Prion disease is a lethal degenerative disorder of the central nervous system,
infecting humans and animals. The disease has been of scientific interest
because protein itself was thought to be an infectious agent. Now
prion disease is becoming a social issue as well because of the bovine
spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) epidemic and the outbreak of variant
Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD) in the United Kingdom.
BSE has begun to attack humans by an oral route, through food. But
now we must also think about a second line attack of BSE, i.e., infection
via transfusions. In addition to transfusions, we must be concerned about
the safety of therapeutic drugs and medical practices against BSE.
As editor, I have compiled this book mainly from papers presented at the
meeting of the International Symposium of Prion Diseases for Food and
Drug Safety, held October 31-November 2, 2004, in Sendai, Japan. Sendai
is a city that is historically associated with the prion hypothesis. The International
Congress of Virology was held there in 1984. The 1984 meeting
was the first time that there was intense discussion about whether the etiologic
agents of transmissible spongiform encephalopathy (TSE) are prions
or scrapie-associated fibrils (SAP). In this 2004 symposium, invited
speakers comprised those at the cutting edge of current prion research who
had not taken part in the 1984 arguments. These scientists thus represent
the second generation of prion researchers. One of the purposes of this
symposium was to spotlight a third generation of prion researchers whose
work can continue over the next two decades.