About Us

Board Members
     <<-About Us

Jonathan M. Samet, Chair
Director
Institute for Global Health;
Chairman
Department of Preventive Medicine
University of Southern California

Ramón Alvarez
Senior Scientist
Environmental Defense Fund

John M. Balbus
Senior Scientist and Program Director
Environmental Defense Fund;
Adjunct Professor Department of Environmental Health Sciences Bloomberg School of Public Health Johns Hopkins University

Dallas Burtraw
Senior Fellow
Resources for the Future

James S. Bus
Director of External Technology
The Dow Chemical Company

Ruth DeFries
Professor
Department of Geography
University of Maryland

Costel D. Denson
Managing Member
Costech Technologies, LLC

E. Donald Elliott
Adjunct Professor of Law
Georgetown University Law Center
Yale Law School;
Senior Partner
Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP

Mary R. English
Adjunct Professor
Department of Sociology
University of Tennessee

J. Paul Gilman
Director
Oak Ridge Center for Advanced Studies
Oak Ridge National Laboratory

Judith Ann Graham
Senior Scientist
American Chemistry Council

William M. Lewis
Professor and Director
Center for Limnology, Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES)
University of Colorado

Judith L. Meyer
Distinguished Research Professor
Institute of Ecology
University of Georgia

Dennis D. Murphy
Research Professor and Director
Ecology, Evolution, and Conservation Biology
University of Nevada, Reno

Danny D. Reible
Chair in Environmental Health Engineering
Department of Civil Engineering
College of Engineering
University of Texas

Joseph V. Rodricks
Founding Principal
ENVIRON International Corporation

Armistead G. Russell
Distinguished Professor
Environmental Engineering
Georgia Institute of Technology

Robert F. Sawyer
Professor Emeritus
University of California

Kimberly M. Thompson
Associate Professor
Harvard School of Public Health and
Children's Hospital Boston

Mark. J. Utell
Professor and Associate Chair
School of Medicine and Dentistry
University of Rochester;
Director
Division of Pulmonary/Critical Care
Division of Occupational Environmental Medicine
University of Rochester Medical Center






Jonathan M. Samet, Chair
Founding director of the Institute for Global Health and chairman of the Department of Preventive Medicine at the University of Southern California (USC). Prior to his position at USC, he was professor and chair of the Department of Epidemiology at The Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health. He was elected to the Institute of Medicine in 1997. An epidemiologist and pulmonary physician, he has focused on the effects of inhaled pollutants, respiratory diseases, cancer, and risk assessment. Dr. Samet has worked extensively on risks posed by indoor and outdoor air pollution. He has served on several committees of the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of Energy, and the National Institutes of Health, and currently chairs the IOM's Committee on Asbestos He earned his M.D. in 1970 from the University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry.
          <<-Members

Ramón Alvarez
Senior scientist at Environmental Defense Fund. Dr. Alvarez promotes cleaner air in Texas cities, with an emphasis on reducing emissions from electric power plants and diesel vehicles. He has worked with industries on the U.S.-Mexico border to find cost-effective methods of reducing waste and pollution. Dr. Alvarez serves on the Science Advisory Committee of the Texas Environmental Research Consortium. He received his B.S. degree from Duke University, and his Ph.D. in physical chemistry from the University of California at Berkeley.
          <<-Members

John M. Balbus
Director of the Health Program at Environmental Defense and adjunct professor of environmental health sciences at The Johns Hopkins University. His expertise is in epidemiology, toxicology, and risk science. Previously he spent seven years at George Washington University where he was the founding director of the Center for Risk Science and Public Health and served as Acting Chair of the Department of Environmental and Occupational Health. He was also an Assistant Professor of Medicine. Dr. Balbus has served as a member of EPA's Children's Health Protection Advisory Committee, a core panel member on EPA's Voluntary Children's Chemical Exposure Program, and on the EPA Science Advisory Board subcommittees for National Air Toxics Research Plan Review and Computational Toxicology Review. He currently serves on the National Research Council Committee on Applications of Toxicogenomic Technologies to Predictive Toxicology. Dr. Balbus received his M.D. from the University of Pennsylvania and his M.P.H. from Johns Hopkins University.
          <<-Members

Dallas Burtraw
Senior fellow in the Quality of the Environment Division at Resources for the Future. His research interests include restructuring of the electric utility market, the social costs of environmental pollution and benefit-cost and cost-effectiveness analysis of environmental regulation. Dr. Burtraw has investigated the effects on electric utilities of the emission-permit trading program legislated under the 1990 Amendments to the Clean Air Act. He has also evaluated the benefits of sulfur dioxide emission reductions as related to Title IV. Dr. Burtraw served on the National Research Council Committee on Air Quality Management in the United States. He received his Ph.D. in economics from the University of Michigan.
          <<-Members

James S. Bus
Director of External Technology at Dow Chemical Company. His research interests include the mechanism of superoxide radical-mediated paraquat toxicity; the relationship between benzene metabolism and toxicity; metabolic pathways as defense mechanisms to toxicant exposure, and mode of action considerations in the use of transgenic animals for mutagenicity and carcinogenicity evaluations. He is a member of several professional societies including the Society of Toxicology (serving as President in 1996-97), the American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics, the American Conference of Governmental and Industrial Hygienists, the Teratology Society, and is a Diplomate of the American Board of Toxicology. Dr. Bus currently serves on the National Research Council standing Committee on Emerging Issues and Data on Environmental Contaminants and the Committee on Applications of Toxicogenomic Technologies to Predictive Toxicology. He received his Ph.D. in pharmacology from Michigan State University in 1975.
          <<-Members

Ruth Defries
Denning Professor of Sustainable Development in the Department of Ecology, Evolution and Environmental Biology at Columbia University. Her research examines human transformation of the landscape and its consequences for climate, biogeochemical cycling, biodiversity, and other ecosystem services that make our planet habitable. She is interested in observing land cover and land use change at regional and global scales with remotely sensed data and exploring the implications for ecological services such as climate regulation, the carbon cycle, and biodiversity. She is a fellow of the Aldo Leopold Leadership Program. Dr. DeFries currently serves on the NRC Geographical Sciences Committee and the Committee on Climate Data Records from Operational Satellites: Development of a NOAA Satellite Data Utilization Plan.
          <<-Members

Costel D. Denson
Managing member of Costech Technologies, L.L.C., a company that fabricates instrumentation for characterizing the application and performance properties of synthetic materials, and the impact that the use of these materials could have on the environment. Dr. Denson's research has focused on the rheological characterization and processing of polymeric materials, with an emphasis on mixing, mass transfer and chemical reactions in viscous media, and on the shaping operations for these materials. Dr. Denson has published numerous papers, holds patents related to the synthesis and characterization of synthetic materials and is the recipient of many honors and awards. He has served on a wide range of scientific and engineering advisory committees, including the National Research Council's Committee on Air Quality Management in the United States, the National Research Council's Committee to Review EPA's Research Grants Program, the American Chemistry Council's Board Research Committee, the National Science Foundation's advisory committee for the Engineering Directorate, the National Science Foundation's advisory committee on Environmental Education and Research, and a wide array of engineering advisory committees at various universities. And, he served as the first chair of the Board of Scientific Counselors of EPA's Office of Research and Development. Dr. Denson was employed from 1977 to 2005 at the University of Delaware where he was a professor of chemical engineering. From 1991 to 1992 he served as Engineering Dean and from 1992 to 2000, he served as Vice Provost for Research at that institution. Dr. Denson received his Bachelor of Science Degree from Lehigh University, and his Doctorate from the University of Utah, all in chemical engineering.
          <<-Members

E. Donald Elliott
Adjunct professor of law at Yale Law School and Georgetown University Law Center and a partner in the law firm of Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP. He received both his B.A. and J.D. from Yale in 1970 and 1974, respectively. His subjects include environmental law, toxic chemicals, torts, administrative law, constitutional law, complex civil litigation, food and drug law, law and science, and law and the genome. He was assistant administrator and general counsel for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency from 1989-1991. He currently serves on the editorial board of the Journal of Industrial Ecology.
          <<-Members

Mary R. English
Research leader at the Institute for a Secure and Sustainable Environment and an Associate of the Center for Applied and Professional Ethics at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville. Her current research interests include land use, transportation, and growth management planning at the local and state levels, and participatory processes for environmental decision making. Over the past 20 years, her work has focused on the social and political aspects of various environmental management issues, such as siting controversial projects, cleaning up Superfund sites, the restoration and reuse of brownfield sites, and alternative mechanisms for involving stakeholders in environmental decisions. Dr. English is a member of the Tennessee Air Pollution Control Board. She previously served on the National Research Council's Board on Radioactive Waste Management and several NRC study committees as well as the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's National Environmental Justice Advisory Council, and the National League of Women Voters' Advisory Committee to the Nuclear Waste Education Project. Dr. English received her Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of Tennessee at Knoxville.
          <<-Members

J. Paul Gilman
Senior vice president and chief sustainability officer at Covanta Energy Corporation. Previously he was director of the Oak Ridge Center for Advanced Studies, Oak Ridge National Laboratory. He has also worked at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency as Assistant Administrator; at the U.S. Office of Management and Budget, where he had oversight responsibilities for the Department of Energy (DOE) and all other science agencies; and at DOE, where he advised the Secretary of Energy on scientific and technical matters. From 1993 to 1998, Dr. Gilman was the executive director of the Life Sciences and Agriculture divisions of the National Research Council (NRC). He has also served as a member of the NRC Board on Environmental Studies and Toxicology from 1999 to 2002. Dr. Gilman earned his Ph.D. degrees in ecology and evolutionary biology from The Johns Hopkins University.
          <<-Members

Judith Ann Graham
Independent consultant on issues related to health risks of environmental chemicals. She recently retired as the Managing Director of the American Chemistry Council's Long-Range Research Initiative, which sponsors research to advance the science of health risk assessment of chemicals to support decision-making by government, industry, and the public. Prior to this, she retired from EPA's Office of Research and Development after 32 years of service; her last position was Associate Director for Health of the National Exposure Research Laboratory. Her research interests include inhalation toxicology, exposure analysis, and health effects and health risks of air pollutants. Dr. Graham is a Fellow of the Academy of Toxicological Sciences and a past President of the board. She has served on several previous NRC study committees and is a member of BEST; been elected to offices of several scientific societies; and has won several career achievement awards. She has a Ph.D. in physiology and pharmacology from Duke University.
          <<-Members

William M. Lewis
Professor and director of the Center for Limnology, Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES) at the University of Colorado. Dr. Lewis earned his Ph.D. from Indiana University (1973) with emphasis on limnology. His research interests, as reflected by over 120 journal articles and books, include productivity and other metabolic aspects of aquatic ecosystems, aquatic food webs, composition of biotic communities, nutrient cycling, and the quality of inland waters. The geographic extent of Dr. Lewis's work encompasses not only the montane and plains areas of Colorado, but also Latin America and southeast Asia, where he has conducted extensive studies of tropical aquatic systems. Dr. Lewis has chaired or served on many National Research Council committees. He was also a member of the NRC's Water Science and Technology Board. His current research projects include the use of stable isotopes to define carbon flux in the Orinoco River floodplain, biogeochemistry of the waters of the Orinoco River, metabolic adaptations in planktonic algae, and nutrient regulation in montane waters of the central Rockies.
          <<-Members

Judith L. Meyer
Distinguished fellow at the River Basin Center and professor emeritus at Odum School of Ecology, University of Georgia. Dr. Meyer has served on the Water Science and Technology Board and several NRC committees. She is a past president of the Ecological Society of America. She currently serves on the Environmental Processes and Effects Committee of the EPA's Science Advisory Board and on The Independent Science Board of the California Bay Delta Authority. She chairs the Scientific and Technical Advisory Committees of American Rivers and Upper Chattahoochee River keeper. Her expertise is in river and stream ecosystems with emphasis on nutrient dynamics, microbial food webs, riparian zones, ecosystem management, river restoration, and urban rivers. Dr. Meyer received a Ph.D. in 1978 from Cornell University.
          <<-Members

Dennis D. Murphy
Research professor in the Biology Department at the University of Nevada, Reno. Until recently he served as director, then as president of the Center for Conservation Biology at Stanford. Author of more than 170 published papers and book chapters on the biology of butterflies and on key issues in the conservation of imperiled species, Dr. Murphy has worked in conflict resolution in land-use planning on private property since the first federal Habitat Conservation Plan on San Bruno Mountain, including HCPs in the Pacific Northwest, southern California, and Nevada. He won the industry's oldest and most respected prize in conservation, the Chevron Conservation Award, has been named a Pew Scholar in Conservation and the Environment, and has received the California Governor's Leadership Award in Economics and the Environment. Dr. Murphy has served on the National Research Council Committee on Endangered and Threatened Species in the Platte River Basin and the Committee on Scientific Issues in the Endangered Species Act. Dr. Murphy received his doctorate from Stanford University.
          <<-Members

Danny D. Reible
Bettie Margaret Smith Chair of Environmental Health Engineering and Coordinator of Environmental and Water Resources in the Department of Civil Architecture & Environmental Engineering at The University of Texas. Previously, he was professor of chemical engineering and director of the EPA Hazardous Substance Research Center at Louisiana State University. His research focuses on transport phenomena and its applications to environmental assessment and remediation, especially as related to contaminated sediments and dredged materials. He is a member of the National Academy of Engineering and a Diplomate of the American Academy of Environmental Engineering. He served on the National Research Council Committee on Environmental Remediation at Naval Facilities, the Committee on Remediation of PCB-Contaminated Sediments, the Committee to Review the OMB Risk Assessment Bulletin and the Committee on Dredging at Superfund Megasites. Dr. Reible received his Ph.D. in chemical engineering from the California Institute of Technology.
          <<-Members

Joseph V. Rodricks
Founding principal of the ENVIRON environmental consulting firm in 1982. He earned a Ph.D. in biochemistry from University of Maryland and became a postdoctoral scholar at the University of California, Berkeley. Dr. Rodricks is an internationally recognized expert in the field of toxicology and risk analysis, and in their uses in regulation and in the evaluation of toxic tort and product liability cases. Since 1980, he has consulted for hundreds of manufacturers, for government agencies, and the World Health Organization, and he has served on fifteen boards and committees of the National Academy of Sciences and the Institute of Medicine. He has more than 200 publications on toxicology and risk analysis, and has lectured nationally and internationally on these topics. Dr. Rodricks was formerly Deputy Associate Commissioner, Health Affairs, and Toxicologist, U.S. Food & Drug Administration (1965-1980), and is a Visiting Professor, The Johns Hopkins University School of Public Health. He has been certified as a Diplomate, American Board of Toxicology, since 1982. Dr. Rodricks' experience includes chemical products and contaminants in foods, food ingredients, air, water, hazardous wastes, the workplace, consumer products, and medical devices and pharmaceutical products.
          <<-Members

Armistead G. Russell
Georgia Power Distinguished Professor of Environmental Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology. His research areas include air pollution control, aerosol dynamics, atmospheric chemistry, emissions control, air pollution control strategy design and computer modeling. Dr. Russell has served on a number of NRC committees and was chair of the Committee to Review EPA's Mobile Source Emissions Factor (MOBILE) Model. He received a Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from the California Institute of Technology.
          <<-Members

Robert F. Sawyer
Class of 1935 Professor of Energy Emeritus in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley. As a professor emeritus with the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley, he has taught and conducted research in engine combustion, pollutant formation and control, toxic waste incineration, and alternative fuels. Dr. Sawyer has served on numerous National Research Council committees including the Committee for the Evaluation of the Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality Improvement Program, the Committee to Review EPA's Mobile Source Emissions Factor (MOBILE) Model, and the Committee on Adiabatic Diesel Technology, among others. He served as chair of the California Air Resources Board, 2006-2007. He received his Ph.D. from the Department of Aerospace Sciences at Princeton University.
          <<-Members

Kimberly M. Thompson
Associate professor of risk analysis and decision science at the Harvard School of Public Health and Children's Hospital Boston. She earned a B.S. and a M.S. in chemical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1988 and 1989, respectively, and a Sc.D. in environmental health from Harvard School of Health in 1995. Her research interests focus on the issues related to developing and applying quantitative methods for risk assessment and risk management, in addition to the consideration of the public policy implications associated with including uncertainty and variability in risk characterization. Dr. Thompson is a member of many organizations and societies including the Society for Risk Analysis, of which she is currently the President. She was a Sigma Xi Distinguished Lecturer for 2003-2005 and has been the recipient of several honors, including recognition in 2003 by the Society of Toxicology for an outstanding published paper demonstrating an application of risk assessment with fellow colleagues and the 2004 Society for Risk Analysis Chauncey Starr Award.
          <<-Members

Mark J. Utell
Professor of Medicine and Environmental Medicine, Director of the Occupational/Environmental Medicine Division, and former Director of the Pulmonary/Critical Care Division at the University of Rochester Medical Center. He serves as the Associate Chairman of the Department of Environmental Medicine. His research interests have centered on the effects of environmental toxicants on the human respiratory tract. Dr. Utell has published extensively on the health effects of inhaled gases, particles and fibers in the workplace, indoor and outdoor environments. He was an associate editor of Environmental Research and was on the airborne pulmonary medicine committee. Dr. Utell currently serves on the National Research Council's (NRC) Committee on Biodefense Analysis and Countermeasures and has previously served on the NRC Committee on Research Priorities for Airborne Particulate Matter and the Committee to Review the Health Consequences of Service during the Persian Gulf War. He received his M.D. from Tufts University School of Medicine in 1972.
          <<-Members