Dr. Björn Sigurðsson (1913–1959) was the first director of Keldur - the Institute for Experimental Pathology,

University of Iceland The University of Iceland ( ) is a public research university in Reykjavík, Iceland, and the country's oldest and largest institution of higher education. Founded in 1911, it has grown steadily from a small civil servants' school to a modern co ...

. Björn died at an early age while having been the director of Keldur for only about ten years. In his short life, he made many developments in research in the fields of

pathology Pathology is the study of disease. The word ''pathology'' also refers to the study of disease in general, incorporating a wide range of biology research fields and medical practices. However, when used in the context of modern medical treatme ...

bacteriology Bacteriology is the branch and specialty of biology that studies the Morphology (biology), morphology, ecology, genetics and biochemistry of bacteria as well as many other aspects related to them. This subdivision of microbiology involves the iden ...

virology Virology is the Scientific method, scientific study of biological viruses. It is a subfield of microbiology that focuses on their detection, structure, classification and evolution, their methods of infection and exploitation of host (biology), ...

immunology Immunology is a branch of biology and medicine that covers the study of Immune system, immune systems in all Organism, organisms. Immunology charts, measures, and contextualizes the Physiology, physiological functioning of the immune system in ...

and

epidemiology Epidemiology is the study and analysis of the distribution (who, when, and where), patterns and Risk factor (epidemiology), determinants of health and disease conditions in a defined population, and application of this knowledge to prevent dise ...

. Björn became a world-renowned scientist because of his research on infectious diseases caused by slow viruses. This group of viruses was given the name,

Lentivirus ''Lentivirus'' is a genus of retroviruses that cause chronic and deadly diseases characterized by long incubation periods, in humans and other mammalian species. The genus includes the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), which causes AIDS. Lent ...

, in honor of the work of Björn Sigurðsson. The slow virus concept was first introduced by Björn Sigurðsson and he and his co-workers made pioneering studies on slow diseases in sheep including mæði, visna and scrapie. Mæði is a slowly progressive

interstitial pneumonia Interstitial lung disease (ILD), or diffuse parenchymal lung disease (DPLD), is a group of respiratory diseases affecting the interstitium (the tissue) and space around the Pulmonary alveolus, alveoli (air sacs) of the lungs. It concerns Pulmonar ...

of adult sheep while visna is a slow, progressive

encephalomyelitis Encephalomyelitis is inflammation of the brain and spinal cord. Various types of encephalomyelitis include: * '' Acute disseminated encephalomyelitis'' or ''postinfectious encephalomyelitis'', a demyelinating disease of the brain and spinal cord ...

and the same virus, belonging, to the lentivirus subgroup of

retrovirus A retrovirus is a type of virus that inserts a DNA copy of its RNA genome into the DNA of a host cell that it invades, thus changing the genome of that cell. After invading a host cell's cytoplasm, the virus uses its own reverse transcriptase e ...

es, was found to be responsible for both conditions.eNotes, World of Microbiology and Immunology, Slow Viruses
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References

In memoriam Björn Sigurdsson born 100 years ago
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bjorn Sigurdsson 1913 births 1959 deaths Icelandic infectious disease physicians Icelandic virologists