Editorial
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Welcome to the Internet Symposium on Food Allergens,

with the first issue we would like to start the turntable of easy information access making use of the new media. Even though prevalence data differ considerably there has been an undeniable increase in food allergies over recent years. At the same time molecular biological techniques  have developed rapidly. They have a great impact on food production as well as allergen characterization. The aim of the Internet Symposium is to provide an extensive overview of available data on certain food allergens. Therefore an Allergen Data Collection is presented in tabular form getting a general idea as well as detailed information very easy. The first two data collections presented here are focussing on  Hen's Egg White (Gallus domesticus) and Kiwi Fruit (Actinidia chinensis) allergies. An Original Paper is about new epitope studies of the predominant allergen from hen's egg white ovomucoid (Identification of IgE-Binding Peptides from OM).

Moreover the Internet Symposium offers "allergen links" to interesting web sites of general interest, databases, organizations and research groups. The journal index of recent publications regarding the field of food allergens and associated allergens. Please feel free to submit any comments, proposals or mistakes regarding the Internet Symposium either by e-mail or using the comment form. The papers are open for discussion.