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Dr. Merchant
is a native of Ames, Iowa, where he received a bachelor's degree in
bacteriology from Iowa State University in 1962 and an MD degree from
the UI in 1966. He taught and practiced medicine at the University of
North Carolina and West Virginia University and directed the Appalachian
Laboratory for Occupational Safety and Health for the National Institute
for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) of the Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention (CDC) before returning to Iowa in 1981. He has
directed the UI Institute for Rural and Environmental Health, the Great
Plains Center for Agricultural Health, the Injury Prevention Research
Center, the Center for International Rural and Environmental Health,
and the Environmental Health Sciences Research Center. Dr Merchant was
appointed as the first dean of the University of Iowa College of Public
Health July 1, 1999. Dr. Merchant is a nationally known expert on occupational
and environmental health and public health policy. He served as the
head of the College of Medicine's Department of Preventive Medicine
and Environmental Health from July 1, 1997, to June 30, 1999, and taught
in the department since 1981. At the national level, Dr. Merchant currently
chairs the Board of Scientific Counselors of NIOSH and serves as a consultant
member of the Advisory Committee to the Director for the CDC. Dr. Merchant's
research interests include the epidemiology of pulmonary disease, environmental
and occupational health, rural health care delivery, agricultural disease
and injuries, international health, and public and rural health policy.
Kenneth Olden, PhD, was named director of the National Institute of
Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) and the director of the National
Toxicology Program (NTP) on June 18, 1991, by Dr. Louis Sullivan, Secretary
of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. He is the first
African-American to become director of one of the 18 institutes of the
National Institutes of Health during the history of the agency. Dr.
Olden is a cell biologist and biochemist by training, and has been active
in research into the properties of cell surface molecules and their
possible roles in cancer for more than two decades. He was director
of the Howard University Cancer Center and professor and chairman of
the Department of Oncology at Howard University Medical School (1985-1991),
Washington, D.C., before coming to NIEHS. He joined Howard in 1979 as
Associate Director for Research after a stint at the National Institutes
of Health, first as a senior staff fellow, then expert, then research
biologist in the Division of Cancer Biology and Diagnosis, National
Cancer Institute. Ken Olden was born in Parrottsville, Tennessee. He
earned his bachelor's degree in biology from Knoxville College, his
master's degree at the University of Michigan, and his doctoral degree
from Temple University, with research done at the University of Rochester.
He held postdoctoral fellowships and then was a Macy Faculty Fellow
as an instructor at Harvard Medical School before joining NIH.
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