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This book overviews ongoing and upcoming clinical applications of basic immunology. Recent advances in our knowledge of immunology coupled with new technologies have aided in the development of efficient cancer immunotherapy, as well as the control of emerging microorganisms such as SARS-CoV-2. However, knowledge of basic immunology has not been fully utilized even after the discoveries of immune checkpoint inhibition for cancer immunotherapy and the development of mRNA vaccination against SARS-CoV-2. There is still room for improving the clinical application of basic immunology. The book summarizes the achievements in clinical applications of basic immunology and highlights what can be further extended to make immunology a more practical human science. Basic immunology and its clinical applications are two wheels of the same cart in the immunology field, which aids in the development of more efficient cancer immunotherapy and rapid control of infectious diseases against microorganisms, including new viruses and classical toxoplasmosis. The exploration of ongoing and upcoming applications of basic immunology in this book makes it a useful resource for immunologists, physicians, molecular and genome biologists, bioinformaticians, and students in these fields.

Hepatobiliary cancers, including hepatocellular carcinoma and biliary tract cancers, have high rate of mortality and low survival rate. The third volume of the “Interdisciplinary Cancer Research” series, entitled “Hepatobiliary Cancers: An Interdisciplinary Approach” publishes comprehensive volumes on mechanisms of hepatobiliary cancers and therapeutic modalities and presents the most updated and peer-reviewed chapters on hepatobiliary cancers. This interdisciplinary series is of special value to researchers working on cell biology, immunology, biochemistry, genetics, and practitioners working on oncology and gastroenterology. This is the main concept of Cancer Immunology Project (CIP), which is a part of Universal Scientific Education and Research Network (USERN). This interdisciplinary book will be of special value for researchers, oncologists, and gastroenterologists who wish to extend their knowledge on hepatobiliary cancers.

The third edition of this acclaimed work provides clinicians and investigators with a wealth of state-of-the-art information that will lead to fresh approaches in thinking about liver physiology and liver diseases. Developed by a panel of renowned international authors, this edition outlines a range of important advances in our understanding of the liver's role as an immune organ and the functions of innate and adaptive immunity in the pathogenesis of all liver diseases. Indeed, the liver is a vitally important immune organ producing liver-derived products that can trigger the innate and adaptive immune system to initiate, mediate, regulate, and resolve systemic inflammation. The book begins with an analysis of the core concepts of immunology, including the definition of autoimmunity and its unique application to the liver, a tolerogenic organ. Subsequent chapters then explore the biological elements of liver diseases caused by epigenetics, genetics, and innate and adaptive immunity. Specific clinical presentations and aspects of liver diseases are also examined, such as Hepatitis C, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease and parasitic infections. Closing chapters then discuss liver diseases among specific populations, including pediatrics, those with comorbidities and preexisting conditions, pregnant women, and finally patients with transplanted organs. A timely and invaluable update to the clinical literature, Liver Immunology: Principles and Practice, Third Edition, is once again a comprehensive work that will not only enhance the understanding of liver diseases but also provide the kind of novel insights that greatly accelerates the evidence-based care of children and adults afflicted with these diseases. This volume is again a must-read for clinicians at all levels, for investigators and for students.

Liver Immunology: Principles and Practice, Second Edition begins with important information about the epidemiology and mortality of liver disease worldwide. This information is followed by chapters related to basic immunology, application of liver immunology for diagnosis, and several excellent chapters that provide a solid foundation for understanding immune-mediated liver disease, including those associated with the biliary tree. A chapter on non-hepatic manifestations of immune mediated liver disease helps provide context for how these diseases affect the patient overall. In addition, chapters discuss various discrete immunologically-mediated infectious liver disorders including those related to bacteria, parasites, and all of the classic viruses. Chapters on the traditional autoimmune liver diseases -- primary biliary cirrhosis, autoimmune hepatitis, primary sclerosing cholangitis as well as overlap syndrome – are also included. The breadth of this comprehensive second edition is highlighted by chapters on alcoholic liver disease, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, and drug-induced liver disease, among others. This invaluable new edition ends with a forward-looking view of future directions and how the field might meet the challenge of refractory patients. Developed by a renowned group of authors, Liver Immunology: Principles and Practice, Second Edition will again serve as a comprehensive textbook by providing an excellent overview for this rapidly evolving field. It greatly adds to the understanding of the pathogenesis of these diseases, while also providing novel insights that can be harnessed into helping improve the care of patients afflicted with various immune-mediated diseases. This volume will again be a must-read for clinicians at all levels, investigators andstudents.

The Brescia division of the Italian Association of Blood donors (AVIS­ Brescia) celebrated its 50th anniversary in 1985. The idea of organizing a Postgraduate Course on Viral Hepatitis on this occasion developed for ob­ vious reasons. Viral hepatitis is a major concern in blood transfusion and Brescia is located in the region of Lombardy characterized by a high HBsAg carrier rate in its population. Thus it seemed timely to convene a scientific forum in which the present state of knowledge on viral hepatitis would be summarized. This would allow us to review the tremendous progress achieved over the last 15 years, and also to focus on latest developments which pave the way for future investigation. The publication of the proceedings of this meeting was considered use­ ful, since it provides a tangible reminder of a comprehensive overview of the broad topic of viral hepatitis, its complications, and its connections with the practice of blood transfusion. The organizers were fortunate in obtaining the active participation of recognized experts in a variety of hepatological diSCiplines. Their contri­ butions summarized the more mature areas of knowledge in the field, in­ cluding clinical aspects, epidemiology and morphology, as well as newer developments in the forefront of hepatitis research, like new diagnostic techniques, oncogenesis, treatment, and vaccination.

The three years since our last conference in San Francisco have again seen a dramatic expansion of the number of antivirals either licensed or in the late stages of clinical trials. d4T is now licensed for HIV infection, famciclovir and the oral pro-drug of acyclovir, valacyclovir, are now licensed for VZV infections in some countries. Moreover. oral ganciclovir, cidofovir, and sorivudine are not far behind. Clinical trials with the second-site reverse transcriptase inhibitors and the protease inhibitors for HlV infection are proceeding rapidly and on a broad scale, and the preliminary results would suggest that several of these classes of drugs will be licensed as well. Despite this optimism, however, there is increasing evidence that antiviral-resistant strains of pathogenic viruses will be a significant problem, perhaps especially with therapy of HIV infection, and there remains a desperate need for improved drugs (with either improved efficacy or decreased toxicity, or both) for CMV and HIV infections. This book is the edited proceedings of the Fourth Triennial Conference on Antiviral Chemotherapy, held in San Francisco, in November 1994. The conference was sponsored by the University of California, San Francisco, and co-sponsored by the International Society for Antiviral Research (ISAR), the Macfarlane Burnet Centre for Medical Research in Melbourne, Australia, and the Australian National Centre for HIV Virology Research. The conference had been organized to present an overview of the field of antiviral chemotherapy.

A series of international symposia on viral hepatitis and liver disease has been held triannially, and called the'Olympics'of this research field. Our book presents the results of the eighth of these'Olympiads'which for the first time, was held in Asia (May 1993, Tokyo). Due to the rapid progress in research on both basic and clinical aspects of viral hepatitis and liver disease, the state of the art in this field is continually being updated, and our book provides a broad and in-depth survey of current work. The major topics in our book include molecular biology of the five known hepatitis viruses (HAV, HBV, HCV, HDV, and HEV), clinical implications of genetic variants of HBV and HCV, interferon treatment of HCV-related liver disease, and worldwide epidemiology and control of viral hepatitis. New subjects not seen in previous books, such as genotypes of HCV, are also covered. Expanding knowledge about the heterogeneity of the HCV genome has revealed a great variety of genotypes as well as their association with host pathogenesis and their varying responsiveness to interferon therapy. The first promising results of efforts to develop a hepatitis C vaccine are also presented. Finally, compared with its predecessors, our book contains many more papers from Asian countries, where the prevalence of viral hepatitis and liver disease is the highest in the world.

In the last decade, remarkable advances have been made in bone marrow transplantation (BMT), which is now becoming a powerful tool in the treatment of diseases such as leukemia, aplastic anemia, and congenital immunodeficiency. In animal experiments, it has been found that BMT can be used to treat not only systemic autoimmune diseases but also organ-specific autoimmune diseases. In humans, it has recently been shown that rheumatoid arthritis, ulcerative colitis, and Crohn's disease can be successfully treated after BMT. This volume contains new information on how to prevent graft rejection, how T cell functions can be completely restored, and how concomitant BMT can prevent the rejection of organ allografts without the use of immunosuppressive agents. BMT will become an increasingly useful and powerful treatment for various currently intractable diseases, and this book will contribute by providing details of the latest research in the field.

The scope of the book is very broad, covering a wide range of areas in HBV/HDV and HCV research, including both basic and clinical science. The selected topics range from epidemiology, immunology, molecular virology and oncology, to clinical therapy.Chronic Hepatitis B and C consists of 14 chapters, each being a review of a special topic on HBV or HCV. While review articles on a special topic can be found in periodical journals, they tend to be more restricted in presentation. Therefore, this book will provide more in-depth coverage of what are presented as “unpublished results” and “data not shown” in journal articles. Furthermore, several authors in this book do not write review articles regularly. Some authors wrote reviews on a specific topic regularly, but they tried a new topic in this book (e.g., Dr. YF Liaw on “natural course,” Dr. Shih on “virion release,” Dr. Michael Lai on “lymphotropism of HCV,” etc. ⋯). Overall, the book will offer useful information at the cutting age.Sample Chapter(s)

Natural killer (NK) cells have been at the forefront of immunology for two decades. During that time, a great amount of information about these cells has been obtained. They are important in antiinfectious and antitumoral defense and shape the adaptive immune response. In addition, they can act as immunoregulatory cells. In recent years, the therapeutic potential of NK cells in cancer immunotherapy has become increasingly evident. This book describes in detail current knowledge about NK cells and covers a broad range of NK cell-related topics, including those that are not frequently reviewed, e.g. NK cells and allergy or NK cells and skin diseases.

Immunohistochemistry is the use of specific antibodies to stain particular molecular species in situ. This technique has allowed the identification of many more cell types than could be visualized by classical histology, particularly in the immune system and among the scattered hormone-secreting cells of the endocrine system, and has the potential to improve diagnosis, prognosis and therapeutic options of cancer. This book discusses all aspects of immunohistochemistry and in situ hybridization technologies and the important role they play in reaching a cancer diagnosis. It provides step-by-step instructions on the methods of additional molecular technologies such as DNA microarrays, and microdissection, along with the benefits and limitations of each method. The topics of region-specific gene expression, its role in cancer development and the techniques that assist in the understanding of the molecular basis of disease are relevant and necessary in science today.• The only book available that translates molecular genetics into cancer diagnosis • The results of each Immunohistochemical and in situ hybridization method are presented in the form of color illustrations • Methods discussed were either developed or refined by expert contributors in their own laboratories

The fourth edition of The Cytokine Handbook provides an encyclopedic coverage of the molecules that induce and regulate immune responses. Now expanded to two volumes, co-edited by Michael T Lotze, and written by over 120 international experts, the scope of the book has been broadened to include a major emphasis on the clinical applications of cytokines. The early chapters discuss individual cytokines, chemokines and receptors. Additional chapters discuss the clinical implications and applications of cytokines, including cytokine gene transfer, antisense therapy and assay systems. This book is essential for researchers and clinicians interested in cytokines, including anyone working in cancer biology, transplantation, infectious diseases, autoimmunity or bioinformatics.Key Features• Covers all main cytokines and chemokines • Written by experts• Up-to-date- includes detailed referencing accessing current, modern literature and reflects the newest findings from the human genome • The new edition has been thoroughly revised and extended (now 2 volumes) as compared to the last edition, including new co-editor (MTL), new authors, new hot topics and new chapters• Includes major emphasis on clinical applications• Extensively illustrated with tables and figures

The development of effective antiviral vaccines requires an interdisciplinary collaboration between physicians, epidemiologists, researchers in basic virology and immunology, and experts in vaccine development. To meet this need, the Third International Workshop on ‘Virus-Like Particles as Vaccines'was held in Berlin in September 2001, from which most of the presentations included in this special issue arose. The papers summarize current knowledge regarding the molecular biology, pathogenicity, epidemiology and immunology of hepatitis B virus, human immunodeficiency virus, human papilloma virus and hantavirus infections. A comparative evaluation of different vaccine approaches to combat these viruses is essential. Therefore, various strategies for vaccine development based on live attenuated, recombinant and inactivated viruses, virus-like particles, recombinant proteins, synthetic peptides and naked DNA are discussed in detail. In addition, the exploitation of virus-like particles for the generation of vaccines against other infectious diseases is considered. Scientists and students in the fields of virology, immunology, vaccinology and AIDS research as well as representatives of pharmaceutical companies will greatly benefit from the up-to-date findings presented in this publication.

Advances in Virus Research

HIV and the New Viruses presents cutting-edge reviews of persistent human virus infections as a coherent collection for the first time. These cover recently discovered viruses such as HHV-6, HHV-8 and HCV, as well as the latest research on HIV. This comprehensive and updated reference includes an in-depth study of the major issues in the epidemiology, pathogenicity, molecular virology, host responses and management of conditions associated with those viruses. Information on new pharmaceuticals and vaccine developments is also included. Edited by the leading experts in the field, HIV and the New Viruses will be essential reading for postgraduates, clinicians and researchers in virology, immunology, cancer, molecular biology and the pharmaceutical industry. - Presents cutting-edge reviews of persistent human virus infections as a coherent collection for the first time - Includes an in-depth study of the major issues in the epidemiology, pathogenicity, molecular virology, host responses, and management of conditions associated with those viruses