UMBI hosts global AIDS meeting, 'Cures for Tomorrow'

The meeting will be held September 9-13 in at the Waterfront Marriott, Baltimore, Maryland September 9-13, 2002.

Researchers will exchange the most recent findings in a setting designed especially by IHV Director Robert C. Gallo to encourage opportunities for presentation of the latest scientific advances.

"Dr. Gallo has once again put together an outstanding program," says UMBI President Jennie Hunter-Cevera. "As we are now getting closer to understanding what we need to do to produce an AIDS vaccine and well-targeted therapeutics for many viral diseases, such a gathering of the world's leading researchers is timely and essential."

These are some of the featured speakers, in order of their appearances: Fritz Melchers, Basel Institute for Immunology; Luc Montagnier, Queens College; Anthony Fauci, National Institute of Allergic and Infectious Diseases; Takashi Okamoto, Nagoya City Univ. Med. Ctr.; Ruth Ruprecht, Dana Farber Cancer Institute; David Gold, International AIDS Vaccine Initiative; Martin Delaney, Project Inform; Warner Greene, Gladstone Institutes; Robert Redfield, IHV; Bahige Baroudy, Schering-Plough; Edward Berger, NIAID; Robert Siliciano, Johns Hopkins University; Mark Kaplan, North Shore University Hospital; Judah Folkman, Harvard Medical School; Eithan Galun, Hadassah University Hospital; Maurice Hilleman, Merck Institute; Beatrice Hahn, University of Alabama at Birmingham; Gary Nabel, NIH-Vaccine Research Ctr; Karl-Otto Habermehl, Free University of Berlin; Max Essex, Harvard School of Public Health; Steve O'Brien, NCI Frederick; Courtenay Bartholomew, The Medical Research Foundation of Trinidad & Tobago; Antoine Gessain, Institute Pasteur; Marc Girard, Foundation Merieux; George Lewis, IHV; and Daniel Zagury, Unversite Marie et Pierre Curie.

Their topics will include pluripotent and hematopoietic stem cells, HIV infection and pathogenesis, immune response to HIV infection, new concepts in anti-HIV therapy, HIV/hepatitis C c-infection; genetics and epidemiology of HIV infection, and therapeutic and preventive vaccines to HIV.

In 1996, the University of Maryland Biotechnology Institute added IHV as its fifth research center in order to create a world class center of excellence on viral diseases virus-related cancers. To head the center, the institute recruited Gallo from the National Cancer Institute, where he had organized such large, annual international meetings for more than a decade. IHV became the first U.S. center-perhaps in the world-to combine the disciplines of basic research, epidemiology and clinical research to speed the discovery of diagnostics and therapeutics for chronic and deadly viral and immune disorders. Under Gallo's direction, IHV has expanded its faculty and staff to 220, conducted more than 30 intervention trails of new treatments, set up significant programs of AIDS vaccine collaboration on three continents, increased its sponsored research by more than 7-fold, and was one of only ten centers in the world selected as an HIV Vaccine Trials Unit by the National Institute of Allergic and Infectious Diseases' sponsored trials network. Media can attend the meeting free, but registration is strongly encouraged in order to provide effective assistance. For full program and registration materials, visit www.ihv.org.