December, 2002

PERTH, Western Australia - The International Mesothelioma Interest Group announced recently that its sixth annual mesothelioma conference will take place Dec. 1, to 4 in Perth.

Entitled "Recent Advances in Mesothelioma," the conference topics will include new drugs and other new therapies, surgical techniques, new assays for early diagnosis and screening, epidemiology, SV40 and radiology. The conference is associated with a satellite meeting, "Advanced Technologies in Cancer Research - from Gene Chips to Gene Therapy, " taking place Dec. 3 and 4.

Speakers at the conference include Dr. Adi Gazdar (U.S.), Dr. Brooke Mossman (U.S.), Dr. Geoffrey Berry (Australia), Dr. Roger Reddell (Australia), Dr. Michele Carbone (U.S.), Luciano Mutti (Italy), Valerie Rusch (U.S.), Karin Mattson (Finland), Paul Bass (Netherlands) and Andreas Strasser (Australia).

Other topics that will be included at the conference and satellite session are gene therapy, mesothelioma and mesothelial cell biology, microarray analysis, immunology, proteomics, telomerase, apoptosis and the latest on the medicolegal aspects of mesothelioma.

For further information about the conference, email branigan@cyllene.uwa.edu.au or the International Mesothelioma Interest Group Websit at http://imig.org.