Faculty Bibliography

The next plague may be from a newly discovered infectious agent or a natural mutation that produces a new version of an old microbe. It may even escape from a laboratory. Or the next plague may be caused by a microbe that, having become resistant to standard antibiotics, spreads widely and rapidly. The longstanding threat of bioterrorism turned real with the deliberate release of anthrax spores in 2001. When SARS suddenly appeared, there was speculation that it was bioterrorism. Experts dismissed that. No one was smart enough to invent a SARS from scratch, said Dr. Joshua Lederberg, a Nobel Prize-winning microbiologist. Now, he said, SARS may end up being a biological weapon. If SARS does not return in the next few years, will companies have a continuing incentive to develop a vaccine that might never be needed? If industry lacks incentive, yet SARS returns, the consequences could be devastating

The experimental DNA vaccine is synthesized using modified, inactivated genes from the Ebola virus. Because it does not contain any infectious material from the virus, recipients cannot get the disease, said Dr. Gary Nabel, who directs the institute's Vaccine Research Center. The goal is to use the Vical vaccine and another one to protect against Ebola in a prime-boost strategy. Under those conditions, the Vical vaccine would be given first to prime the immune system. Then a different vaccine, which uses an adenovirus (that causes colds) would bolster the immune system that had been primed by the Vical vaccine. The second vaccine is still being developed for human use; the first tests in volunteers are expected to begin next year, Dr. Nabel said. The government's program to defend against bioterrorism has helped accelerate development of a vaccine, said Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the institute's director. ''An effective Ebola vaccine not only would provide a life-saving advance in countries where the disease occurs naturally, it also would provide a medical tool to discourage the use of Ebola virus as an agent of bioterrorism,'' he said

The experimental DNA vaccine is synthesized using modified, inactivated genes from the Ebola virus. Because it does not contain any infectious material from the Ebola virus, recipients cannot get the disease, said Dr. Gary Nabel, who directs the Vaccine Research Center at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease in Bethesda, Maryland

News of Mr. [Colin Powell]'s cancer surprised all but his closest associates. Adam Ereli, another State Department spokesman, said the surgery had been scheduled for some time, but neither Mr. Powell nor his aides chose to disclose it publicly until the day it was performed

Nigeria has reported the largest number this year, 251, compared with 145 for the comparable period last year. Epidemiologists have traced the spread of polio from Nigeria to four countries that were previously thought to be polio-free, Burkina Faso, Chad, Ghana and Togo. Niger, the fifth country, has had a succession of imported cases. Four polio cases have also occurred since late June in Lagos in southern Nigeria, which had been polio free since April 2001. Nigeria is the last major challenge to the goal of eradication, Dr. [David L. Heymann] said. There, the W.H.O. has run into an unexpected hurdle from accusations by some Islamic leaders that the polio vaccine leaves young girls infertile

The effectiveness of the vaccine will be a critical factor in determining the severity of the flu season. This year's vaccine does not include the Fujian strain that has caused the overwhelming majority of cases in the United States and Europe. LAWRENCE K. ALTMAN

The organization's plan challenges the 34 countries with the highest infection rates to rapidly train workers to accelerate the integration of AIDS treatment in their health care programs. Many countries with the largest numbers of people living with H.I.V./AIDS have very few doctors or other trained health workers, the organization said. Many have died from untreated AIDS, while others have moved to wealthier countries. Many countries, medical schools, private groups and other organizations have started AIDS programs in heavily infected countries. The numbers of programs have reached the point where better coordination is needed to avoid duplication of research, training and treatment efforts, Dr. Peter Piot, the director of the United Nations AIDS program, said in a recent interview. The W.H.O.'s recommended drug combinations for simplified AIDS treatment are: Stavudine (d4t), lamivudine (3TC) and nelfinavir; AZT, lamivudine and nelfinavir; Stavudine, lamivudine and efavirenz; and AZT, lamivudine and efavirenz

About three dozen children have died from influenza or its complications, according to David Daigle, a spokesman for the centers. But, on average, 92 children die every year from influenza, and it is not yet known whether the disease this year will be unusually severe among children. Daigle said the disease centers expected to send out epidemiologists around the country to study pediatric cases in an effort to learn whether other infections are joining forces with the flu virus to produce some of the more severe cases. At least 225 children have been hospitalized, with 32 in the intensive care unit, most on ventilators. Three have died, including two who had underlying illnesses. The third was healthy but developed a severe bacterial infection in addition to influenza

Mr. Powell, who is 66 and by all appearances vigorous, has maintained a demanding schedule in recent weeks, traveling twice to Europe, at one point filling a hole in his schedule with a three-nation, two-day detour to North Africa. On such trips, Mr. Powell rarely lingers. He flies by night, then begins a full workday without ever seeing a bed. Mr. Powell kept up that pace over the weekend, as news emerged of the capture of Saddam Hussein, the deposed Iraqi leader. On Sunday, Mr. Powell spoke to 23 foreign ministers, Mr. Boucher said. Mr. Ereli said Mr. Baker, who was tapped by the president for the job, would limit his contacts to discussion of Iraq's debt. Any suggestion that Mr. Powell is being shunted aside ''is a bunch of hooey,'' said Mr. Ereli, who called the Baker-Powell relationship ''complementary, not competitive.''

No treatment now exists for Ebola, and tests of a vaccine have just begun in humans. Though scientists have had earlier successes in treating Ebola in mice and guinea pigs with antivirals, these drugs did not work in nonhuman primates. In an interview this week in Dallas, Terry Fredeking, a co- author and an expeditionary biologist, said he supplied the raw material that was used to re-create a protein for the new drug. I won't say how long it took me to persuade Peter Jahrling that spit from hookworms might be able to treat monkeys with Ebola, said Fredeking, founder and president of Antibody Systems, a research company in Hurst, Texas. Fredeking said that the World Health Organization in Geneva had asked team members whether rNAPc2 might be used on an experimental basis to treat people in a current outbreak of Ebola in the Congo Republic north of that country's capital, Brazzaville. That outbreak, which is thought to be waning, has caused 28 deaths as of Dec. 2, according to the UN health agency