Deans' Forum on Health, Food, and Nutrition to be held Nov. 5

Virginia Tech's Doris T. Zallen, the Commonwealth's Outstanding Faculty Award winner, and Harvard School of Public Health's John Quackenbush will deliver the keynote address on the "Health Implications of Genomics" at the Virginia Tech Deans' Forum on Health, Food, and Nutrition on Monday, Nov. 5, at 7 p.m. at the Inn at Virginia Tech.

Zallen, professor of science and technology in society in the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences, has helped to provide oversight of ground-breaking medical experiments involving human gene therapy. As chair of an National Institutes of Health advisory committee on informed consent, Zallen wrote the federal guidelines, currently in force, which protect human subjects in gene-therapy experiments.

Quackenbush, professor of computational biology and bioinformatics at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute as well as Harvard, served as an investigator at The Institute for Genomic Research until early 2005. His primary research areas are functional genomics and bioinformatics, and his work has focused on the integration of diverse data types to provide insight into biological systems. He has been investigating gene expression patterns in animal models with the goal of identifying mechanisms underlying a range of human diseases.

The Deans’ Forum on Health, Food, and Nutrition, the third in a series of forums in support of the implementation of the University Strategic Plan, will showcase the university’s latest research, activity, and expertise in these areas.

“We hope that the forum will ultimately yield new contacts, partnerships, and collaborative efforts across disciplines,” said Sue Ott Rowlands, dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences.

“Our goal is to create an opportunity for those currently working in the topic areas of food, health, and nutrition, one of the university’s key strategic scholarship domains, to showcase their work, exchange ideas, and foster discussion,” said Sharron Quisenberry, dean of the College of Agriculture & Life Sciences.

A mid-morning lecture by Stella L Volpe, a nutritionist and exercise physiologist at the University of Pennsylvania’s School of Nursing, will ask the question, “Will Sciences Solve the Obesity Epidemic?” An afternoon talk entitled, "Get the Fat Out: Real Science for Real Life," will be delivered by Paul A. Estabrooks, associate professor human nutrition, foods, and exercise at Virginia Tech and the 2007 winner of the Distinguished Service Award from the Society of Behavioral Medicine.

The event will also provide perspectives from policy leaders on health, food, and nutrition-related needs so Virginia Tech can target and enhance activity to address and further define those needs. Poster sessions will provide members of the university community and guests a chance to meet Virginia Tech’s researchers and learn about their work. The forum will include award presentations to the best graduate and undergraduate student posters.

The forum, held from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. in the Skelton Conference Center of the Inn at Virginia Tech, as well as the keynote lecture, is free and open to the public but advance online registration is requested prior to Oct. 21. A complete agenda is also available at the Forum website.

The Deans’ Forum Task Force Coordinators Bill Herbert, professor of human nutrition, foods and exercise in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, can be reached at (540) 231-6565, and Kerry Redican, professor of learning sciences and technologies in the School of Education, can be reached at or (540) 231-5743.