Epidemiology of Acute Lung Injury (Hudson;Artigas) -- Etiology (Suter; Parsons;Slutsky;Bitterman) -- Pathophysiology and Pulmonary Circulation (Evans, Brunet, Vincent) -- Bronchoaleolar Lavage Fluid and Surfactant (Seeger, Haslet) -- Structural Alterations (Rouby) -- The Alveolar Epithelial Barrier (Matthay, Schuster) -- Mechanical Ventilation (Ranieri, Marini, Dreyfuss) -- Extra Pulmonary Supportive Measures (Pesenti, Albert) -- Pharmacological Manipulation of V/Q in ALI/ARDS (Falke; Payen; Dellinger) -- Liquid Ventilation (Fuhrman, Hirschl) -- Clinical Trials in the next 15 Years (Morris, Bernard, Brower, Abraham).