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Welcome to the Ohio Valley Chapter of SETAC
It's Election Time! Please check out the following biographical sketches for our candidates: Biographical Sketch for Katherine
Coady: Katie Coady has over seven years experience in the
environmental field.
She currently serves as an environmental toxicologist at Dow
Chemical Company in Midland, Michigan. She has her Ph.D. from
Michigan State in Zoology and Environmental Toxicology. She spent
four years teaching at Warner Southern College. She is currently
leading efforts at Dow to develop capabilities to conduct Tier I
Ecotox Endocrine Screens. Other areas of expertise include the
assessment and evaluation of toxicological effects to amphibians and
fish. Katie is looking forward to becoming the first OVC
president-elect from Michigan. Biographical Sketch for Greg
Smith: Greg Smith has a diversified background in the
biological sciences with specialization in aquatic biology and
ecotoxicology. He joined Great Lakes Environmental Center (GLEC)
after completing a doctoral program in zoology/aquatic toxicology at
Oklahoma State University. Doctoral research was performed in the
Water Quality Research Laboratory at Oklahoma State University and
involved the correlation of trace contaminant mixtures in complex
effluents with in-stream effects on benthic macroinvertebrates.
While with GLEC, Dr. Smith's focus has remained in aquatic
toxicology/ecology. He has assisted with or co-authored a number of
ambient water quality criteria documents for the protection of
aquatic life while under contract with the U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency. He also has extensive experience in planning and
conducting in-situ field and laboratory studies that assess the
impacts of effluents, single chemicals, and stormwater on receiving
waters. He has worked extensively with field sampling, culturing of
aquatic organisms, toxicity testing of complex effluents with Daphnia, Ceriodaphnia, and fathead
minnows, and toxicity identification-toxicity reduction evaluation
of complex effluents sediment elutriates, and toxicity testing
following FIFRA and OECD guidelines. He has managed a number of
effluent biomonitoring programs, toxicity identification/reduction
evaluation studies, pollution prevention/waste minimization efforts.
Dr. Smith has also managed pilot-scale programs designed to simulate
an industrial wastewater treatment plant system and to investigate
the feasibility of using air injection to bioremediate vadose zone
soil contaminated with JP-4 fuel. Biographical
Sketch for Konrad Kulacki: I
am a currently a post-doctoral researcher at the University of
Michigan in the lab of Dr Brad Cardinale. In my work, I apply my
training in aquatic ecology to address how emerging and existing
stressors impact the organisms and environments on which society
depends. My current research focuses on the evaluation and ranking
of multiple environmental stressors to ecosystem functions, using
laboratory artificial streams populated with communities of primary
producers. I performed my doctoral work at the University of Notre
Dame under the supervision of Dr. Gary Lamberti, where I studied the
effects of an emerging class of industrial chemicals, ionic liquids,
on freshwater planktonic communities, and how the effects of these
chemicals were modified by environmental conditions and food-web
interactions. After earning my PhD, I performed postdoctoral
research at the University of California Santa Barbara on the
effects of engineered nanoparticles on freshwater phytoplankton,
focusing not only on the broad impacts of these particles across
algal taxa but also on the specific mechanisms underlying those
effects. Thus, while my research often starts at the level of
populations of primary producers, it expands inwards to include
individual organisms and metabolic processes to address underlying
biological causes of stress, and outwards to include community
interactions and ecosystem functions to address its broader
consequences. I
would be excited to serve as a SETAC Ohio Valley Chapter Board
Member to help the Chapter that has helped me in the past. I have
attended several OVC annual meetings where I presented my research
as a graduate student, and got some great feedback from those
presentations. Now that I have returned to the region after a brief
stint in California, I look forward to meeting and working with more
of the local SETAC community, and working to invigorate our Chapter
in the coming years. Biographical
Sketch for Eric Waits: Eric Waits, Ph.D., studies environmental genetics
and molecular toxicology at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
National Exposure Research Laboratory in Cincinnati, Ohio. His principal research
interests lie in environmental genetics, molecular toxicology, and
functional genomics. Current research includes: genome-wide surveys
for genetic determinants of susceptibility to environmental
contaminants in small fish models; population genetic studies to
elucidate the role population processes play in mediating chemical
exposures for keystone aquatic species in urban and agricultural
landscapes; and investigating the utility of phylogenetic diversity
metrics for predicting attainment of ecosystem services in a
mountaintop removal valley fill operation case study. Ultimately,
this research aims to incorporate the inherent capacity of
individuals, populations, and communities to respond to
environmental perturbation and reduce uncertainty when assessing
risk of anthropogenic activity and environmental pollution. He has many published papers
and has presented at numerous SETAC national
meetings. Biographical
Sketch for Katrina Leigh: After receiving a B.S. in Zoology (1990) from Miami
University in Oxford, Ohio, I continued my research in physiological
ecology and specifically, in the freezing tolerance of vertebrates,
and received a M.S. in Zoology in 1993 from Miami University. I then
joined a toxicology research team at Wright State University,
investigating the metabolism of perfluorinated compounds for the
U.S. Air Force. On a part-time basis, I also instructed an
introductory environmental biology course at Miami University. After
six years in toxicology research, I moved to environmental
consulting. Currently, I am a senior associate within the Ecology
and Sediment Management Practice of ENVIRON International
Corporation, specializing in ecological risk assessment (with a
particular emphasis on birds and mammals), aquatic and terrestrial
biological community quality and ecotoxicology, and bioaccumulation
of environmental contaminants. I have enjoyed working within OVC as
a board member, including serving as chapter president, and I look
forward to a continuing role in the development of the
organization. Biographical
Sketch for Susan Oyen: Susan Oyen is a third-year doctoral student in the
Department of Toxicology at the University of Kentucky in Lexington,
Kentucky. Her research is being performed under Dr. Hollie Swanson
and focuses on inflammatory bowel disease and the possible negative
impact of PCBs in the environment in their role as aryl hydrocarbon
receptor antagonists. Ms. Oyen completed Bachelor of Science degrees
in both Biology and Chemistry from Lewis-Clark State College in
Lewiston, Idaho in 2009. Ms. Oyen joined SETAC as an undergraduate
at Lewis-Clark State College and was a member of the Pacific
Northwest SETAC chapter. At the SETAC North America meeting in Tampa, Florida in 2008
Ms. Oyen won first place in the undergraduate student poster
division for her work "Use of a Dynamic Model System to Evaluate the
Bioaccumulation of Contaminants in Food Chains". Biographical
Sketch for Venkata Goparaju: Venkata Goparaju is currently completing a Master of
Science in Environmental Safety and Health Management at the
University of Findlay, Findlay, Ohio. His graduate capstone project
is entitled "Analysis of Temporal Trends in Dioxin Emissions and
their Levels in Sediments, Foods and Human Body Lipids in the United
States" and was conducted under Dr. William Doyle. He also gave a
presentation on "Eutrophication of the Great Lakes - Factors
Influencing Algal Blooms" at the University of Findlay Symposium for
Scholarship and Creativity in 2011. After finishing his master's
degree, Mr. Goparaju intends to continue on at the University of
Findlay as a doctoral student.
The regional Ohio Valley Chapter of SETAC is a group of volunteers dedicated to improving our regional network of scientists, regulators, and educators. Founded in 1984, OVC SETAC organizes small regional scientific conferences for us to meet our neighbors and potential collaborators, become familiar with advances in many environmental fields, and give opportunities (and sometimes money!) to students to present their work and meet new mentors.
We have more than 80 members from OH, KY, IN and MI that are involved with developing workshops and timely discussions of topics of both regional and national interest. Your involvement in helping us achieve our goals for 2012 is encouraged. We are: 1. Continuing to expand our member participation. Key efforts include:
2. Creating forums for relationship building through more frequent information exchange via:
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