Ecologist to Address Link Between Environment, Cancer

Steingraber will present a lecture, “Living Downstream: An
Ecologist Looks at Cancer and the Environment” on March 1 at 7 p.m. The event
will be held in McMurtry Auditorium, Anne and Charles Duncan Hall, on the Rice
University campus. The event is free and open to the public.

In her book, “Living Downstream,” Steingraber brings
together data on toxic releases, made available under federal right-to-know
laws, with newly released data from United States cancer registries. The
right-to-know laws have allowed scientists to examine the extent to which toxic
chemicals, including cancer-causing agents, have seeped into air, water, soil
and food. Steingraber is currently a visiting assistant professor at Cornell
University’s Center for the Environment. She holds a doctorate degree in biology
from the University of Michigan and a master’s degree in English from Illinois
State University.

She serves on President Clinton’s National Action Plan on
Cancer, which is administered by the U.S. Department of Health and Human
Services.

Steingraber is also author of “Post-Diagnosis,” a volume of
poetry, and co-author of work on ecology and human rights in Africa, “The Spoils
of Famine.” She has taught biology for several years at Columbia College,
Chicago, and held visiting fellowships at the University of Illinois, Radcliffe
College and Northeastern University.

In 1997, Steingraber was named one of Ms. Magazine’s Women
of the Year, and in 1998, she received the first annual Altman Award from the
Jenifer Altman Foundation “for the inspiring and poetic use of science to
elucidate the causes of cancer.” Also in 1998, the New England chapter of the
American Medical Association presented her with the Will Solimene Award for
“excellence in medical communication.” In 1999, the Sierra Club called her “the
new Rachel Carson.”

Steingraber’s visit is sponsored by the Rice University
Office of the Provost, the Center for the Study of Cultures and the
Environmental Programs Steering Committee.

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