Biology of marijuana: from gene to behaviour, 1st Edition.

Biology of marijuana: from gene to behaviour, 1st Edition

E.S. Onaivi (Ed); Taylor & Francis, London, 2002, 635 p., price $150.00, ISBN 0-415-27348-X (HC)

There is tremendous activity in the world of cannabis research at present. A quick search of MEDLINE[R] reveals an exponential growth in publications over the past 13 years, and the presentations at recent scientific meetings of the International Cannabinoid Research Society (ICRS; Cornwall, Ontario, Canada on July, 2003) and the International Association for Cannabis as Medicine (IACM; Cologne, Germany on September, 2003) bear witness to the emerging clinical implications of exploiting the cannabinoid system in human therapeutics.

Choosing an editorial path through the modern cannabinoid landscape is not a matter for the faint of heart. Clear and succinct reviews should serve as signposts for the future of cannabis research. For example, the 1999 report from the Institute of Medicine carefully reviewed the research at that time with a view to assessing the therapeutic potential of cannabis, while John Morgan's Marijuana Myths Marijuana Facts opted for a more critical interpretation of the literature. Whatever the approach, a new publication must carefully describe its aims and intended audience to retain relevance as a reference tool.

With the publication of Biology of marijuana: from gene to behavior, Emmanuel Onaivi has produced a weighty addition to the cannabinoid bookshelf. For someone unfamiliar with the progress cannabinoid research, this book provides a useful indication of the wide variety of issues involved. It may therefore be a useful starting point before embarking on a deeper search of the primary sources. By comparison, a dedicated issue of a specialty journal dedicated to endogenous cannabinoids such as Prostaglandins Leukot Essent Fatty Acids 2002, 66(2/3) presents a comprehensive review of the most up-to-date research in this area, written by many of the same outstanding authors that have contributed to Onaivi's book, with a clear focus and solid framework for reference. However, such is the pace of the science of cannabis that within a year such work is rapidly being updated and replaced with new findings and progress. A further difficulty is that textbooks are notoriously out of date by the time they come to press, and as a result there are no references in Biology of marijuana published later than 2000. This reduces the book's value as a reference tool.

The choice of title is unfortunate, as it is really not strictly about the biology of marijuana; it is a collection of reviews of various aspects of the scientific cannabinoid literature, and at times the text wanders far from the cannabis plant itself. As a whole the book is not well organized. The organization of the material does not follow any clear logic. The topics jump randomly from molecular studies to clinical effects and back again, with no clear pattern emerging to tie them all together. The individual contributions are, for the most part, well written and balanced and provide some useful perspectives on cannabinoid pharmacology. The list of authors includes internationally recognized experts on the areas involved. Chapters of particular relevance to clinicians include Sanudo-Pena and Fride on Movement Disorders, Solowij on Cognitive Function, and Murphy on Endocrine Function; while the chapters by Glass and McAllister on Cannabinoid Mediated Signal Transduction and Onaivi and others on Cannabinoid Receptor Genetics are detailed and useful overviews. The last chapter by Hubbard on Adverse Events, however, does not contribute meaningfully to the overall work, as it draws substantially from other reviews of adverse effects. Readers are better advised to stick to the relevant chapters rather than rely on this rather scant handling at the end of the book.

In summary, Onaivi has produced a work that is timely as we enter a second decade of exciting progress in the neurobiology of cannabinoids. It joins an expanding collection of reviews of this literature, and may be a useful source of reference to clinicians and scientists. Biology of marijuana is full of detail, but lacks sufficient overall structure and coherence to give it any real merit as a unified work.

Mark A. Ware

E19.145 Montreal General Hospital, 1650 Cedar Avenue, Montreal, Quebec, Canada H3G 1A4

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