This book presents the material from the 1953 "Detroit Symposium on Dynamics of Virus and Rickettsial Infections." The 33 papers have been divided into five sections, with the appropriate discussion included. The sections include mechanisms, ecology and pathogenesis, mechanics of immunity, laboratory diagnosis, and approaches to prophylaxis and therapy.
For the person interested in virus diseases and the recent developments in the fields of virus chemistry, mechanism of cell invasion, virus formation, and virus precursors, the first section is excellent. The articles are well written, and documented material from study of phage, plant, and animal viruses demonstrate the tremendous fundamental advances which have been made in the past few years.
The papers in the section on pathogenesis are also at a fundamental level and include plant and animal as well as human diseases. However, for the practitioner interested in a more precise understanding of clinical problems but not particularly interested