North America Leadership
SETAC North America Board of Directors
President
Chris Stransky, GEI Consultants, USA
Vice President
Carla Ng, University of Pittsburgh, USA
Immediate Past President
Mark Johnson, Federal Government (retired), USA
Treasurer
Michele Harmon, University of South Carolina Aiken, USA
Board Members
Meredith Bohannon, Federal Government, USA
Katie Coady, Bayer, USA
Alan Jones, BASF, USA
Scott Lynn, Federal Government, USA
Ryan Otter, Grand Valley State University, USA
Patricia Ramírez Romero, Metropolitan Autonomous University, Mexico
Ruth Sofield, Western Washington University, USA
Scott Teed, Stone Environmental Inc., Canada
Kara Warner, wsp, USA
Student Members
Katie Irhin, Virginia Tech, USA
Jessica Donaldson, University of Florida, USA
SETAC North America Executive Director
Tamar Schlekat, ex officio
Officers
Chris Stransky
Chris Stransky is a senior aquatic scientist and group leader at GEI Consultants in Carlsbad, California. Prior to joining GEI in 2024, Stransky led an Aquatic Sciences practice and was the Director of a Toxicology Laboratory which he designed and built with his team at WSP and predecessor companies. His experience and interest have been centered on a wide variety of toxicology and ecological risk assessment programs in support of regulatory compliance, as well as developing and testing new innovative methods for monitoring. Characterizing the health of aquatic biological communities is a role and passion of his. Stransky received his B.A. in Aquatic Science from the University of California Santa Barbara and an M.S. in Ecology from San Diego State University.
Stransky has been an active member of SETAC for more than 30 years. He currently serves on the Board of Directors for SETAC North America and was elected Vice President in 2024. Stransky also currently serves on the Board of Directors for the Boz Life Science Research and Teaching Institute, affiliated with the University of California San Diego. He enjoys identifying and fostering collaborative opportunities and inspiring others through motivation and encouragement.
Outside passions include surfing, diving and exploring the outdoors, hiking and backpacking. He has two boys: one currently in the Coast Guard and one studying engineering at San Diego State University.
Carla Ng
Carla Ng has been an active member of SETAC North America for nearly twenty years and has also actively participated in SETAC Europe. She has an appreciation for the roles that SETAC plays globally. She has participated in Pellston Workshops and Focused Topic meetings, and SETAC has been the core association and scientific meeting place for her research career.
Carla is trained as a chemical engineer, works in a department of civil and environmental engineering, and manages projects that span chemical hazard assessment, toxicology, environmental fate modeling and human exposure assessment. This highly interdisciplinary experience helps her appreciate many of the fields of relevance to SETAC and the important roles this association plays in academic, regulatory and industrial sectors.
She is currently an Associate Editor for Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry, a Past President of the Exposure Modeling Interest Group, a Past Steering Committee Member of the Chemistry Interest Group and was a Co-Chair of the 2022 SETAC North America annual meeting.
Mark Johnson
Mark Johnson serves as the Director of Toxicology for the U.S. Army Public Health Center. He has held several leadership roles including as a past president of the American Board of Toxicology (ABT) and board member of the International Board of Environmental Risk Assessment (IBERA). He believes that the role of SETAC as a leader in environmental sciences is changing from one that has traditionally focused on understanding contaminants to one that has had to respond to increasingly complex emerging environmental issues that include human public health concerns. Johnson hopes to help SETAC encourage new ways to support multi-matrixed efforts to include One Health concepts in environmental risk assessment through focusing on emerging issues. He would also like to see SETAC bridge into recommending courses of action that will result in applied tools and solutions.
Michele Harmon
Michele has been an active member of both SETAC North America and the Carolinas Regional Chapter for over 25 years. Throughout her involvement, she has taken on multiple roles within the regional chapter, including several officer positions, and she currently serves as the chapter’s treasurer. Additionally, Michele contributes her expertise as a member of SETAC North America’s Finance Committee.
She earned her Ph.D. in Environmental Health Sciences from the Arnold School of Public Health at the University of South Carolina. Since 2005, Michele has been a part of the University of South Carolina Aiken (USCA), where she serves as the director of the Environmental Restoration and Remediation Program and co-director of the Center for Research Excellence.
Board Members
Meredith Bohannon
Meredith Bohannon received a B.A. from St. John’s College in Annapolis, Maryland. She received a Ph.D. from the University of Maryland – College Park (UMCP) in 2014, then served as a postdoctoral research associate there for three years. She is currently a biologist at the Defense Centers for Public Health, where she is responsible for overseeing and executing toxicity studies pertinent to military toxic exposures to advance and promote the health of the warfighter.
Bohannon has been engaged with SETAC since 2007 and has presented at most SETAC North America annual meetings since then. She has served in several roles the governance of the Chesapeake-Potomac Regional Chapter (CPRC).
Katherine (Katie) Coady
Katie Coady is an ecotoxicologist at Bayer Crop Sciences, with previous industry experience at Dow Chemical for more than 13 years. She received her Ph.D. from Michigan State University and began her career as a consultant followed shortly after as an assistant professor of biology and chemistry at a small college in Central Florida. Her areas of expertise include aquatic toxicology, ecological risk assessment, endocrine disruption, microplastics and bioaccumulation science. She first became involved in SETAC as a graduate student in the late '90s and has regularly participated in SETAC activities since on the regional level and in several geographies. Her goal as a board member is to give back to the scientific society that’s been so important to her, and she believes that SETAC should be moving toward greater inclusion and diversity and adopt innovative approaches to advancing science education and communication.
Alan Jones
Alan Jones is a Senior Aquatic Ecotoxicologist with BASF in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina. He received a B.S. in Environmental Studies from Emory & Henry College and a M.S. and Ph.D. in Environmental Toxicology from Clemson University, where he studied the effects of multiple stressors on small stream ecosystems. He was a postdoctoral scholar at Oregon State University, working on the Hanford Site Natural Resources Damage Assessment, and went on to join the crop protection chemicals industry in 2015. He has been an active SETAC member since 2005 and has both been a member of and (co-)chaired the steering committees of the Chemistry Interest Group and the Sediments Interest Group. He was a member of the Membership Committee and has organized the SETAC North America Buddy Program for the last three years.
Scott Lynn
Scott has been actively involved with SETAC since attending his first North America annual meeting as a student, making it his professional society of choice. He has served two terms on the board of the Chesapeake-Potomac Regional Chapter (CPRC) and volunteered in various roles, including chairing the Science Committee and co-chairing the 43rd annual meeting in Pittsburgh. Scott is committed to SETAC’s mission of promoting environmental quality, focusing on emerging scientific topics, career development and fostering diversity and inclusion.
For the past 13 years, Scott has worked as a fish biologist at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. His academic background spans environmental science, toxicology and molecular biology.
Ryan Otter
Ryan has been an active member of SETAC since 2002, contributing to multiple meeting program committees in both North America and Europe. He is a dedicated reviewer for SETAC journals and has participated in SETAC Pellston® workshops, sharing his expertise to advance environmental science and management. Ryan strongly supports SETAC's multi-sector approach, which he believes sets the organization apart from others.
With a Ph.D. from Clemson University and postdoctoral research at the University of Miami, Ryan spent 16 years at Middle Tennessee State University, where he served as Director of the Data Science Institute. He brings valuable skills in strategic direction and financial oversight, which he aims to apply to SETAC's continued leadership in environmental science. Now a professor at Grand Valley State University, Ryan is eager to contribute his scientific and governance expertise to SETAC's future.
Patricia Ramírez Romero
Patricia Ramírez Romero has been a SETAC member since 1993 and was the founding President of the SETAC Mexico Chapter (AMEQA) in 2003. She continues to serve on their board, organizing national and international meetings and editing special journal issues relevant to Mexico. She has previously served on both the SETAC North America Board of Directors and the SETAC World Council.
Patricia brings a multicultural perspective on environmental protection to the board. Since 2007, she has also been a member of the International Coral Reef Initiative (ICRI) Committee on Coral Reef Enforcement & Investigation, contributing to capacity building in marine forensic evidence handling across 20+ countries. With over 30 years of experience, she is dedicated to teaching and currently serves as Coordinator of the Energy and Environment Postgraduate Program. She earned her Ph.D. in Zoology from Miami University of Ohio in 1997 and began her career as a Research Assistant in 1988, now holding the position of Principal Professor at Metropolitan Autonomous University.
Ruth Sofield
Ruth Sofield has been an environmental toxicology and chemistry faculty member in the Environmental Science Department at Western Washington University since 2003. Her research is focused on contaminants in Puget Sound, and she's involved in the restoration of the Sound as a member of the Puget Sound Partnership Science Panel. Additionally, she has coordinated and ran an online speaker series since 2020 called Toxicology and Societies; this series is designed to make science more relatable to the general public.
Ruth has a B.A. in Biology from West Virginia University, an M.S. in Environmental Science from McNeese State University, and a Ph.D. and post-doc from Colorado School of Mines (Environmental Science and Engineering). She would like to contribute to activities that make toxicology and chemistry relatable and relevant to different audiences, support toxicology programs in universities, and build on inclusive practices.
Scott Teed
Scott Teed is an environmental professional with more than 30 years of experience. He holds a B.Sc. in Biology (1991) from Carleton University. Early in his career, Teed worked at Transport Canada’s Emergency Response Center and later at Environment Canada. Since 1997, he has been in consulting. He has experience in regulatory guidance development and specialization in ecological risk assessments in support of contaminated site remediation, permitting and product registration.
Teed has been a SETAC member since around 1994. He has actively contributed by presenting research, organizing sessions, participating in interest groups, judging student platform and poster presentations, and coordinating exhibits. He has served on the SETAC North America Finance Committee since 2024.
Kara Warner
Kara Warner earned her B.A. in Zoology at UT Austin, an M.S. in Biology at Texas State University, and a Ph.D. in Toxicology at Oregon State University. She is a Vice President and Toxicologist with WSP USA. Her expertise includes aquatic toxicology, ecological risk assessment and environmental impact assessment in permitting.
Warner has been a member of SETAC for more than 17 years. She has served on several SETAC committees and has been involved in governance in the Pacific Northwest Chapter. Warner co-chaired the SETAC North America 42nd Annual Meeting in 2021, where she had experience pivoting the meeting to virtual to address the challenges of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Katie Irhin
Katie is a second-year Ph.D. student at Virginia Tech studying pharmaceuticals and organismal toxicology. She has been a SETAC member since 2022 and has presented posters at both North American and European annual meetings. SETAC has provided Katie with opportunities to connect with peers and professionals, helping her grow as a researcher. Her experiences inspired her to take on a leadership role as co-chair of the NASAC Outreach Committee, where she is working to enhance student engagement at SETAC meetings.
Permanent Guests
Liaison from the SETAC Board of Diretcors
Nile Kemble
Nile Kemble received a B.S. degree from the University of Nebraska-Kearney in biology with a wildlife emphasis and a M.S. from the University of Missouri in fisheries management. Kemble has worked with a variety of other organizations, both nationally and internationally, to develop sediment quality guidelines that can be used to predict the incidence of toxicity in sediments as well as working with ASTM and USEPA in developing standard methods for conducting toxicity tests with contaminated sediments. His current research is primarily focused in evaluating toxicity and effects of hazardous algal blooms on freshwater fish and invertebrates and working on developing a bait food for eradicating invasive carp. He has published 94 peer reviewed articles or final reports.
Representative from North America Students
Jessica Donaldson
Jessica Donaldson received her bachelor’s in marine science from Eckerd College. Following Eckerd, she interned at Mote Marine Laboratory in Sarasota, FL, from 2020 to 2022. Donaldson is currently pursuing a PhD at the University of Florida under the mentorship of Dr. Joseph Bisesi. She has worked on numerous projects assessing the effects of metals, pesticides, and emerging contaminants, including PFAS, on aquatic organisms.