Perry J. Blackshear, M.D., D.Phil., of Duke University Medical Center, was named today director of the Office of Clinical Research at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences in Research Triangle Park, N.C.

The appointment was announced by NIEHS Director Kenneth Olden, Ph.D., who said it signals an Institute thrust into more work with patients on the health impact of environmental hazards and environmentally associated diseases, as well as greater cooperation with the medical programs at Duke and the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill.

Dr. Blackshear said, "NIEHS has an international reputation for first class epidemiological and basic science research. I am excited about this opportunity to help with the translation of their discoveries in these areas into improvements in public health and patient care."

"Our objective in establishing the position is to move research findings from the laboratory to the bedside more quickly, and to gain insights and information from patient care," Dr. Olden said. "Dr. Blackshear is superbly qualified to accomplish this."

Dr. Blackshear, an endocrinologist, has been a professor of medicine and biochemistry and an investigator with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute at Duke University Medical Center.

Dr. Blackshear's research interests include mechanisms of hormone action, insulin control of cellular processes, and drug delivery systems. He has published more than 160 articles and book chapters on these subjects.

He invented and holds patents on an implantable infusion pump and a hormone mixture used for infusion.

Dr. Blackshear is a graduate of University of Minnesota. He was a Rhodes Scholar and received a D.Phil. degree from Trinity College, Oxford University, England, and his medical degree from Harvard Medical School. He was an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard before joining the Duke faculty in 1984.

Dr. Blackshear will retain appointments at Duke as consulting professor of medicine and adjunct professor biochemistry.

He was a recipient of the Becton Dickinson Career Achievement Award and the AFCR Outstanding Investigator Award for Clinical Research.

NIEHS is particularly known for biological studies such as the co-discovery of the first breast cancer gene and for the development of basic laboratory technologies. But the Institute has a current trial of a treatment for lead toxicity in children and is beginning research aimed at cleaning up substances in homes in an attempt to reduce asthma in children.

Walter J. Rogan, M.D., directs the lead toxicity study. He has been acting clinical director pending Dr. Blackshear's appointment.

UNC and Duke medical have signed an agreement with NIEHS to work with NIEHS in this clinical program.