Cell growth, one of the most fundamental of biological processes, has
long been among the least understood. On April 24-28, 1984 sci- entists
convened from around the world in Canada's Banff National Park for The
International Cell Cycle Society's 10th Conference. Their purpose was to
evaluate recent developments in the field of cell prolif- eration and to
explore the interrelationship between cell growth, de- velopment, and
differentiation, and proliferative diseases such as can- cer. Growth,
Cancer, and the Cell Cycle collects those conference papers that present
the most recent advances in this field. The first section of the book is
Gene Expression and Development During Growth. It examines the structure
and function of chromatin, DNA unwinding proteins, and nonhistone
nuclear proteins, then ex- plores transcriptional, translational, and
post-translational regulation during the cell cycle and the
interrelationship and coordinate regula- tion of cell growth,
differentiation, and gene expression. The second section, Growth
Activation and Dormancy, focuses upon the events that occur during the
transition between active cell growth and proliferative quiescence. The
role of DNA strand breaks, protein kinase activity, growth regulatory
factors, and the cytoskeleton are examined. Section three discusses The
Topology of the Cell Cycle. It reviews genetic approaches for
determining the sequence of events and cau- sality relationships that
comprise and coordinate the many separate processes involved in cell
cycle progression and describes the use of multipara meter flow
cytometry to characterize the mammalian cell cy- cle and intracellular
metabolic and transitional growth states.
