International Herpesvirus Workshop

Project SummaryThis proposal requests funds to be used to support travel and registration fees for postdoctoral fellows andgraduate students to attend the 41st International Herpesvirus Workshop (IHW) in Madison, Wisconsin, in2016. The IHW is the major annual meeting for scientists studying all the herpesviruses and is very wellestablished in its 41st year. This meeting has been very successful, in part, because of the enthusiasticparticipation of the world?s leading herpesvirus researchers. The strength of the Workshop rests on the cross-fertilization that results from comparison of different herpesviruses, different approaches to key questions andon the support and participation of leading researchers in the field, most significantly including promising younginvestigators and students in training. Moreover, the forum is truly international, with broad-based world-wideattendance. The medical importance of this meeting is clearly indicated from the wide variety of diseasescaused by the now-recognized eight human herpesviruses. These include skin and eye ulcerations (HSV-1),genital lesions (HSV-2), meningitis and encephalitis (HSV-1 and HSV-2), infectious mononucleosis (EBV),chicken pox and shingles (VZV). CMV is a major cause of birth defects including mental retardation, blindnessand deafness due to congenital transmission but also a significant opportunistic pathogen in AIDS patients andorgan transplant recipients. More recently, CMV has been implicated as a pathogenic contributor in thedevelopment of atherosclerosis. Cancer has also been associated with herpesvirus infections. EBV isassociated with Burkitt?s lymphoma, other B cell neoplasias and nasopharyngeal carcinoma. The most recenthuman herpesvirus discovered (HHV-8 or KSHV) is associated with Kaposi?s sarcoma in AIDS patients andother immunosuppressed persons and in other groups. All of the herpesviruses persist for life and thereforepose significant problems in the treatment of immune-compromised individuals. Diseases caused byreactivation of most human herpesviruses are a significant cause of morbidity and mortality in various immunepatient populations. Workshop sessions will take an interdisciplinary approach to the following topics: virusstructure, mechanism of virus entry and cell-cell spread, membrane proteins, pathogenesis and latency, DNAreplication, vaccination and the immune response, transcriptional control, regulation of gene expression,chemotherapeutic targets, and virus gene therapy.