The post-Loeffler-Frosch era: contribution of German virologists.

Abstract

This presentation dealt with the contributions of German virologists in the rapid development of virology following the Loeffler-Frosch era. Thereby, only research was included which was undertaken within German institutions, even though guest scientists from other countries or international cooperative efforts have in some cases contributed to the work. Contributions to the field of veterinary virology were not considered here, since this topic was treated separately during this centennial symposium. The overview includes contributions of the very early period when interest was focussed mainly on the determination of the physicochemical properties of the fast growing number of newly detected viruses, and of the pioneering period when fundamental discoveries of the nature of viruses were made. The concepts that derived from those studies made the development of modern virology possible. Some highlights of the present period were presented describing the findings of selected virus families. This part was followed by a description of the results which were relevant to problems of how viruses become pathogens, and the role of the immune response to virus infections. Finally, attention was drawn to the contributions of molecular studies which became important not only for the field of virology but also for life sciences in general.