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Article: Investigating prion diseases on the Internet.
- Article from:
- AORN Journal
- Article date:
- May 1, 1999
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1999 Association of Operating Room Nurses, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Prion theory is relatively new in the field of epidemiology. Stanley Prusiner, PhD, professor of neurology and biochemistry at the University of California School of Medicine, San Francisco, was awarded the 1997 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his pioneering research on prions that began in 1972. Dr Prusiner discovered that prion diseases are caused by a unique pathogen that differs from other known bacteria and viruses.
Nomenclature of the respective disease depends on the species (ie, humans, Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease [CJD], Gerstmann-Straussler-Scheinker syndrome, kuru, fatal familial insomnia; cattle, bovine spongiform encephalopathy [BSE]; sheep, ...