Environmental Factor, March 2009, National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences

Samson and Hollingsworth to Speak at Duke in March

By Eddy Ball
March 2009

In 2008, Samson, above, spoke at NIEHS as part of the Laboratory of Molecular Genetics Fellows Invited Guest Lecture series (http://www.niehs.nih.gov/news/newsletter/2008/june/mit.cfm) and in Research Triangle Park as a guest lecturer at the Fall Meeting of the Genetics and Environmental Mutagenesis Society (GEMS) (http://www.niehs.nih.gov/news/newsletter/2008/november/gems-meeting.cfm). (Photo courtesy of Leona Samson and MIT)

Hollingsworth, above, spoke at a meeting of the 2008 ONES awardees (http://www.niehs.nih.gov/news/newsletter/2009/january/2008-ones-awardees.cfm) in December 2008. He is senior author on a paper (http://www.niehs.nih.gov/news/newsletter/2009/march/extramural-papers.cfm#wheezing) featured in this issue. (Photo courtesy of Steve McCaw)

Veteran grantee (http://tools.niehs.nih.gov/portfolio/sc/detail.cfm?appl_id=7404461) Leona Samson, Ph.D., and recent Outstanding New Environmental Scientist (ONES) awardee (http://tools.niehs.nih.gov/portfolio/sc/detail.cfm?appl_id=7539822) John Hollingsworth, M.D., are scheduled to lecture in March at the Duke University School of Medicine.

Samson (http://web.mit.edu/be/people/samson.htm) , who is the director of the Center for Environmental Health Sciences at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, will speak March 27 at 12:00 p.m. in 147 Nanaline Duke Building. Her presentation, "Complex Responses to DNA damaging Agents," is hosted by Professor of Biochemistry Ken Kreuzer, Ph.D., and is part of the Duke Biochemistry Seminar Series.

Samson investigates alkylating agents, an abundant class of chemical DNA damaging agents in the environment that are toxic, mutagenic, teratogenic and carcinogenic. The repair of DNA alkylation damage provides tremendous protection against the toxic effects of these agents. Samson's aim is to understand the biology, biochemistry and genetics of the numerous DNA repair pathways that act upon DNA alkylation damage.

A professor in the Department of Medicine, Division of Pulmonary, Allergy, and Critical Care Medicine at Duke University Medical Center, Hollingsworth (http://www.dukehealth.org/physicians/34F2D9623275962385256F6A007682D0) will speak March 31 at 4:00 p.m. in 143 Jones Building. His talk, "Ambient Environmental Exposures and Pulmonary Innate Immunity," is part of the Duke Department of Immunology Seminar Series.

Hollingsworth studies the complex interaction between the innate immune system and the common inhaled toxicant, ozone. Current studies are focused on both understanding the role of innate immunity in environmental airway disease and how exposure to ambient ozone can modify subsequent innate/adaptive immune response in the lung.

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