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Resonance

March 2004
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S Mahadevan

Last year, the world at large and biologists in particular, celebrated the golden jubilee of the proposal of the double helical structure of DNA by James Watson and Francis Crick. The event has been used effectively to take stock of the remarkable progress made in biological sciences over the last five decades. Extensive accounts of the breakthrough, as well as reviews of the subsequent develop-ments triggered by the event, were published in both the popular as well as the scientific press. Though many of them are objective, in some cases, outrageous claims regarding the power of the new science of biotechnology/ genetic engineering have been made, including one by Watson himself (DNA – The Secret of Life). In this context, the book The DNA Saga: 50 Years of the Double Helix by Biman Basu (Vigyan Prasar Publishers) deserves a special mention. The book gives a concise account of the events leading to the proposal and the discoveries that followed.

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Address for Correspondance

S Mahadevan,
Indian Institute of Science,
Bangalore 560 012, India.
Email: mahi@mrdg.iisc.ernet.in

S Ramasubramanian

The opening sentence of the book under review says, “Game theory is a mathematical theory dealing with models of conflict and cooperation’’. So it is not surprising that ever since its formulation by Borel (1921) and von Neumann (1928), game theory has found applications in economics and more recently in evolutionary biology. Moreover the jargon as well as the growth of the subject has been influenced by economics. A high point of this connection is the work of Nash on game theory being awarded the Nobel prize in economics. Though not much of mathemati-cal background is needed to appreciate the rudimentary aspects of the theory, the subtleties of the subject soon become mathematically demanding.

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Address for Correspondance
S Ramasubramanian,
Statistics and Mathematics Unit,
Indian Statistical Institute,
Bangalore 560 059, India.

Indian Academy of Sciences
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