Written for the more concise course, Principles of Molecular Biology is modeled after Burton Tropp's successful Molecular Biology: Genes to Proteins and is appropriate for the sophomore level course. The author begins with an introduction to molecular biology, discussing what it is and how it relates to applications in "real life" with examples pulled from medicine and industry. An overview of protein structure and function follows, and from there the text covers the various roles of technology in elucidating the central concepts of molecular biology, from both a historical and contemporary perspective. Tropp then delves into the heart of Principles of Molecular Biology with chapters focused on chromosomes, genetics, replication, DNA damage and repair, recombination, transposition, transcription, and wraps up with translation.
Chapter 1 Introduction to Molecular Biology
Chapter 2 Protein Structure and Function
Chapter 3 Nucleic Acid Structure
Chapter 4 Molecular Biology Technology
Chapter 5 Chromosomes
Chapter 6 Genetic Analysis in Molecular Biology
Chapter 7 Viruses in Molecular Biology
Chapter 8 DNA Replication
Chapter 9 DNA Damage and Repair
Chapter 10 Double Strand Break Repair and Homologous Recombination
Chapter 11 Transposable Elements
Chapter 12 Bacterial Transcription and its Regulation
Chapter 13 Eukaryotic Transcription
Chapter 14 RNA Polymerase II: Cotranscriptional and Posttranscriptional Processes
Chapter 15 Small Silencing RNAs
Chapter 16 Protein Synthesis
Burton Tropp received a Ph.D. in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology from Harvard University. After completing his graduate research on the mechanism of methylation of transfer RNA he studied protein synthesis in regenerating rat liver while a post-doctoral fellow in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at the Harvard Medical School. He then joined the faculty of the City University of New York where he is currently a professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry at Queens College and in the Ph.D. Biochemistry Program at the City University of New York Graduate Center. He teaches biochemistry and biochemical genetics at both the undergraduate and graduate levels. His major research interest has been the genetic aspects of lipid metabolism. He has authored more than 50 peer-reviewed papers in this research area.