Dr. Murayama is a Senior Researcher of Influenza/Prion Disease Research Center, National Institute of Animal Health (NIAH). He graduated from the Department of Biology, Faculty of Science, Shinshu University in 1979, and entered the Graduate School of Science of Kyoto University and obtained his PhD in 1988. From 1988 to 1994, he studied at Tsukuba Primate Center as a research fellow of the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science and the Japan Science and Technology Agency, and performed immunological analysis of a primate model of AIDS. He worked at the Institute of Basic Medical Sciences, the University of Tsukuba, as a lecturer from 1994 to 1998. During this period, he studied proteins and genes which participated in the immune system and the nervous system. After work as a Research Scientist of the Japan Science and Technology Agency, he was appointed as a Senior Researcher at NIAH in 2002. His major research interest is to develop the ultrasensitive method for prion detection.