In the 1970s, the author of this work and his co-workers initially found Epstein-Barr virus DNA in Burkitt’s lymphomas and nasopharyngeal cancer and made the connection between HPV infection and cervical cancer. It was also during this period and subsequently that scientists all over the world discovered tumor-inducing bacteria, viruses, parasites, and protozoa, opening up entirely new prospects for the prevention and treatment of infection-induced cancer by vaccination.

Adopting a unifying concept and a consistent structure for the individual chapters, Professor zur Hausen provides a thorough and comprehensive overview on cancer-inducing infective agents — viruses, bacteria and parasites — and their corresponding transforming capacities and mechanisms. He does not cover the structure and molecular biology of the agents presented in great detail, but rather concentrates on those aspects that link the respective agents to human oncogenesis. As such, an extensive bibliography after each chapter permits further studies on the subject.

With a chapter on Helicobacter written by James Fox and his colleagues at Harvard University, this is an invaluable and instructive reference for all oncologists, microbiologists and molecular biologists working in the area of infections and cancer.