Hello!
I am a student of microbiology in my fourth year. I have already done
many more or less general microbiology courses but now the emphasis in
my studies has been put on DNA analysis and recombinant DNA technology
with microorganisms. One of my courses in this field is called "Research
Methods in Microbiology" and the textbook for this course is "Short
Protocols in Molecular Biology". This book, however, is rather a
collection of protocols (as the title may already suggest), and it gives
only little theoretical background. Of course, I already have basic
knowledge about recombinant DNA technology but this course is very
detailed. It also includes a lab where we use current microbiology and
molecular biology methods from our textbook. Knowing the basics is not
enough in this course, we are expected to know about specific plasmids
and phages, and at the end of the course we should be able to do cloning
(at least in theory, maybe in practise); we should be able to choose a
suitable method and find the appropriate bacterial strains, plasmids,
cosmids, phages, restriction enzymes, media for selection, and so on; we
should be able to do site-specific mutagensis; ect., ect.
Since the course textbook is not able to "teach" me the knowledge I
need, I have been looking for pertinent literature. But I've only been
able to find two extremes: Either the books were of a kind like "Short
Protocols in Molecular Biology", which expect the reader to know most
about the methods and "just" give him precise recipes/protocols, or they
were too basic and too general (after reading this kind of book you know
how a method works, but you would not be able to design a concrete
cloning experiment yourself).
So my question is: Does anybody know any microbiology/molecular biology
books which go deeply into the details of recombinant DNA technology and
DNA analysis, and which are concrete enough to enable you to suggest a
cloning method and the appropriate "tools" after having read the
book(s)? Or how did you get into this complex matter?
I appreciate any advice and recommendations.
Ken Winford
