Biotechnology Foundations - 2nd Edition

Reviewed by Justin Anderson, Professor, Radford University on 7/7/20

Comprehensiveness rating: 4 see less

The emphasis here should be on the word "foundations" in the title. As in, foundation for understanding biotechnology. There is very little in the book on biotech (chapters 14 and, to a lesser extent, 15 and 16). The rest of the book is repackaged from the OpenStax Concepts of Biology textbook, which I have used in introductory biology courses for non-majors.

Content Accuracy rating: 5

I found no real errors in accuracy, as it is an introduction to basic cell and molecular biology.

Relevance/Longevity rating: 3

The basic biology in the textbook is relevant at a very introductory level or for referring back to. It should only require minimal updating. Changes should be relatively easy to do, and are probably already necessary. For example, there is only one mention of CRISPR, and that is a throw-away sentence in Chapter 1.

Clarity rating: 5

The text is an easy read for anyone with a basic background in biology. Having used Concepts of Biology in my classes, I do realize that some students struggle with even this level of biology. I read the online version, and it was broken up into short sections, each on its own page. Figures are interspersed at the appropriate places, making the pages flow well.

Consistency rating: 5

No real issues with consistency, although it was obvious when the author took over the writing from the chapters taken from Concepts of Biology.

Modularity rating: 5

This text would be easy to use out of the provided order, as the chapters are broken into sections, each with its own page. There are two or three places where material already presented is repeated nearly word-for-word, including the same figures. I found this to be a bit wasteful, since the relevant sections could have been referenced instead.

Organization/Structure/Flow rating: 4

Overall, the text flows fine. If going from start to finish, there were a couple jarring (to me) changes in topics, including a short section on the history of the discovery of nucleic acid structure and overly long sections on the organization and function of various government agencies. That's not to say these aren't relevant to biotechnology, just that their presentation didn't provide all that much useful information.

Interface rating: 5

The book is easy to use in the online format, with a table of contents that is expandable and clickable. I had no trouble jumping around, or finding where I had left off.

Grammatical Errors rating: 5

I think I may have noted a couple grammatical errors, but they weren't egregious enough for me to write down.

Cultural Relevance rating: 4

In general, this is just an introductory biology book. However, there are several places that go into a little history of various concepts, and these tend to focus on older science, and therefore men. Rosalind Franklin and Henrietta Lacks get some extended mention, however.

Comments

To be honest, I was hoping for more focus on biotechnology, so I find myself disappointed. Because most of this is a repurposing of the Concepts of Biology by OpenStax, there isn't a lot of new or extra info in here. Also note that this is in OpenStax's CNX lineup, which is being archived starting in the summer of 2020. The text will still be available after this time, though.