microbe talk: june 2014

posted on june 17, 2014   by benjamin thompson

this month on the podcast, we sent ben to keble college at the university of oxford, to attend a conference that celebrated the 50th anniversary of the first paper to detail the epstein–barr virus. the virus, also known as ebv, was the first virus shown to cause cancer in humans.

on the podcast this month:

sir anthony epstein, who was one of the co-discoverers of ebv and published the first paper on the virus, in the lancet in 1964.

professor paul farrell (imperial college london), who was an author on the first paper that detailed the genetic sequence of ebv.

professor jeffrey cohen (us national institute of allergy and infectious diseases), who is working to develop a vaccine against the virus.

show notes:

• information on the epstein-barr virus via wikipedia.
• a great write up about ebv’s history on the cruk blog.
• the nature paper that first published the ebv genetic sequence.
• dr jeffrey cohen’s research page.

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