Seminar - Quantifying the Risk of Infectious Microorganisms
Date: November 4, 2011
Time: 4:00 PM
Location: Bossone Research Enterprise Center, Room: Mitchell Auditorium
Speaker(s):
Charles N. Haas, Ph.D.
LD Betz Professor of Environmental Engineering and
Head of the Department of Civil, Architectural & Environmental Engineering
Drexel University
Details:
We live in a microbial world; indeed by recent estimates the human body contains more microbial cells than human cells. Some of these microorganisms are pathogenic. Over the past 25+ years, a basis of knowledge to estimate the relationship between exposure to microorganisms and the likelihood of infection and disease has been developed by the speaker and his collaborators. At a gross level, there is a simple stochastic model that can be developed. However as we incorporate finer grained details of host anatomy, physiology and immunology, and finer grained details of pathogen dynamics, it may be possible to develop predictive models to assess the risk from a newly emerged pathogen. In this talk, I will go over the historical development of QMRA (quantitative microbial risk assessment), talk about recent work in our lab on dynamic models, and discuss where the field might benefit from coupling with information from other fields of study including molecular biology, fluid dynamics, and immunology.
WATCH WEBCAST
Biosketch:
Charles N. Haas is the L.D. Betz Professor of Environmental Engineering and head of the Department of Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering, at Drexel University, where he has been since 1991. He also has an adjunct appointment in the Department of Emergency Medicine of the Drexel University College of Medicine. He received his BS (Biology) and MS (Environmental Engineering) from the Illinois Institute of Technology and his PhD in Environmental Engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He has served on the faculties of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and the Illinois Institute of Technology prior to joining Drexel. He co-directs the USEPA/DHS University Cooperative Center of Excellence – Center for Advancing Microbial Risk Assessment (CAMRA). He is a fellow of the American Academy for the Advancement of Science, the Society for Risk Analysis, the American Society of Civil Engineers and the American Academy of Microbiology. He is a Board Certified Environmental Engineering Member by eminence of the American Academy of Environmental Engineers. For over 30 years, Professor Haas has specialized in the assessment of risk from and control of human exposure to pathogenic microorganisms, and in particular the treatment of water and wastewater to minimize microbial risk to human health. Professor Haas has served on numerous panels of the National Research Council. He is a past member of the Water Science and Technology Board of the National Academies, and is on the US EPA Board of Scientific Counselors.
Directions:
The Bossone Research Enterprise Center is located at the corner of 32nd and Market Streets.
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