Document ID: EPA-HQ-OPP-2006-0657-0043
Agency: epa
Document Type: Supporting & Related Material
Title: 
Posted Date: 2006-10-23T04:00Z

FIFRA SCIENTIFIC ADVISORY PANEL (SAP)

	OPEN MEETING

	OCTOBER 24 - 26, 2006

FIFRA SAP WEB SITE http://www.epa.gov/scipoly/sap/

OPP Docket Telephone: (703) 305-5805

Docket Number: EPA-HQ-OPP-2006-0657

FQPA Science Review Board Members Biographical Sketches 

Dr. Andrew Paul Gutierrez is a Professor in the Division of Ecosystem
Science at the University of California, Berkeley.  Dr.Gutierrez's
inter-disciplinary research group investigates plant - herbivore-natural
enemy interactions as driven by edaphic and weather factors using
physiologically based tritrophic models.  The models are based on
extensive field and laboratory data.  The models are used to assess the
theory and practice of biological control, to solve practical problems
in pest management and crop production and protection (IPM), and to
explore economic and theoretical issues.  The models have been used to
analyze diverse agroecosystems worldwide: alfalfa, apple, cassava,
coffee, common bean, cotton, grape, olive, rice/fish pond system and
agro-forestry.

Dr. Gutierrez current research focuses on five interrelated areas: (1)
The refinement of existing and development of new tritrophic models of
invasive species and transgenic crops; (2) The development of a
geographical information systems (GIS) based decision support system for
implementing crop systems models; (3) the analysis of climate warming on
ecosystem dynamics; (4) The analysis of the ecological and economic
impact of transgenic crops in agriculture; (5) Theoretical studies on
the bioeconomics of food web dynamics.

Dr. Gary P. Fitt is a senior principal research scientist in CSIRO, the
Australian government’s national research agency, where is Assistant
Chief of the Division of Entomology.  Dr. Fitt has a long background in
research related to ecologically based pest management systems, insect
pest ecology and behaviour, and the evaluation and management of GM
crops.  He joined CSIRO in 1983 and worked at the Australian Cotton
Research Institute, Narrabri for 20 years, researching the ecology and
management of Helicoverpa spp., the most devastating pests of field
crops in Australia. Since1992 he has been involved with research on
insect-tolerant GM cottons and prior to their commercial release in 1996
he coordinated the development of the pre-emptive management strategies
to protect the technology from the evolution of resistance by
Helicoverpa. Dr. Fitt was Program Leader for Cotton in CSIRO for 10
years from 1990 and the CEO of the Australian Cotton Cooperative
Research Centre from 1999-2003. Dr. Fitt has worked on collaborative
projects across Australia and internationally, particularly in relation
to cotton systems. He is currently Chair of the International Cotton
Advisory Committee (ICAC) Expert Panel on Cotton Biotechnology,
executive member of the IOBC Global Working on GM Crops in IPM and Board
Director of the Cotton Catchment Communities Cooperative research
Centre.

Dr. Alan S. Robinson obtained a PhD at the University of Bristol, UK on
Drosophila population genetic studies related to the development of
genetic control techniques for insect pests. He then spent one year as a
postdoc in Summerland Research Station, BC, Canada working on radiation
induced sterility in the codling moth Cydia pomonella. This work was
part of a sterile insect technique (SIT) programme that is still ongoing
and expanding in the Okanagan Valley in BC.

In 1972 he took up a position as a government scientist at the research
institute ITAL, Wageningen, The Netherlands to develop genetic control
techniques for the onion fly, Delia antiqua. This work also involved the
implementation of an SIT field programme. This SIT project is still
running and has in fact been taken over by private industry. Following
successful developments in the field of the SIT for Mediterranean fruit
fly Ceratitis capitata, he became heavily involved in the successful
development of genetic sexing strains for this species. These strains
are now in world-wide use in all Mediterranean fruit fly SIT programmes.

Anopheles mosquitoes remain a major problem for much of the world and in
The Netherlands a project was put together to examine the possibility of
developing genetic control techniques for Anopheles stephensi, a major
vector of malaria on the Indian sub-continent. A consortium of
institutes in the Netherlands, together with an institute in Pakistan,
collaborated on this project which he led until 1987. A reorganisation
of priorities at the Institute led to the premature closure of the
project.

At about this time the possibility of adding modern biotechnological
techniques to the development of insect control methods was beginning to
take shape and he obtained a two-year Senior Research Fellowship from
the EU to work at the Institute of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology,
Heraklion, Crete. Following the completion of the fellowship in 1989, he
took up a tenured position to work on genetic transformation and
molecular biology of the Mediterranean fruit fly.

In 1994 he was appointed the Head of the Entomology Unit at the FAOIAEA
Agriculture and Biotechnology Laboratory, Seibersdorf, Austria. The
major work of the Unit concerns the development and transfer of new
technology related to the implementation of SIT field programmes for
several different insect pest species. These include various species of
fruit flies and tsetse flies and in 2001 a new project was initiated to
assess the feasibility of developing the SIT for an important vector of
malaria in Africa, Anopheles arabiensis.

Dr. Ian V. MacRae is an Associate Professor with the Department of
Entomology at the 

University of Minnesota and is the State Coordinator for the USDA CSREES
IPM 

Program. Stationed at the Northwest Research & Outreach Center in
Crookston.  Dr. 

MacRae has a 3-way appointment with responsibilities in research,
outreach and 

teaching.  He received his PhD from the Dept. of Entomology at Oregon
State University 

in 1994 and was a post-doctoral research associate in the departments of
Entomology and 

then Bioagricultural Sciences & Pest Management at Colorado State
University prior to 

joining the faculty at the University of Minnesota.  Dr. MacRae’s
current research focuses on the spatial dynamics of insect pest
populations (especially in agricultural crops of NW Minnesota), Site
Specific Pest Management, the regional movement of insect populations
between habitats, and the union of meteorological forecasting and
spatial mapping into insect population predictions.  Although a faculty
member of the St Paul based Dept of Entomology, he fulfills his teaching
responsibilities at the Crookston campus of UMN.  He has taught
Introductory & Applied Entomology there since the fall of 1997 and has
trained approximately 300 undergraduate students through this course. 
He has a very active outreach program, publishing numerous educational
articles via various media and participates in a variety of educational
events for producers and Agricultural Professionals.

Dr. Steven L. Peck is Associate Professor in the Department of
Integrative Biology at Brigham Young University.  He received his Ph.D.
in Biomathematics and Entomology under the direction of Dr. Stephen
Ellner and Dr. Fred Gould, professors at North Carolina State
University.  He received his Masters Degree in Environmental
Biostatistics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and his
Bachelors Degree in Statistics from Brigham Young University.  The
general focus of his research revolves around the rates and modes of
evolution in spatially complex systems.  He has developed mathematical
and computer models of the spread of insect resistance in complex
regions of transgenic cotton plantings.  These models have been used by
the EPA in developing strategies to manage insect resistance to Bt
crops.  Before coming to Brigham Young University he worked for the
USDA-ARS in the Pacific Basin Agricultural Research Center in Hilo,
Hawaii where he worked on problems related to the movement and control
of tephritid fruit flies.  He has served on ad hoc committees for the
USDA CREES grants panel (2005, 2006).  In 2004, he also served on the
U.S. EPA FIFRA Scientific Advisory Panel (FIFRA SAP) for product
characterization, human health risk, ecological risk, and insect
resistance management for Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) cotton product. 
He has served as a consultant to the Korean government on developing
strategies for managing insect resistance to Bt crops.  He is currently
working on an EPA/USDA initiated program to gain a comprehensive
understanding of the complex simulation models that have been used to
inform government agencies on the spread of resistance in transgenic
crops.  He teaches classes in Environmental Science, Ecology and the
History and Philosophy of Biology.

Dr. Linda J. Young is a Professor of Statistics at the University of
Florida where she teaches, consults, and conducts research on
statistical methods for studies in public health, agricultural,
environmental, and ecological settings.  Dr. Young has a Ph.D. from
Oklahoma State University.  She has been a faculty member at Oklahoma
State University, the University of Nebraska, and the University of
Florida.  Dr. Young has more than 100 publications in 47 different
journals, constituting a mixture of statistics and subject-matter
journals, and two books with a third one currently under review.  A
major component of her work is collaborative with researchers in the
agricultural, ecological, environmental, and health sciences.  Her
recent research has focused on linking disparate data sets and the
subsequent analysis of these data using spatial statistical methods. 
Dr. Young has been the editor of the Journal of Agricultural, Biological
and Environmental Statistics.  She is currently associate editor for
Biometrics, Journal of Environmental and Ecological Statistics, and
Sequential Analysis.  Dr. Young also has a keen interest in statistics
education at all levels, having worked with students and teachers from
Kindergarten through High School as well as undergraduate, graduate, and
post-graduate training.  Dr. Young has served in a broad range of
offices within the professional statistical societies, including
President of the Eastern North American Region of the American
Statistical Association, Vice-President of the American Statistical
Association, Chair of the Committee of Presidents of Statistical
Societies, and member of the National Institute of Statistical
Science’s Board of Directors.  Dr. Young is a fellow of the American
Statistical Association and an elected member of the International
Statistical Institute.  She has served on numerous panels for the
National Science Foundation and the Environmental Protection Agency.