This volume presents the state of the art description of the current understanding of the biology of somatostatin including its gene regulation, prosomatostatin processing, cellular effects, somatostatin receptor subtypes, mechanism of action, signal transduction, regulation of cell growth and apoptosis, design and use of receptor subtype-selective somatostatin analogs, derivatives of somatostatin analogs tagged with radionuclides/chemotoxins, and their clinical relevance in the diagnosis and treatment of cancer. Each chapter is written by expert(s) active in somatostatin research (experimental and/or clinical). It will serve as the only single one-stop source of the most up to date information on the basic and clinical aspects of the biology of somatostatin and its receptors.