Acute respiratory infections constitute the commonest cause of illness, 1 yet progress in the
identification of the viruses responsible for the great majority of these poorly differentiated
infections has been slow and tedious. Isolation of the adenoviruses 2-4 represented the first
significant contribution to the specific definition of the etiology of the common respiratory
diseases since the discovery of the influenza viruses. The studies summarized by the papers
of this symposium were all done during the last four years, and the scope of the data …