The University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center has published an open-access book called “Streptococcus pyogenes: Basic Biology to Clinical Manifestations” that provides a comprehensive review of research on the bacteria. The university’s first online, open-access book, “Streptococcus pyogenes” is freely available on NCBI’s Bookshelf, at http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK333424/.

Streptococcus pyogenes (Group A Streptococcus) is responsible for diseases such as scarlet fever, pharyngitis, impetigo, cellulitis, necrotizing fasciitis and toxic shock syndrome, as well as the sequelae of rheumatic fever and acute poststreptococcal glomerulonephritis. The book aims to provide an up-to-date and comprehensive review of research on Streptococcus pyogenes, including its basic biology, epidemiology, genetics and pathways that facilitate group A streptococcal infections.

The book is organized in 28 chapters and represents a combined effort by an international group of S. pyogenes researchers, who present the current status of work in their areas of expertise. The editors—Joseph Ferretti, Dennis Stevens, and Vincent Fischetti—intend the information to be a resource for the general public, students, researchers, and clinicians, and to aid future work towards understanding the mechanism of Streptococcus pyogenes disease, in hopes that it will lead to development of better methods of disease control.

As a living document in an open access format, new information and updates can be provided at any time. In fact, three new chapters will be added in the next few months.

Streptococcus pyogenes is fully indexed and searchable from NCBI’s Bookshelf, and book and chapter citations are searchable in PubMed. The entire book, or single chapters, can be downloaded as a PDF file and/or printed. Under terms of its Creative Commons license (CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0), the book is available for reuse and redistribution via the NLM LitArch Open Access Subset.

Editor’s Note: This is the first in what we expect will be periodic blog posts highlighting books and documents available on NCBI’s Bookshelf. We will also be keeping people informed about new books and documents via Twitter @ncbibooks (coming soon).

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