This volume is the third in a continuing series on medically important fungi by the same two editors, though the title 'Human Pathogenic Fungi' would more accurately describe its content. That said, this volume, with its focus of methodological issues, does contain information of interest to a broad range of microbiologists/mycologists. Following the format of its predecessors, both published in 2004, the book is a compilation of review articles covering diverse topics in the field of fungal molecular biology. The eight chapters are written by authors who are well-established in their respective fields, and the articles are current, generally well-written and comprehensively referenced.

The range of topics is broad, including signalling and gene regulation; drug discovery and resistance; heterozygosity; and fungal identification/diagnostics. The layout of the articles varies considerably, from methodological, hands-on descriptions of techniques such as proteomics, to critical reviews of specific molecular applications. The emerging 'omics' technologies as applied to human pathogenic fungi are generally well-covered, especially proteomics (chapter 7; Waldin et al.), though there is little mention of the impact and potential of high-throughput pyrosequencing technologies (genome resequencing, expression analysis, metagenomics, etc.) in medical mycology. However, the authors/editors are not to blame for this, since in such a fast-moving field the relevant studies have only recently reached the public domain.

A collection such as this cannot be all things to all mycologists, and most readers would probably purchase this volume to read only one or a few articles specific to their field of interest. However, an advantage of this book is that it enables the non-specialist to get a comprehensive overview of a number of rapidly evolving fields in molecular medical mycology. Overall, the book will provide a valuable resource for clinical research laboratories, but may find a more limited audience in the wider mycological community.