The First International Virtual Conference on Infectious
Diseases in Animalsby Marcus E. Kehrli, Jr., Thaddeus B. Stanton,
Timothy E. Ingram, and Kerry
K. Kartchner
Tim Berners-Lee created the World Wide Web to enhance the ability of peers to work together. He had hoped it would develop into a creative, expressive tool that researchers and coworkers might use in a productive work environment.1 A scientific conference recently held through the Web site of the National Animal Disease Center, USDA-Agricultural Research Service, of Ames, Iowa, is testimony to his vision and expectations.
The First International Virtual Conference on Infectious Diseases of Animals was held April 20 - May 2, 1997, solely on the World Wide Web. The two-week conference's objective was to provide a unique forum for scientific interchange on research of infectious diseases of animals important to agriculture. This conference was the brainchild of Drs. Neil Jensen and Thad Stanton. The conference was announced via e-mail on selected scientific specialty discussion lists with well over 9,000 known subscribers worldwide.
Governor Terry E. Branstad of Iowa and Dr. Thomas Walton, Director of NADC, opened by welcoming the nearly 2,400 visitors to the Virtual Conference, which utilized a high-speed connection to the Internet provided by a statewide fiber optic communication network.
The nine session topics of the Virtual Conference were Mechanisms of Infection of Bacterial Respiratory Diseases of Ruminants; Molecular Biology and Pathogenesis of Enteric, Respiratory, and Reproductive Viral Diseases of Cattle and Swine; Transmissible Spongiform Encephalopathies; Pathogenesis and Diagnosis, Immunology, Pathology, and Genetics of Mycobacteria in Food Animals; Pathogenesis of Escherichia coli Infections in Cattle and Swine; Pathogenesis, Transmission, and Control of Salmonellosis in Cattle and Swine; Veterinary Immunology of Food Animals; Molecular Aspects of Brucella Infections of Animals; and Spirochete Diseases of Cattle, Swine, and Avian Species: Swine Dysentery, Intestinal Spirochetosis, Leptospirosis, Hairy Footwart. Each session was convened by NADC scientists.
Conference Participants
Over 130 papers were presented by more than 289 scientists as authors or coauthors. The Virtual Conference was truly international, with scientists authoring or coauthoring abstracts or posters from 12 countries including Australia, Belgium, Canada, France, Germany, Hungary, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Nearly 4,000 visitors from around the world "attended" by viewing the conference during the 12 days in which it was live. Participants and attendees were encouraged to interact via e-mail with the authors of the abstract and poster presentations. The dialogue between presenters and the Web audience was captured for all viewers and included as part of the conference site. Presenters of posters were instructed that data they displayed was copyright protected, i.e., considered published. For future access and citation, the information from the Virtual Conference has been retained at the conference site. The dialogue between abstract presenters and viewers was conducted via e-mail, and was not posted on the conference for copyright reasons.
Eighteen authors were invited to present their data in a poster format that allowed authors to include graphical data. The Web site design was created for participants and viewers by the NADC computer services support staff, created from scratch in that there was no previous model for such a Web conference and no commercial software available that could automatically handle submission forms and posting of text and graphics.
Consistent with its broad subject area, the session with the largest number of participants was Veterinary Immunology of Food Animals, in which over 60 abstracts were presented by participants, with nine participants presenting a poster. Two of the posters, presented by Lunney et al. and Davis et al., give an interesting example of the types of information that work well in the format of a Web-based scientific conference. Presentation of data from a scientific workshop in a poster by Dr. Joan Lunney, et al. ("2nd International Swine CD Workshop Summary") provided the opportunity for rapid global dissemination of this data and the opportunity for new collaborators and participants in the next swine CD workshop to become involved. An obvious strength of a Web scientific conference is the power of presenting graphical data or histological images in color (e.g., see the posters "Unique Characteristics of the Immune Systems in Ruminants and Pigs" by William C. Davis and Mary J. Hamilton, and "Evaluation of Day-old SPF Chicks for Pathogenicity Testing of Intestinal Spirochete Species" by Darren J. Trott, Sophy L. Oxberry, and David J. Hampson). The quality of these graphics far exceeded the expectations of the conference organizers, and allowed the presenters to illustrate their data vividly. Moreover, the color microscopy images and other graphical data were superior to many images reproduced in scientific journals that rely on black and white.
Two of the posters that presented information about gamma/delta T cells generated some good discussion ("Unique Characteristics of the Immune Systems in Ruminants and Pigs" by William C. Davis and Mary J. Hamilton, and Generation of a Supernatant Fluid by Stimulated Lymphocytes that Causes Selective Migration of Bovine Gamma Delta T cells through Endothelial Monolayers by Eric Wilson and Mark A. Jutila). These T cells represent a unique subpopulation of lymphocytes that are found at higher levels in ruminant animals than in monogastric animals (e.g., humans). The reason for this higher level of gamma/delta T cells in ruminants is not known, but the finding represents an important beginning to understanding what function these cells play in host defense of ruminants.
Tracking discussion between visitors and presenters of abstracts was not possible, but follow-up contacts with presenters of abstracts indicated that several presenters were contacted directly by conference visitors for discussion of their research. Some of these discussions have already resulted in new collaborations, achieving a goal of the conference organizers and possibly of Berners-Lee.
Conference visitorsThe NADC Web server tracked the number of unique visitors by day of conference, illustrated in the accompanying chart. Additional statistics of the visitors to the conference indicated individuals from 32 identifiable countries and 14 additional countries. A tabulation of unique visitors (determined each day) shows where most visitors came from. Approximately 44% of visitors from foreign countries were from Canada, the United Kingdom, or Australia. Nearly 700 visitors were from educational institutions in the United States, and 120 visitors were from the U.S. government (exclusive of NADC). Interestingly, over 400 visitors were from commercial industry. This surprising number of visitors from commercial firms (including several pharmaceutical and biologics companies) made technology transfer a laudable achievement of the Virtual Conference.
The principal advantage of a conference held over the Web is that it eliminates the need for physically relocating participants. In today's tight budgetary times, this saves expending valuable resources and facilitates interaction with colleagues. Moreover, a Web-based conference enables participants to view topics of research interest at their leisure from the convenience of their lab, office, or home. This was an obvious benefit to participants from outside the United States.
As with any new technology, some misconceptions arose with the Virtual Conference. Several people did not initially understand that the meeting was virtual and that no physical travel to a meeting site was involved. Numerous scientists contacted via e-mail alone did not respond, yet if contacted by telephone were eager and enthused and wanted to participate. Clearly, e-mail alone was inadequate for communicating the concept and generating interest. Curiously, some people wanted to participate, but did not have access to a computer and were looking for a computer on which to visit the conference. The copyright issue was perhaps the biggest obstacle to submission or display of data in the virtual conference. Copyright issues, as well as the views of scientists and nonscientists about publishing on the Web, will certainly evolve as time passes. Growing numbers of people have access to the Web and make electronically available information from virtual conferences or electronic journals like HMS Beagle part of their daily lives.
Marcus Kehrli is the lead scientist for the Immunology of Ruminant Perinatal Diseases Research Project at the National Animal Disease Center in Ames, Iowa.
Thadeus Stanton is a research microbiologist in the Agricultural Research Service, USDA, and is stationed at the National Animal Disease Center in Ames, Iowa.
Tim Ingram is Manager of Information Services for the National Animal Disease Center, Ames, Iowa.
Kerry Kartchner, a GTE programmer, is a recent graduate of Iowa State University with a B.S. in computer science and a minor in linguistics.
Endlinks
NetVet - the Internet hub for numerous veterinary medical and animal resources.
U.S. Armed Forces Institute of Veterinary Pathology - includes links for descriptive and comparative pathology, descriptions of laboratory animal pathologies listed by species (POLA Notes), and a weekly slide conference.
Veterinary Infectious Disease Organization is a nonprofit research institute located at the University of Saskatchewan, Canada.
National Veterinary Institute - the largest veterinary laboratory in Scandinavia.
American Association of Immunologists - dedicated to the development, promotion, and dissemination of knowledge in immunology, primarily of domestic animals.
Emerging Infections Information Network at Yale University School of Medicine - has an online seminar series in human and animal infectious diseases. The First International Symposium on Emerging Diseases will be held November 12-13, 1997, in Lima, Peru.
Recent Internet conferences in various areas of biological and medical research include :
