Preface

As all the prior editions of this textbook before, the twenty-eighth edition of Jawetz, Melnick, & Adelberg’s Medical Microbiology remains true to the goals of the first edition published in 1954, which is to "to provide a brief, accurate and up-to-date presentation of those aspects of medical microbiology that are of particular significance to the fields of clinical infections and chemotherapy".

For the twenty-seventh edition, under the authorship of Dr. Karen Carroll, all chapters had been extensively revised, reflecting the tremendous expansion of medical knowledge afforded by molecular mechanisms and diagnostics, advances in our understanding of microbial pathogenesis, and the discovery of novel pathogens. While Dr. Carroll decided to step down as an author and contributor for this new edition, the remaining authors would like to express their gratitude for her leadership and contributions to the previous, greatly expanded edition. For the 28th edition, Chapter 47, “Principles of Diagnostic Medical Microbiology,” and Chapter 48, “Cases and Clinical Correlations,” were again updated to reflect the continued expansion in laboratory diagnostics as well as new antimicrobial therapies in the treatment of infectious diseases. Chapter 48 was specifically updated to reflect clinically important and currently emerging infectious disease cases.

New to this edition are Peter Hotez, MD, PhD, Rojelio Mejia, MD, and Stefan Riedel, MD, PhD, D(ABMM). Dr. Hotez is the Dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, TX, and is a Professor of Pediatrics, Molecular Virology and Microbiology; he brings extensive expertise in parasitology. Dr. Mejia is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Pediatrics, Section of Tropical Medicine, at the National School of Tropical Medicine, Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, TX. Dr. Riedel is the Associate Medical Director of the Clinical Microbiology Laboratories at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, MA, and holds the academic rank of Associate Professor of Pathology at Harvard Medical School. Following Dr. Carroll’s departure as an author and contributor to this textbook, Dr. Riedel assumed the role as Editor-in-Chief for this revised, 28th edition of the textbook.

The authors hope that the changes to this current edition will continue to be helpful to the student of microbiology and infectious diseases.