The incidence of autoimmune diseases is increasing worldwide, and the search for better management of these diseases and even for a cure is being pursued by scientists from many disciplines. Tools from the areas of genetics, neuroscience, cell biology, virology, and infectious disease are being applied to the problem and are yielding useful results.

This volume contains the first section of the proceedings of a large, comprehensive meeting held in Sorrento, Italy. Because the meeting focused on such an important area of human health, four volumes have been dedicated to it: Part A presents...