FOREWORDS

The 26th Annual Meeting on Basic Research on Chagas Disease and the 16th Meeting of Brazilian Society of Protozoology remain as a standard for the quality of science in Brazil.

This issue of the Memórias do Instituto Oswaldo Cruz contains more than 500 abstracts presented to these meetings, which highlight many of the major advances that have been achieved in Protozoology research in the last few years, including Biology, Ultrastructure, and Biochemistry of Trypanosoma, Leishmania, Plasmodium, Entamoeba, Toxoplasma and monoxenic trypanosomatids. In addition, contributions also cover immunology of Chagas disease, leishmaniasis, malaria and toxoplasmosis as well as different aspects of treatment (chemotherapy) and transmission (vector biology and interactions) of these diseases.

We wish to express our acknowledgements to all colleagues that have contributed to this meeting and in particular to the 71 scientists who accepted to present their data in conferences and round tables. We wish to thank Angela K. Cruz, Alvaro Romanha, Fernando C. Silva Filho, George dos Reis, Hatisaburo Masuda, Jorge Kalil, José R. Coura, Norton Heise, Renato Mortara, Sergio Coutinho, Sergio Schenkman, and Thais Souto-Padron for their suggestions and help in the organization of the symposia. We would also like to express our gratitude to Lucile F. Winter, Lúcia Maria da Cunha Galvão and Thais Souto-Padron for their help in the organization of this meeting. Joab S. Pinto, Orlando A. Agrellos, Safira Farache, Esmeralda Farache, Edna Aleixo dos Santos, Maureen Rodarte and Malka Jukiewcz are acknowledged for their help in the secretary.

We would like to acknowledge the financial support from CNPq, Capes, Faperj, Fapesp, Fapemig and Fiocruz. We would also like to acknowledge the Instituto Oswaldo Cruz for the valuable contribution to the editing of this special issue of the Memórias.

The Organizing Committee would like to welcome all participants and wish a profitable meeting in Caxambu.

Caxambu, 9-11 November 1999

Meeting Coordinators

Lucia Mendonça Previato

Samuel Goldenberg

Wanderley De Souza

Erney P. Camargo

Rossiane Vommaro

Paulo Marcio Faria

This year we commemorated the 90th anniversary of the discovery of Chagas disease (April 15, 1909), by organizing an International Symposium on the Advances in Knowledge about Chagas Disease, 90 years after its discovery. The symposium was held in Rio de Janeiro from 11 to 16 of April. Twelve plenary lectures, ten round-tables and 104 selected posters were presented and debated by more than 500 scientists from 15 different countries, covering the biology and ultrastructure, biochemistry and molecular biology, characterization of Trypanosoma cruzi and T. cruzi-vector-vertebrate host interaction, immunopathology, diagnosis, epidemiology, treatment and control of Chagas disease.

The summary of the posters presented at the symposium was published in a booklet distributed at the meeting. The plenary lectures, round-tables and debates appeared in a special issue of the Memórias do Instituto Oswaldo Cruz (Suppl. I, 1999). This journal also completed, last April, 90 years and published in 1909, in its first volume, the article "Nova Tripanozomiaze Humana (A New Human Trypanosomiasis)" by Carlos Chagas.

During the symposium the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation awarded Carlos Chagas Filho with the Oswaldo Cruz prize, a gold medal and a diploma, for a life entirely dedicated to Brazilian Biomedical Science. Nine selected papers from the poster presentation were rewarded with the Carlos Chagas prize, dedicated to young promising scientists and their supervisors. A highlight of the meeting was the conference by Marilia Coutinho at the National Academy of Medicine, in April 15 on "The Noble Enigma: Chagas Nominations for the Nobel Prize", which he never received.

The first symposium of this XXVI Annual Meeting on Basic Research entitled "90 years of Chagas disease" is also a tribute to the 90th anniversary of the discovery of Chagas disease. These "Caxambu meetings", have been, for the last 26 years, the most important events throughout the world, not only for advances in knowledge of this disease, but mainly for the maintenance of the "research flame" among young researchers and for the international interchange with different people from many countries. The meetings and Chagas disease research itself have been an ideal model for other meetings and researches in protozoan and several other parasitic diseases.

The organization of this XXVI meeting clearly demonstrates the maturity of the coordinators and the quality of the structure and advice of the ghost committee. The opening conference "Parasitology-Today/Parasitology-Tomorrow" by Luiz Hildebrando Pereira da Silva, is to be a highlight for the meeting, which is organized with 12 symposia and 25 conferences involving more than 100 top foreign and Brazilian scientists. As in the past years more than 500 posters are also expected. The Samuel Pessoa (1999) award, which will be presented by Prof. Isaac Roitman and given to Prof. Luiz Rodolpho Travassos, is the highlight of the meeting.

José Rodrigues Coura

Director of the Oswaldo Cruz Institute

Publication Dates

• Publication in this collection
  25 Aug 2000
• Date of issue
  Nov 1999