Garrett (Danish Archaea Center, Copenhagen U., Denmark) and Klenk (microbial genomics, Darmstadt Technical U., Germany) present 26 papers for the purpose of sampling recent research into the single-celled organisms of the Archaea domain (one of the fundamental classifications, together with Eukaryota and Bacteria, of the relatively recent three-domain system of taxonomy). Eleven of the papers are literature reviews on such topics as the natural history of the archaeal domain, features of the genomes, genetics, chromatin and regulation, DNA replication and the cell cycle, DNA repair, transcriptional mechanism, and biotechnology. A further 14 papers are specialist articles discussing lateral gene transfer and the nature of the domains, nanoarchaeota, mechanisms of rearrangement and change in Sulfolobus genomes, plasmids, possible role of integration mechanisms in genome evolution, genetic properties of Sulfolobus acidocaldarius and relate Archaea, transcriptional regulation in Haloarchaea, translational mechanisms and protein synthesis, glycolytic pathways of Archaea, metabolism of inorganic sulfur compounds in Archaea, methylation of metalloids by methanoarchaea, and other topics. Annotation ©2007 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)