BOOK REVIEWS PAPER CHROMATOGRAPHY--A LAB- ORATORY MANUAL, by Richard J. Block, Raymond Le Strange, and GunterZweig. Academic Press, Inc. New York, 1952. 195 pp. Probably in no other branch of modern analytical techniques is a laboratory manual more needed than in the branch of paper chro- matography. It is a branch of analytical chemistry that has been expanding rapidly in the past five to ten years. In the field of bio- chemistry this expansion has been particularly rapid and any researcher in this or related fields has had to make an extensive search of the original literature for information regarding the applicability of the chromatographic technique to com- pounds with which he may be work- ing. As the authors state in the fore- word "The object of this monograph is to provide a readily accessible source for some of the many uses and adaptations of paper chromatog- raphy that have appeared since the publication by Consden, Gordon, and Martin less than 10 years ago." The book is divided into twelve chapters. The first chapter, which is the Introduction, presents some simple but fundamental rules to be ex. nployed in chromatographic practice. The second chapter deals with the theory of chromatography, as worked out by Martin and Synge, based on its similarity to distilla- tion with fractionating columns. The theoretical aspects have been minimized, because the book is Pcrincipally of practical nature. hapters 3 and 4 are concerned with General Methods and Quan- titative Methods, respectively. These two chapters are probably the most important to the inexpe- rienced worker, as they present the various techniques devised for paper chromatography. Chapters 5-12 discuss the general directions and experimental proce. dures used in analyzing the various groups of compounds that have been investi- gated by the paper chromatographic technique up until January, 1952. Numerous tables of Rs values are included in these chapters. The authors have crowded a large body of literature into a small book, and some descriptions may appear too brief for clarity. For- tunately they have an extensive bibliography to which the reader can refer. Some typographical er- rors have been noted. On page 31, Fig. 12 depicts a diagram of a light source for the densitometer but not for the densitometer described. On page 163, paragraph 2, is the elec- trographic cell used by Strain shown in Fig. 1 or in Fig. 2 ? A book of this type is a necessity for the average laboratory that is at all concerned with paper chroma- tography.roW. W. Er)iVlA•r, Evans Research & Development Corp. VIRUSES AS CAUSATIVE AGENTS IN CANCER, Volume 54. Consulting Editor, C. P. Rhoads. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences. New York, Pp. 869-1232. 1952. 325

326 JOURNAL OF THE SOCIETY OF COSMETIC CHEMISTS The volume contains 32 papers by various authors dealing with dif- ferent aspects of the role of viruses in regard to cancer. Some of the discussions pertain to fundamental aspects such as propagation, identi- fication, biological action, and meta- bolic function of viruses in general-- having only a very slight direct relation to the cancer problem. Rhoads emphasized the fact that the transmission of a tumor by cell-free extracts does not neces- sarily indicate the virus nature of a tumor since the tumor transfer by cell fragments such as plastids and plasmagenes is a distinct possibility. Pinkerton noted that the type of activity of an intracellular virus such as necrosis, hemorrhage, in- flammation, or neoplasia may de- pend upon the action of exogenous agents on the host virus parasite relation. He maintains that chemi- cal carcinogens may only set the stage for the activation of latent viruses--the malignant cell then being the result of an irreversible adaptation to the virus. Porter and Kallman stated that malignant cells and proliferating, normal, and embryonic cells con- tain numerous cytoplasmic partic- ulates which are absent or scanty in non-malignant cells. To the readers of this JOURN^•., it may be of special interest that viral multiplication may be influenced by certain hormones--ACTH, cor- tisone, and testosterone (Hots fall). That several of the investigators maintain that the failure to dem- onstrate viruses in the great majority of mammalian tumors may be due to a masking of a tumor virus in the tumor tissue (Schles- inger). That the appearance of symptoms indicating a virus infection follow- ing the implantation of cancer tissue into the brain of mice may not nec- essarily indicate the viral nature of the tumor but the presence of a pre-existing dormant virus infection of the brain in the host mice or a contamination of the tumor tissue while being processed with a virus or'the presence of a dormant pas- senger virus in the tumor tissue (Koprowski). Duran-Reynals found that cer- tain viruses have a dual role being cell stimulants in the adult animal or cell destroyers in the young ani- mal. Chickens and pigeons painted with methylcholanthrene developed early lesions which resembled histo- logically fowl pox, had inclusion bodies and showed subsequently a gradual transition into squamous cell carcinomas. Fowl pox virus recovered from these lesions was apparently activated by methyl- chol.anthrene. It is concluded that the virus played a role in the pro- duction of some or all of the lesions elicited by the carcinogen. In discussing fowl lymphomatosis, Burroester noted the long incuba- tion period of the disease upon trans- mission. The active agent of un- certain vital nature was able to produce also leukemia, endothe- lioma, hemangioma, and various sarcomas indicating that the agent may be multipotent. Studies of Andervont indicated that the mammary tumor agent demonstrated in certain pure in- bred strains of mice is also harbored by wild house mice. The presence of the mammary tumor virus in laboratory strains of mice is thus not the result of domestication. Graff, Heidelberger, and Haagen- sen, stating that viruses play an accepted role in the causation of cancer and noting that mammary cancer is a disease of the adult fe- male acquired in infancy through