The discovery of the Major Histocompatibility Complex (MHC) in the 1960s opened new horizons in medical research and practice. The award of the Nobel Prize in Medicine in 1996 to P. Doherty and R. Zinkernagel for their studies on the phenomenon of HLA restriction indicates the importance of the system in medicine and sets the measure for future applications.

The significance of the HLA system for humans is manifold. In relation to this, we can say that it determines the immune response of humans to various environmental factors and contributes to human survival. It plays a crucial role in organ transplants, in anthropological studies, in forensic problems, in blood transfusions, in reproductive issues, and in resistance to infections.

[...] (from the book's preface)