One major function of the liver is the uptake of endo- and xenobiotics from the bloodstream and their excretion into bile. The transport systems involved in hepatobiliary transport have been recently cloned and characterized at the molecular level and it is becoming clear that mutations and polymorphisms of individual transporter molecules underlie a variety of liver diseases. Furthermore, new research has shown that bile acids, whose function in digestion is long known, also behave as signal molecules in a variety of organs, including the intestinal and biliary epithelia, sinusoidal endothelial and immune cells. This book provides indepth surveys on the structure and function of transport molecules involved in hepatobiliary transport, on the role of different bile acids receptors in various organs and their function in health and disease, the mechanisms of bile salt-induced apoptosis and hepatocyte protection, and the role of transporter mutations as causes and modifiers of liver diseases. The book will be of interest not only for biochemists, structural chemists and biologists, but also for clinicians.

In 2013, the Hirsch Institute of Tropical Medicine (HITM) was officially inaugurated as a branch of the Department of Gastroenterology, Hepatology, and Infectious Diseases at Heinrich Heine University Dusseldorf under the direction of Professor Dieter Haussinger. The HITM serves as a place of scientific medical knowledge transfer, postgraduate medical training, and of conducting scientific projects relating to tropical medicine and infectious diseases. The publication relates the past activities of the institute, its history, and perspectives. Moreover, it permits a look behind the scenes during the construction of the institute in Africa and describes the living conditions and impressions of the staff. Dieter Haussinger, Director of the HITM and the Department of Gastroenterology, Hepatology, and Infectious Diseases and Professor of Internal Medicine at Heinrich Heine University Dusseldorf, focuses on the areas of clinical and experimental hepatology and gastroenterology, he is committed to the expansion and further development of the field of infectious diseases. He encouraged the certification of his department as a Center of Infectious Diseases, the addition of a tropical medicine and an infectious diseases outpatient clinic, the building of the Liver and Infectious Diseases Center, which houses the only treatment unit in North Rhine-Westphalia for highly infectious patients, and the founding of the Hirsch Institute of Tropical Medicine.