♦ Chemokines and Cytokines in Infection and Inflammation - Monday, May 4, 8:30 am - 10:00 am

Chair: Margaret K. Hostetter, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis

Response to infection or an inflammatory stimulus is dependent on the nature of the stimulus and a communications network between the cellular sensors of infection and cells of the inflammatory and immune response. Chemokines, cytokines and their receptors are key players in this network. The speakers in this symposium will address advances in our understanding of the initial cellular response to infection and the role of molecules which make up the signaling pathways between microbes, the cells they first contact and the effector cells of the immune response.

Craig Gerard, Children's Hospital, Boston

Chemokines and Viral Host Defense

Bruce Beutler, Howard Hughes Medical Institute, University of Texas Southwestern at Dallas

Genetics of Endotoxin Response

Martin Kagnoff, University of California San Diego

Epithelia cells sensors and signals for infection and inflammation

♦ Genes and Behavior - Sunday, May 3, 8:30 am - 10:30 am

Chair: Walter Miller, University of California, San Francisco

Sponsored in part by an educational grant from Pharmacia & Upjohn.

Recent advances in genetics and the biology of human development have suggested a role for inheritance in human behavior, personality traits and cognition. Understanding the molecular basis of these complex characteristics remains a major challenge. The speakers in this symposium will address advances in the study of genes regulating behavior from a clinical and basic perspective.

David Skuse, Institute of Child Health, University College, London, England

Imprinting, the X-chromosome and “The Male Brain”

Dean Hamer, National Cancer Institute

Genes for Human Personality and Behavior

Marc G. Caron, Duke University Medical Center

♦ Innate Immunity: The First Line of Defense - Saturday, May 2, 3:15 pm - 5:15 pm

Chair: Sam Hawgood, University of California San Francisco

Innate immunity refers to a means of pathogen recognition and defense that is based on a system of highly conserved pattern-recognition molecules that are not generally considered part of the acquired cellular or humoral system. In evolutionary terms the innate immune system is ancient but recent discoveries have highlighted the complexity and importance of this primitive system of host defense. The innate immune system remains the first line of host defense in humans, and may be of paramount importance before the acquired system has fully developed or when acquired immunity is disarmed by inherited defects or disease. Innate immunity may have the additional role of sorting self from non-self and determining which antigen the acquired immune system responds to. This session will review the scope of innate immune defenses highlighting the potential role of recently discovered serum and pulmonary surfactant proteins in protection from infection. Mechanisms of innate immunity may be of particular importance to the preterm neonate generally deficient in most aspects of acquired immunity.

Charles A. Janeway, Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Yale University School of Medicine

The Role of Innate Immunity in the Development of the Adaptive Immune Response

Alan B. Ezekowitz, Massachusetts General Hospital & Harvard Medical School

Pattern Recognition in Innate Immunity

Jo Rae Wright, Duke University Medical Center

Pulmonary Surfactant: A Front Line of Lung Host Defense