Contemporary Nephrology

This volume is the first of a biannual series entitled Contemporary Nephrology. The series intends to provide the reader with a broad, authoritative review of the important developments that have occurred during the previous two years in the major areas of both basic and clinical nephrology. We have been fortunate to enlist a distinguished group of scientists, teachers, and clinicians to serve as members of the Editorial Board of this series. We are grateful to them for the outstand ing contributions they have made to this first volume of Contemporary Nephrology. This volume has fifteen chapters. The first four chapters deal with more basic aspects of nephrology: Membrane Transport (Schafer); Renal Physiology (Knox and Spielman); Renal Metabolism (School werth); and Renal Prostaglandins (Dunn). Chapters 5-10 are more pathophysiologically oriented, and each contains an "appropriate mix" of basic and clinical information. This group of chapters includes Acid-Base Physiology and Pathophysiology (Arruda and Kurtzman); Mineral Metabolism in Health and Disease (Agus, Goldfarb, and Was serstein); Hypertension and the Renin-Angiotensin-Aldosterone Axis (Williams and Hollenberg); Immunologically Mediated Renal Disease (Glassock); Acute Renal Failure and Toxic Nephropathy (Anderson and Gross); and the Kidney in Systemic Disease (Martinez-Maldonado). The last five chapters, which are more clinically oriented, include Uremia (Friedman and Lundin); Nutrition in Renal Disease (Mitch); Dialysis (Maher); Renal Transplantation (Strom); and, finally, Drugs and the Kidney (Bennett).