertook to he produced evidence for the theory, already discoveries. Cancer research over the past cen- bring her husband’s work to the attention of in wide circulation, that the determinants of tury has involved a succession of blind alleys the non-German-speaking scientific world. heredity lie in the nucleus, not in the cytoplasm, and detours, mountains of largely uninterpret- Harris’s translation presents Boveri’s ideas in and that faulty cell division is responsible for able observational data and the occasional more contemporary English and is far more the presence of abnormal numbers of chromo- brilliant leap forward. This book takes us back accessible. Frequent explanatory footnotes set somes. From his later experiments, he deduced to the humble beginnings of this now thriving the arguments in the context of recent findings that each chromosome within a single nucleus field. ■ and, on occasion, in light of twenty-first-cen- must carry a distinct type of heritable informa- Robert A. Weinberg is a member of the tury cancer research. tion and that proper Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research and Boveri is remembered for the seminal idea, depends on the inheritance of the correct professor of biology, Massachusetts Institute of laid out in Concerning the Origin of Malignant complement of chromosomes. Technology, 9 Cambridge Center, Cambridge, Tumours, that chromosomes are the seats of cell Boveri seems to have been unaware of the Massachusetts 02142, USA. He is author of The heredity, and that the atypical chromosomes dramatic revolution in that followed Biology of Cancer.

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