This conference grant (R13) application requests funds to partially cover the cost of planning, organizing, publicizing and hosting the 22nd Annual Symposium on Nonhuman Primate Models for AIDS. The symposium will be held November 3-6, 2004 at The Westin Riverwalk Hotel in San Antonio, Texas and will be hosted by the Southwest National Primate Research Center, Southwest Foundation for Biomedical Research. This meeting is the premier forum for the presentation and exchange of the most recent scientific advances in AIDS research utilizing the nonhuman primate model. The latest findings in primate pathogenesis, immunology, genomics, virology, vaccines and therapeutics will be presented. It is anticipated that more than 300 scientists from the United States and other countries will attend. The symposium will encompass 5 half-day scientific sessions and a poster session. The sessions will be: Virology, Pathogenesis, Immunology, Vaccines, and Therapeutics/Genomics. Each session will have an invited Chair, who will give a 25-minute state-of-the-art presentation to open the first half of the session, a co-Chair, who will moderate the session and entertain questions, and an invited speaker, who will also provide a 25-minute talk to open the second half of the session. In addition, there will be an invited keynote opening speaker and a banquet speaker, who will address scientific approaches and concerns regarding the global AIDS crisis and related issues of public health. A Scientific Program Committee consisting of fourteen members representing a broad geographic and institutional distribution will review abstracts and assign oral or poster presentation for each of the scientific sessions. Committee members will include leaders in the field from a variety of scientific disciplines. Criteria for selection of oral presentations will include relevance of the topic as well as originality and quality of the information contained in the abstract. Those giving talks will be invited to submit their presentations in manuscript form for publication in the Journal of Medical Primatology. A poster session will include meritorious presentations that cannot be accommodated in one of the platform sessions. The conference will also include an opening reception on the day of arrival, a reception accompanying the poster session, and an evening banquet at the Southwest School of Arts and Crafts with a preceding boat cruise along the San Antonio river.
