UC Davis

format problem, see bak<div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">entine bona fides:</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">World Food Center’s Institute for Food and Agricultural Literacy at the University of California-Davis</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">=</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><a href="https://www.desmog.com/2022/11/03/animal-agriculture-industry-commits-millions-to-prominent-university-animal-science-research-center-documents-show/">https://www.desmog.com/2022/11/03/animal-agriculture-industry-commits-millions-to-prominent-university-animal-science-research-center-documents-show/</a></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div class="elementor-element elementor-element-c66afa0 elementor-widget elementor-widget-shortcode" data-id="c66afa0" data-element_type="widget" data-widget_type="shortcode.default" style="box-sizing: border-box; --flex-direction: initial; --flex-wrap: initial; --justify-content: initial; --align-items: initial; --align-content: initial; --gap: initial; --flex-basis: initial; --flex-grow: initial; --flex-shrink: initial; --order: initial; --align-self: initial; -webkit-box-orient: vertical; -webkit-box-direction: normal; flex-direction: var(--flex-direction); flex-wrap: var(--flex-wrap); -webkit-box-pack: var(--justify-content); justify-content: var(--justify-content); -webkit-box-align: var(--align-items); align-items: var(--align-items); align-content: var(--align-content); gap: var(--gap); flex-basis: var(--flex-basis); -webkit-box-flex: var(--flex-grow); flex-grow: var(--flex-grow); flex-shrink: var(--flex-shrink); -webkit-box-ordinal-group: var(--order); order: var(--order); align-self: var(--align-self); position: relative; --widgets-spacing:20px; width: 414px; margin-bottom: 0px; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: Rubik, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><div class="elementor-widget-container" style="box-sizing: border-box; transition: background 0.3s ease 0s, border 0.3s ease 0s, border-radius 0.3s ease 0s, box-shadow 0.3s ease 0s, -webkit-box-shadow 0.3s ease 0s;"><div class="elementor-shortcode" style="box-sizing: border-box;">a<a href="https://www.desmog.com/2022/11/03/animal-agriculture-industry-commits-millions-to-prominent-university-animal-science-research-center-documents-show/" data-wpel-link="internal" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; color: rgb(29, 29, 30); box-shadow: none; font-weight: 700; font-size: 21px;">nimal Agriculture Industry Commits Millions to Prominent University Animal Science Research Center, Documents Show</a></div></div></div><div class="elementor-element elementor-element-5c33c7a jedv-enabled--yes elementor-widget elementor-widget-jet-listing-dynamic-meta" data-id="5c33c7a" data-element_type="widget" data-widget_type="jet-listing-dynamic-meta.default" style="box-sizing: border-box; --flex-direction: initial; --flex-wrap: initial; --justify-content: initial; --align-items: initial; --align-content: initial; --gap: initial; --flex-basis: initial; --flex-grow: initial; --flex-shrink: initial; --order: initial; --align-self: initial; -webkit-box-orient: vertical; -webkit-box-direction: normal; flex-direction: var(--flex-direction); flex-wrap: var(--flex-wrap); -webkit-box-pack: var(--justify-content); justify-content: var(--justify-content); -webkit-box-align: var(--align-items); align-items: var(--align-items); align-content: var(--align-content); gap: var(--gap); flex-basis: var(--flex-basis); -webkit-box-flex: var(--flex-grow); flex-grow: var(--flex-grow); flex-shrink: var(--flex-shrink); -webkit-box-ordinal-group: var(--order); order: var(--order); align-self: var(--align-self); position: relative; --widgets-spacing:20px; width: 414px; margin-bottom: 0px; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: Rubik, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><div class="elementor-widget-container" style="box-sizing: border-box; transition: background 0.3s ease 0s, border 0.3s ease 0s, border-radius 0.3s ease 0s, box-shadow 0.3s ease 0s, -webkit-box-shadow 0.3s ease 0s;"><div class="jet-listing jet-listing-dynamic-meta meta-layout-inline" style="box-sizing: border-box;"><div class="jet-listing-dynamic-metaauthor jet-listing-dynamic-metaitem" style="box-sizing: border-box; display: inline-block; margin: 0px 5px 0px 0px; font-size: 12px; color: var( --e-global-color-4ff75b6 );">By<a href="https://www.desmog.com/user/michaela-herrmann/" class="jet-listing-dynamic-metaitem-val" data-wpel-link="internal" style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; color: rgb(29, 29, 30); display: inline-block; box-shadow: none; font-weight: 700;">Michaela Herrmann</a></div><div class="jet-listing-dynamic-metadate jet-listing-dynamic-metaitem" style="box-sizing: border-box; display: inline-block; margin: 0px 5px 0px 0px; font-size: 12px; color: var( --e-global-color-4ff75b6 );">on<time datetime="2022-11-03T13:44:35-07:00" style="box-sizing: border-box;">Nov 3, 2022 </time></div></div></div></div><div class="elementor-element elementor-element-88cdac5 elementor-widget elementor-widget-shortcode" data-id="88cdac5" data-element_type="widget" data-widget_type="shortcode.default" style="box-sizing: border-box; --flex-direction: initial; --flex-wrap: initial; --justify-content: initial; --align-items: initial; --align-content: initial; --gap: initial; --flex-basis: initial; --flex-grow: initial; --flex-shrink: initial; --order: initial; --align-self: initial; -webkit-box-orient: vertical; -webkit-box-direction: normal; flex-direction: var(--flex-direction); flex-wrap: var(--flex-wrap); -webkit-box-pack: var(--justify-content); justify-content: var(--justify-content); -webkit-box-align: var(--align-items); align-items: var(--align-items); align-content: var(--align-content); gap: var(--gap); flex-basis: var(--flex-basis); -webkit-box-flex: var(--flex-grow); flex-grow: var(--flex-grow); flex-shrink: var(--flex-shrink); -webkit-box-ordinal-group: var(--order); order: var(--order); align-self: var(--align-self); position: relative; --widgets-spacing:20px; width: 414px; font-size: 14px; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: Rubik, sans-serif;"><div class="elementor-widget-container" style="box-sizing: border-box; transition: background 0.3s ease 0s, border 0.3s ease 0s, border-radius 0.3s ease 0s, box-shadow 0.3s ease 0s, -webkit-box-shadow 0.3s ease 0s;"><div class="elementor-shortcode" style="box-sizing: border-box;">Internal documents reveal the integral role of the livestock industry in establishing and funding the CLEAR Center at University of California Davis.</div></div></div></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div> =</div><div>
</div><div>drilled panel 10 22 got 25$K to dispute beef = transpo [meme], has branched out, cashed in</div><div>----</div><div>eg artl</div><div>
</div><div><div>no lnx</div><div>Is GWP* really 'fuzzy math?' You decide.</div><div>October 20, 2021</div><div>By Frank Mitloehner</div><div>
</div><div>Has the beef industry landed on a metric that finally gives it a rosy glow? Is a new system of measurement absolving the sector from much of the global warming blame it’s been shouldering? And if so, is it all too good to be true?</div><div>
</div><div>According to a recent article in Bloomberg Green, the author contends that GWP star (GWP*), which some would argue is an improved way to measure the warming effect of greenhouse gases, is a sweetheart deal for methane-producing sectors such as animal agriculture. In fact, beef and dairy might even be dipping a hoof in conspiracy waters with the metric that comes to us from University of Oxford.</div><div>
</div><div>If you’re reading this, you likely know the conversation around cows and climate is a contentious one. It’s often charged and emotional, and expectedly so. That’s what happens when discussions touch on things that are highly personal and steeped in tradition. From our culture to our rituals to our upbringing to our health, food is so much more than nourishment. It also plays a role in our environment, and if we’re talking about red meat, this is where the argument typically begins.  </div><div>
</div><div>I’ve dedicated my professional life to reducing the environmental impact of animal agriculture. Though I’m not a climate scientist, a large portion of my work focuses on quantifying greenhouse gases from cattle and other livestock, which is why my Twitter handle is @GHGGuru and not @ClimateGuru (who happens to be a lawyer for the National Wildlife Federation – go figure). Throughout the year, you can find me on farms or in one of our facilities at UC Davis, overseeing the measurement of greenhouse gas emissions from cattle.</div></div></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">=</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><a href="https://www.davisenterprise.com/local-news/ucd/anti-gmo-group-sues-ucd-over-public-records-requests/" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none;">https://www.davisenterprise.com/local-news/ucd/anti-gmo-group-sues-ucd-over-public-records-requests/</a></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">2016</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">a national nonprofit group is suing UC Davis to comply with requests for public records related to the university’s work on genetically modified organisms, pesticides and its relationship with the agrichemical industry.Gary Ruskin, co-founder and co-director of U.S. Right to Know said, “We are conducting this investigation of the food and agrichemical industries in an effort to improve the food we eat and the health of all Americans.”Since Jan. 28, 2015, U.S. Right to Know has filed 17 public-records requests with UCD, the group said in a statement, “but the university has provided a total of merely 751 pages in response to all of these requests, while similar requests at other universities have yielded thousands of pages each.”<p noticia="Noticia" text="Text" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" font-size="font-size" px="px" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb" style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;" /><p noticia="Noticia" text="Text" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" font-size="font-size" px="px" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb" style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;" /><p noticia="Noticia" text="Text" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" font-size="font-size" px="px" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb" style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;" /><p noticia="Noticia" text="Text" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" font-size="font-size" px="px" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb" style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;">The lawsuit was filed on Wednesday in the Yolo County Superior Court against the Regents of the University of California.<p noticia="Noticia" text="Text" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" font-size="font-size" px="px" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb" style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;">A specific issue that Ruskin is concerned with involves Jon Entine, listed on UCD’s World Food Center as a “senior fellow.”<p noticia="Noticia" text="Text" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" font-size="font-size" px="px" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb" style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;">In March of 2015, U.S. Right to Know filed a request with UC Office of the President asking for all correspondences to or from Entine to any staff of 19 organizations, including Monsanto, Bayer, DuPont and Dow.<p noticia="Noticia" text="Text" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" font-size="font-size" px="px" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb" style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;">In March of this year, Ruskin wrote a letter to UCD Chancellor Linda Katehi asking that she and the university reveal the sources of funding for Entine’s work with the Genetic Literacy Project, the UC Davis Institute for Food and Agricultural Literacy, and its parent unit, the UC Davis World Food Center.”On April 7, Josette Lewis, associate director of the World Food Center, responded to Ruskin on behalf of Katehi saying, “The World Food Center has not accepted any industry funding to support IFAL, Mr. Entine, or the Genetic Literacy Project.”<p noticia="Noticia" text="Text" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" font-size="font-size" px="px" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb" style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;" /><p noticia="Noticia" text="Text" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" font-size="font-size" px="px" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb" style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;" /><p noticia="Noticia" text="Text" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" font-size="font-size" px="px" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb" style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;" /><p noticia="Noticia" text="Text" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" font-size="font-size" px="px" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb" style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;">She further stated that Entine serves in a non-compensated role as a senior fellow.<p noticia="Noticia" text="Text" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" font-size="font-size" px="px" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb" style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;">UCD has not provided an estimate of when it will fill the remainder of the PRA requests, according to U.S. Right to Know’s statement. “It originally estimated production of documents in April 2015. It has completed only one response — regarding the soda industry — but none of the 16 requests related to the agrichemical industry.”<p noticia="Noticia" text="Text" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" font-size="font-size" px="px" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb" style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;">UCD spokeswoman Dana Topousis said on Friday, “As is our normal practice, we have been working diligently on U.S. Right to Know PRA requests, in addition to responding to a higher volume of other PRA requests over the last year.”<p noticia="Noticia" text="Text" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" font-size="font-size" px="px" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb" style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;">A copy of the complaint is available at http://usrtk.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/UCDaviscomplaint.pdf<p noticia="Noticia" text="Text" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" font-size="font-size" px="px" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb" style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;">— Reach Tanya Perez at tperez@davisenterprise.net or 530-747-8082. Follow her on Twitter at @EnterpriseTanya</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">=</div>=<div>refIndustries Turn Freedom of Information Requests on Their Critics<header class="css-g9zndl e12qa4dv1" style="margin: 2.8125rem 0px 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline;"><div class="css-79elbk" data-testid="photoviewer-wrapper" style="font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; vertical-align: baseline; position: relative;"><div class="css-z3e15g" data-testid="photoviewer-wrapper-hidden" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; position: fixed; opacity: 0; 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width: 600px; max-width: 600px;"><p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">WASHINGTON — Dennis J. Ventry Jr., a law professor at the University of California, Davis, drew the ire of tax preparation companies like Intuit and H&R Block this summer by <a class="css-1g7m0tk" href="https://thehill.com/opinion/finance/395762-free-file-providers-scam-taxpayers-congress-cant-be-fooled" title="" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102); font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline;">criticizing a deal</a> they have to provide a free tax filing service through the Internal Revenue Service.<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">The companies promptly hit back with a tactic that corporations, lobbyists and interest groups are increasingly using against academic researchers: Their trade coalition filed a public records request with the university in July seeking everything Mr. Ventry had written or said about the companies this year, including emails, text messages, voice mail messages and hand-jotted notes.<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">The university estimated that it spent 80 to 100 hours complying with the request, filed under the California Public Records Act, which requires employees of any state agency or institution to produce, upon request from any member of the public, any record that relates to “the conduct of the public’s business” that is “prepared, owned, used or retained” by the university.<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">The request generated 1,189 pages of documents, university officials said. And it was just one example of how both state-level public records laws and the federal Freedom of Information Act, written to ensure transparency and accountability in government, have morphed into potent weapons in legal and business disputes, raising questions about the chilling effects — and costs — they impose on targets who are doing research in controversial or sensitive fields.</div><aside class="css-o6xoe7" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 0px auto; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; display: flex; width: 210px; -webkit-box-align: center; align-items: center;"><div class="css-ke163a" data-testid="article-companion-wrapper" style="margin: 25px auto 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; 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padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">A 2017 analysis of requests filed under the Freedom of Information Act found that “public-oriented inquiries by concerned citizens and their advocates” account for “only a small fraction of the 700,000-plus FOIA requests submitted each year,” wrote David Pozen, a law professor at Columbia University, whose <a class="css-1g7m0tk" href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2907719" title="" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline;">paper reviewed studies on the issue</a>. “The bulk of requests come from businesses seeking to further their own commercial interests by learning about competitors, litigation opponents or the regulatory environment.”<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">Public records requests have long been an important tool for a wide variety of groups, like journalists, political opposition researchers, climate-science skeptics, animal rights advocates and anti-abortion activists keen to dig into research and the work of people in the government.<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">But the sheer scale of the requests in recent years, and their growing use by advocacy groups and business interests to challenge academic work at public universities, has alarmed some experts, who say the commitment to openness embodied by freedom of information laws could be tested.<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">The weaponization of such requests poses “a real danger that we’ll hit a tipping point, where the cost and burden of open records laws will overcome the benefits and we’ll have a retrenchment of transparency rights,” said Margaret Kwoka, a University of Denver professor with expertise in government transparency litigation. “This kind of abuse fuels the political will to do that.”<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">The University of California system, with nearly 45,000 faculty and academic appointees on its campuses and in its laboratories and medical centers, sits at the center of this trend.</div></div><div class="css-190ncxp" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; width: 1583px; height: 1rem;"><div class="css-1fanzo5 StoryBodyCompanionColumn" style="margin: 0px auto 1rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; display: flex; flex-direction: row; height: 420px; width: 1200px;"><div class="css-53u6y8" style="margin: 0px 0px 0px calc((100% - 600px) / 2); padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 600px;"><p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">In 2009, the system received a total of 3,266 public records requests. In 2017, it received 16,921, an increase of 418 percent.<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">A significant portion of the requests are from activists and industry groups “using public records requests as one part of a strategy to undermine the work of researchers in controversial fields,” Maria Shanle, managing counsel for education affairs and governance at the University of California, said in an interview.<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">These have included a 2011 request for every document a visiting scholar produced related to “chemical substances, including flame retardants”; a 2012 demand by an anti-abortion group for the names of researchers working on an abortion safety study; and a 2015 request for every email to and from a journalism professor that contained words like “biotech” and “Monsanto.”</div><span style="font-weight: inherit; margin-left: auto; border-style: initial; border-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; align-items: center;" /><aside class="css-o6xoe7" style="margin: 0px 0px 0px auto; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; display: flex; width: 210px; -webkit-box-align: center; align-items: center;"></aside></div><div class="css-79elbk" data-testid="photoviewer-wrapper" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; position: relative;"><div class="css-z3e15g" data-testid="photoviewer-wrapper-hidden" style="margin: 0px; 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border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; position: absolute; width: 1px; height: 1px; clip: rect(0px, 0px, 0px, 0px); overflow: hidden;">Image</div></figure></div></div><div class="css-1fanzo5 StoryBodyCompanionColumn" style="margin: 0px auto 1rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; display: flex; flex-direction: row; height: 420px; width: 1200px;"><div class="css-53u6y8" style="margin: 0px 0px 0px calc((100% - 600px) / 2); padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 600px;"><p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">“What we need is a dividing line between financial and ministerial accountability, and the university’s function as an intellectual and teaching institution,” Claudia Polsky, an assistant law professor who directs the Environmental Law Clinic at the University of California in Berkeley, said in an interview.<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;"><a class="css-1g7m0tk" href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3140154" title="" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline;">In a paper titled</a> “Open Records, Shuttered Labs: Ending Political Harassment of Public University Researchers,” Ms. Polsky argued for legislative protections, already offered in some states, for unpublished emails and other personal records that can be used to stymie research.<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">“Digging into professors’ email inboxes has nothing to do with democratic accountability or fiscal transparency,” she said, “and everything to do with creating ideologically based mischief.”</div><span style="font-weight: inherit; margin-left: auto; border-style: initial; border-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; align-items: center;" /><aside class="css-o6xoe7" style="margin: 0px 0px 0px auto; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; display: flex; width: 210px; -webkit-box-align: center; align-items: center;"></aside></div><div class="css-190ncxp" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; width: 1583px; height: 1rem;"><div class="css-1fanzo5 StoryBodyCompanionColumn" style="margin: 0px auto 1rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; display: flex; flex-direction: row; height: 1080px; width: 1200px;"><div class="css-53u6y8" style="margin: 0px 0px 0px calc((100% - 600px) / 2); padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 600px;"><p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">In Mr. Ventry’s case, he said he did not have anything to hide — he has been a critic of the tax preparation program, Free File, and an outspoken advocate for no-cost, simplified, government-provided tax preparation for years. But he said that the request had made collaborators in his research wary of communicating with him and amounted to intimidation by the industry.<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">“They are trying to bully me,” Mr. Ventry said of the industry group. “More importantly, they are trying to chill my research and scholarship, whether it has to do with tax law reform or not.”<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">The industry group, the Free File Alliance, whose legal name is Free File Inc., defended the request as a proper use of public records law.<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">Mr. Ventry, the group said, had a conflict of interest because he also serves as the chairman of an outside advisory group to the I.R.S. and was intent on promoting an alternative plan under which the government would offer its own tax preparation service through the I.R.S. The alliance defends its program as benefiting low- and middle-income Americans who would otherwise have to pay for tax preparation services.<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">Freedom of information requests “are a legitimate, legal method to determine what public officials are doing and saying in their official capacity,” the alliance said in an emailed statement. “Professor Ventry holds a strong preconceived bias against the I.R.S. Free File program.”<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">Mr. Ventry is not employed by the I.R.S. He is the chairman of the Internal Revenue Service Advisory Council, a public forum on tax administration issues that advises the I.R.S. commissioner and is composed of outside experts who volunteer their time. He was a published critic of Free File for years before joining the council.<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">Mr. Ventry; Joseph Bankman, a tax law professor at Stanford University; and others have worked over the years to create a model for free tax-filing programs administered by a half-dozen states, while advocating a free, streamlined federal e-filing system.</div><span style="font-weight: inherit; margin-left: auto; border-style: initial; border-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; align-items: center;" /><aside class="css-o6xoe7" style="margin: 0px 0px 0px auto; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; display: flex; width: 210px; -webkit-box-align: center; align-items: center;"></aside></div><div class="css-190ncxp" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; width: 1583px; height: 1rem;"><div class="css-1fanzo5 StoryBodyCompanionColumn" style="margin: 0px auto 1rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; display: flex; flex-direction: row; height: 510px; width: 1200px;"><div class="css-53u6y8" style="margin: 0px 0px 0px calc((100% - 600px) / 2); padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 600px;"><p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">In July, Mr. Ventry, Mr. Bankman and other colleagues wrote op-eds <a class="css-1g7m0tk" href="https://www.politico.com/agenda/story/2018/07/18/tax-filing-congress-irs-000683" title="" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline;">taking aim at Free File</a>, which the I.R.S. offers to many taxpayers through an agreement with the Free File Alliance, which includes Intuit, makers of TurboTax and other software; H&R Block; and 10 additional commercial tax preparation companies.<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">After the House passed a bill that included a provision making the Free File agreement permanent, the academics raised alarms. Citing research, I.R.S. statistics and <a class="css-1g7m0tk" href="https://www.propublica.org/article/free-file-online-tax-preparation-fees-intuit-turbotax-h-r-block" title="" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline;">investigations</a> by <a class="css-1g7m0tk" href="https://www.propublica.org/article/how-the-maker-of-turbotax-fought-free-simple-tax-filing" title="" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline;">ProPublica</a>, <a class="css-1g7m0tk" href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/why-free-file-for-taxes-isnt-so-popular-1422633546" title="" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline;">The Wall Street Journal</a> and others, <a class="css-1g7m0tk" href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3219900" title="" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline;">Mr. Ventry wrote</a> that Free File is a “failed program” that “inflicts substantial harm on taxpayers” by confusing them, pushing them toward paid products and failing to fully protect their personal data.<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">The companies in the Free File program are not compensated by the I.R.S. for providing their services. But ending the program and replacing it with a government-run electronic filing service for all taxpayers would threaten the industry.</div><span style="font-weight: inherit; margin-left: auto; border-style: initial; border-color: initial; border-image: initial; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; align-items: center;" /><aside class="css-o6xoe7" style="margin: 0px 0px 0px auto; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; display: flex; width: 210px; -webkit-box-align: center; align-items: center;"></aside></div><div class="css-79elbk" data-testid="photoviewer-wrapper" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; position: relative;"><div class="css-z3e15g" data-testid="photoviewer-wrapper-hidden" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; position: fixed; opacity: 0; top: 0px; left: 0px; bottom: 0px; right: 0px; transition: opacity 0.2s ease 0s; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); pointer-events: none;"><div data-testid="photoviewer-children" class="css-1cyq7ax ehw59r12" height="575.84375px" width="720px" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; position: absolute; top: 0px; left: 432px; height: 575.844px; width: 720px; pointer-events: none;"><div data-testid="photoviewer-overlay" class="css-t972an ehw59r13" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; position: absolute; z-index: 1; top: 0px; bottom: 0px; left: 0px; right: 0px; overflow: hidden; transition: top 0.2s ease 0s, right 0.2s ease 0s, bottom 0.2s ease 0s, left 0.2s ease 0s; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"><div width="720px" height="575.84375px" class="css-1jk3v6p ehw59r14" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; position: relative; z-index: 1; width: 720px; height: 575.844px; transition: width 0.2s ease 0s, height 0.2s ease 0s, margin 0.2s ease 0s;"><div style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; visibility: hidden; transition: visibility 0s ease 0.5s;"><div class="css-8h527k" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; width: 720px; background-color: rgb(247, 247, 245); animation: 300ms ease-in 0s 1 normal forwards running animation-1m9j9gf;"><div data-testid="lazyimage-container" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; height: auto;"><img alt="" class="css-1j5kxti e1t57l6r0" src="https://static01.nyt.com/images/2018/10/20/us/politics/29dc-records3/merlin_145533567_bcf86d1e-ea83-4bfa-89a9-0d5d7cf51068-articleLarge.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale" srcset="https://static01.nyt.com/images/2018/10/20/us/politics/29dc-records3/merlin_145533567_bcf86d1e-ea83-4bfa-89a9-0d5d7cf51068-articleLarge.jpg?quality=90&auto=webp 600w,https://static01.nyt.com/images/2018/10/20/us/politics/29dc-records3/merlin_145533567_bcf86d1e-ea83-4bfa-89a9-0d5d7cf51068-jumbo.jpg?quality=90&auto=webp 1024w,https://static01.nyt.com/images/2018/10/20/us/politics/29dc-records3/merlin_145533567_bcf86d1e-ea83-4bfa-89a9-0d5d7cf51068-superJumbo.jpg?quality=90&auto=webp 2048w" sizes="((min-width: 600px) and (max-width: 1004px)) 84vw, (min-width: 1005px) 60vw, 100vw" itemprop="url" itemid="https://static01.nyt.com/images/2018/10/20/us/politics/29dc-records3/merlin_145533567_bcf86d1e-ea83-4bfa-89a9-0d5d7cf51068-articleLarge.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale" style="margin: 0px; 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font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; opacity: 1; transition: opacity 0.3s ease 0.2s;"><figure class="css-jcw7oy e1g7ppur0" aria-label="media" role="group" itemprop="associatedMedia" itemscope="" itemid="https://static01.nyt.com/images/2018/10/20/us/politics/29dc-records3/merlin_145533567_bcf86d1e-ea83-4bfa-89a9-0d5d7cf51068-articleLarge.jpg?quality=90&auto=webp" itemtype="http://schema.org/ImageObject" style="margin: 2.6875rem auto; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; width: auto; max-width: 720px;"><div class="css-1xdhyk6 erfvjey0" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline;"><span class="css-1ly73wi e1tej78p0" style="margin: -1px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; position: absolute; width: 1px; height: 1px; clip: rect(0px, 0px, 0px, 0px); overflow: hidden;">Image</div></figure></div></div><div class="css-1fanzo5 StoryBodyCompanionColumn" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px auto 1rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; display: flex; flex-direction: row; height: 480px; width: 1200px;"><div class="css-53u6y8" style="margin: 0px 0px 0px calc((100% - 600px) / 2); padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 600px;"><p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">In <a class="css-1g7m0tk" href="https://thehill.com/opinion/finance/395762-free-file-providers-scam-taxpayers-congress-cant-be-fooled" title="" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline;">a July opinion piece<span class="css-8l6xbc evw5hdy0" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> in The Hill</a> titled “Free File Providers Scam Taxpayers; Congress Shouldn’t Be Fooled,” Mr. Ventry originally included his affiliation as chairman of the tax agency’s advisory council as well as his academic post. (After a complaint from the industry group, he removed the affiliation to the council.)<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">In a subsequent commentary, the academics criticized the I.R.S. for poor oversight of the industry agreement, saying that Free File “puts tax preparation companies first and taxpayers last.” Some of the criticism echoed the I.R.S.’s independent taxpayer advocate, Nina E. Olson, who said in an interview that Free File was a “poorly designed” program that only 3 percent of eligible taxpayers used after 15 years in existence.<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">Days later, the University of California received the request for all of Mr. Ventry’s communications about the op-eds, including his contacts with the I.R.S. taxpayer advocate’s office.</div><aside class="css-o6xoe7" style="margin: 0px 0px 0px auto; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; display: flex; width: 210px; -webkit-box-align: center; align-items: center;" /></div><div class="css-190ncxp" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; width: 1583px; height: 1rem;"><div class="css-1fanzo5 StoryBodyCompanionColumn" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px auto 1rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; display: flex; flex-direction: row; height: 1080px; width: 1200px;"><div class="css-53u6y8" style="margin: 0px 0px 0px calc((100% - 600px) / 2); padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 600px;"><p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">In addition to its public records requests, the alliance wrote directly to the I.R.S. about Mr. Ventry in July, saying he “improperly used his I.R.S. affiliation to lend credibility to this attack.” The alliance questioned whether Mr. Ventry should be able to speak out publicly on the issue given his role on the I.R.S. advisory council.<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">Mr. Ventry said that role was strictly advisory and that he received no compensation aside from his university salary. After the industry alliance leveled the complaint, he says he voluntarily recused himself from the council’s analysis of the Free File program, due out in November.<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">Responding to the academics’ criticism in <a class="css-1g7m0tk" href="https://www.taxnotes.com/tax-notes-today/tax-technology/irs-free-file-program-valuable-taxpayers-and-should-be-strengthened/2018/08/20/28btf?highlight=tim%20hugo%20free%20file%20alliance" title="" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline;">a letter to the editor</a> published in the policy journal Tax Notes, Tim Hugo, a Republican member of the Virginia House of Delegates who serves as the alliance’s executive director, wrote that the partnership between the I.R.S. and Free File had saved taxpayers “an estimated $1.6 billion in tax preparation and filing fees” since its inception in 2003.<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">The program was under attack, he wrote, “by a handful of ideologues” who “want a centralized system of direct government tax preparation.”<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">Representatives for Intuit and H&R Block said the companies did not participate in the records requests by the industry group, but the alliance confirmed that the member companies received the documents produced by the university.<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">Stanford is a private institution not subject to public records requests under the California law, but the alliance’s lawyers used the University of California request to obtain Mr. Ventry’s communications with Mr. Bankman, too.<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">“There’s nothing really that interesting in my emails,” Mr. Bankman said in an interview. But worries about such requests, he said, stifle the peer review process, a freewheeling exchange of views, often by email, in which academics around the world evaluate one another’s work.</div><aside class="css-o6xoe7" style="margin: 0px 0px 0px auto; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; display: flex; width: 210px; -webkit-box-align: center; align-items: center;" /></div><div class="css-190ncxp" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; width: 1583px; height: 1rem;"><div class="css-1fanzo5 StoryBodyCompanionColumn" style="font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px auto 1rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; display: flex; flex-direction: row; height: 405px; width: 1200px;"><div class="css-53u6y8" style="margin: 0px 0px 0px calc((100% - 600px) / 2); padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 600px;"><p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">Companies often request such emails “to intimidate people like us, because it really raises the ante and makes it very scary just to email stuff,” he added. For the industry, “it’s a freebie,” he said. “But imagine you’re some young professor somewhere — you don’t know what hit you.”<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">Mr. Ventry said he was more worried that Mr. Bankman and other colleagues would shy away from collaborating with him.<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); margin: 0px 0px 0.9375rem; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">“We went from emailing multiple times a day over the course of a couple months to not emailing at all,” he said. The request “stifled not just academic freedom but the deliberative and beneficial process of thinking through problems with others.”<p class="css-exrw3m evys1bk0" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; text-size-adjust: 100%; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; line-height: 1.875rem; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px; max-width: 100%;">If that constitutes winning for the tax industry, he said, “they won.”<div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></section></div><div>=</div>=milo shut down<div>mark bray antifa bk see milo 2</div><div>
</div><div><a href="https://www.salon.com/2018/01/31/antifa-vs-milo-yiannopoulos-who-won/">https://www.salon.com/2018/01/31/antifa-vs-milo-yiannopoulos-who-won/</a></div><div>
</div><div></div><div>=From kitchen tables worldwide, you can hear a chorus of parents chastising their children with the same refrain: “Stop playing with your food.”<div class="p1_12" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Children aside, this rebuke needs to be loudly directed at the food fabricators of industrial agriculture. Corporate interests keep toying with the very nature of food — not to benefit consumers, family farmers, workers or the environment, but to fatten the profits of Silicon Valley tech giants, food monopolists and Wall Street financiers.<div class="p2_12" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div class="teadsNative" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Meet Recombinetics, a high-tech gene manipulation corporation with bioengineers in its labs remaking farm animals — pigs, for example. Recombinetics wants to mess with the very DNA of Mother Nature’s oinkers to make them produce bigger litters to supply the pork factories of brand-name marketers. It is also genetically altering milk cows to withstand hotter weather so that climate change won’t reduce the output of huge dairy corporations.<div class="p3_12" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">This re-engineering of nature to build industrial Frankenanimals is being supported by such land-grant colleges as the University of California, Davis — your tax dollars at work! Of course, this corporate-government collusion faces a high hurdle in the marketplace, for consumers have demonstrated again and again that they don’t want the food they put on their tables tampered with by profiteering geneticists. The tamperers, though, have a solution to that problem: secrecy. The industry is lobbying lawmakers and regulators to outlaw any requirement that milk and meat produced by genetically altered animals be labeled as such. Better to keep consumers in the dark because… well, if given a free choice, people might reject Recombinetics in favor of natural food.<div class="p4_12" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Rather than remake animals and remake the marketplace to benefit corporations that play with our food, let’s remake the corporate system that is trying to industrialize dinner. Corporate manipulators are not out to make food better or more affordable for us, but strictly to make it more profitable for them.<div class="p5_12" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">How’re you gonna keep ’em down on the farm after they’ve seen … Angus?<div class="p6_12" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Not Angus the breed of cattle, and not the time-honored given name of many farm boys, but Angus the 1,000-pound “farmer of the future.” He’s actually not a he, but an it: a robot, toiling away on a hydroponic “farm” that is indoors, soilless and, yes, soulless. Angus is owned and programmed by a multimillion-dollar Silicon Valley startup named Iron Ox, and its homestead is hardly bucolic. It’s in an 8,000-square-foot concrete warehouse in a suburb south of San Francisco.<div class="p7_12" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">This farm bot is more of a heavy lifter than a heavy thinker. Basically, Angus wheels around the warehouse to lift, move and hand off large pallets of basil, bok choy and other produce to another robot that, so far, hasn’t earned a name. The human overseers of this robotic animal farm don’t wear John Deere “gimme caps,” but clean-room hairnets, apparently to prevent anything organic from contaminating the edibles or the robot.<div class="p8_12" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Started by a Google engineer, Iron Ox hopes to install duplicates of its faux farm in metropolitan areas across the country. The obvious question is, Why? Well, for the greater good, claims the Googlite owner. “If we can feed people using robots, what could be more impactful than that?” Well, reconnecting our food system to nature, a democratic economy and human beings. The roboticists brag that local warehouses can provide fresher lettuce than what megafarms ship from thousands of miles away. But wait! Local farmers markets do that, do it even fresher and keep the consumer dollars in the community rather than siphoned off to Iron Ox and the Wall Street financiers of Angus robots.<div class="p9_12" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">In fact, the robotic indoor farm hucksters quietly concede that their real business plan depends on “sidestepping” the cost of human labor and local farm owners. Instead of spreading wealth to people and communities, their scheme concentrates food profits in a handful of absentee syndicators, rich investors and technology giants.<div class="p10_12" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Deep in his digital brain, even Angus must know this is stupid.<div class="p11_12" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Populist author, public speaker and radio commentator Jim Hightower writes “The Hightower Lowdown,” a monthly newsletter chronicling the ongoing fights by America’s ordinary people against rule by plutocratic elites. Sign up at <a href="https://www.hightowerlowdown.org/" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">HightowerLowdown.org</a>.</div>usrtk:In 2014 and 2015, Genetic Literacy Project partnered with a <a target="blank" href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/stacy-malkan/monsanto-fingerprints-fou_b_10757524.html" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; box-sizing: border-box;">Monsanto-backed group</a>, <a href="http://usrtk.org/gmo/following-an-email-trail-how-a-public-university-professor-collaborated-on-a-corporate-pr-campaign/" target="blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?hl=en&q=http://usrtk.org/gmo/following-an-email-trail-how-a-public-university-professor-collaborated-on-a-corporate-pr-campaign/&source=gmail&ust=1500499545809000&usg=AFQjCNHZ_z_j3SBTWlLhJ8CYwaymO8d0Zg" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; box-sizing: border-box;">Academics Review</a>, to sponsor the Biotechnology Literacy Project <a href="https://www.usrtk.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/TamarHaspel1.pdf" target="blank" rel="noopener" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none; box-sizing: border-box;">“Boot Camps,”</a> a series of conferences designed to teach scientists how to “best engage the GMO debate with a skeptical public.” Reporters <a target="blank" href="http://www.popsci.com/on-science-journalism-and-conflicts-interest" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none;" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large" box-sizing="box-sizing" border-box="border-box">were told</a> the funding for the 2015 BLP <a target="blank" href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=5&ved=0ahUKEwinyYHD55PVAhXkqVQKHbXKAfIQFghGMAQ&url=http%3A%2F%2Frwjms.umdnj.edu%2Feducation%2Fgsbs%2Fdocuments%2F2-12-015BLPProspectus_000.doc&usg=AFQjCNHkM3msg1T7VEXR3bMRXmWL2ZxknA" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none;" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large" box-sizing="box-sizing" border-box="border-box">Boot Camp at UC Davis</a> came from UC Davis, USDA, state money, and the Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO) — in fact, the industry group appears to have provided all the funding, as <a target="blank" href="http://progressive.org/magazine/how-the-biotech-industry-cultivates-positive-media/" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; outline: none;" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large" box-sizing="box-sizing" border-box="border-box">Paul Thacker reported in 2017.</a>  <span style="font-family: " times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb" box-sizing="box-sizing" border-box="border-box" font-weight="font-weight">(See section on <a href="https://usrtk.org/hall-of-shame/jon-entine-the-chemical-industrys-master-messenger#funding" style="text-decoration-line: none; outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent;">Entine’s funding</a> for more.)

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dn 4/29/16

pike cop got more $ than those sprayed; no longer there

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<a href="http://www.extremetech.com/internet/226677-uc-davis-spent-175000-to-boost-public-image-after-pepper-spraying-incident">http://www.extremetech.com/internet/226677-uc-davis-spent-175000-to-boost-public-image-after-pepper-spraying-incident</a>

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Assemblyman Luis Alejo, D-Salinas, and Assemblyman Jim Cooper, D-Elk Grove, asked Thursday for Katehi to resign or be removed. Their statements followed earlier calls for her resignation by <a href="http://www.sacbee.com/news/investigations/the-public-eye/article63917982.html" target="blank" title="">Assemblymen Kevin McCarty</a>, D-Sacramento, and <a href="http://www.sacbee.com/news/investigations/the-public-eye/article65236687.html" target="blank" title="">Evan Low</a>, D-Campbell.

Alejo is the chairman of the California Latino Legislative Caucus and a UC Davis School of Law graduate. Cooper sits on the Assembly Budget Committee.

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/news/local/education/article66689912.html#storylink=cpy</div>

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In response to these events, the UC Davis Student Workers Union is leading a <a href="https://www.facebook.com/events/1025384410867423/">Fire Katehi protest</a> at the Memorial Union on Friday.

Written by: Alyssa Vandenberg – <a href="mailto:campus@theaggie.org">campus@theaggie.org</a>

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DAVIS (AP/CBS) — A group of students at the University of California, Davis who are demanding the chancellor resign say they have been threatened with disciplinary action.

The Sacramento Bee reports (<a href="http://bit.ly/1pklMPI" rel="nofollow">http://bit.ly/1pklMPI</a>) about 20 students are occupying the lobby outside Chancellor Linda P.B. Katehi’s office Monday to protest her involvement with private corporate boards and to demand her resignation.

Graduate student Emily Breuninger tells the newspaper administrators told them they could face dismissal from the school.

Read Also: <a href="http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2016/03/01/uc-davis-chancellor-resigns-from-for-profit-college-board-after-ftc-lawsuit/" target="_blank">UC Chancellor Resigns From For-Profit College Board After FTC Lawsuit</a>

The students say they plan to stay until Katehi agrees to meet with them.

Students began their sit-in Friday after being told the chancellor was not available to meet with them.

UC Davis spokeswoman Dana Topousis says the students were told they could make an appointment to see Katehi.

Katehi was criticized for joining the boards of a textbook publisher and a for-profit education company.

==

By Diana Lambert and Sam Stanton

<a href="mailto:dlambert@sacbee.com" title="" style="">dlambert@sacbee.com</a>

</div>

UC Davis Chancellor Linda P.B. Katehi briefly met Tuesday with students who have camped outside her office for more than four days to demonstrate against her service on paid corporate boards, and protesters said they plan to stay put after the conversation went nowhere.

Based on a <a href="http://www.sacbee.com/news/local/education/article66259492.html" target="_blank" title="">video</a> provided by a UC Davis student, Katehi arrived with two professors and a third, unidentified person, seeking to schedule a time to meet Wednesday. The students objected to having a meeting elsewhere and asked her to discuss her paid board positions as she stood in the lobby area Tuesday. Some asked her directly whether she would resign, a question she did not respond to.

Katehi, 62, has faced criticism since The Sacramento Bee reported earlier this month that she accepted a paid board seat on the board of DeVry Education Group as the for-profit company faces federal allegations of exaggerated job placement claims. She drew further criticism and calls for resignation from two state lawmakers after The Bee reported she received $420,000 in three years for serving on the board of textbook publisher John Wiley & Sons.

Last week, she apologized, resigned the DeVry position and pledged $200,000 in Wiley stock toward a student scholarship fund.

Protester Emily Breuninger, 27, a graduate student, said the Tuesday meeting was brief – only lasting a few minutes – and that the chancellor was mostly silent, choosing to leave most of the talking up to two others who identified themselves in the video as professors of computer science and anthropology.

In the video, the chancellor initially said she was there Tuesday to hear their concerns and offered to have a discussion with the protesters at a later date.

“We want you to resign, a lot of people want you to resign,” one student is heard saying. “So are you going to resign?”

Katehi began to talk about having a discussion, but was interrupted. “Did you actually hear what I just said?” the student asked.

After some protesters accused Katehi of privatizing the university and working against student interests to her own benefit, Katehi responded in the video that “a lot of what was said is totally incorrect and untrue. If you want to sit down and have a discussion and take each one of those, I’m willing to do that. I will bring my team because, these issues, I’m not the only person as a leader of this institution that makes decisions.”

Soon after, Katehi said she and her team of administrators would meet with the students Wednesday. She then walked away and a door was heard closing behind her. The two professors stayed for a few more minutes, but the conversation appeared to be unproductive.

Protesters said they were “outraged” that Katehi didn’t show up until the fifth day of the protest, which began Friday. The students said afterward that they weren’t satisfied with the brief meeting and would continue to camp out in the administration building.

“Ultimately our overall goal is her resignation, and we have yet to see progress on that front,” Breuninger said. “After seeing the way she behaved when she graced us with (her) presence, it reaffirms our commitment. It’s very clear her goals and her heart are not in alignment with the student body.”

Students said they were spurred to protest against Katehi over her membership on private corporate boards, which they said were an insult to students burdened with debt. Many also cited the 2011 pepper-spraying of student protesters as the genesis of the current demonstration.

The UC Davis media relations office issued a brief statement Tuesday titled “Updated on Student Protest.”

“Chancellor Linda P.B. Katehi met at 2 p.m. today with the students on the 5th floor of Mrak Hall to listen to their concerns,” the statement read. “She offered to meet with them again this week to continue the discussion.”

The students did not make an appointment for further talks with Katehi. “We wanted to meet her here and now,” Breuninger said. “We want to be on equal footing.”

Breuninger said the meeting left her “further enraged and disgusted.”

Katehi has not been seen at her Mrak Hall office since the protest began Friday. Protesters were initially greeted by administrators with vegetarian and vegan pizzas, but the welcome eventually faded and they were threatened Monday with reprimands that could include expulsion if they do not leave.

Katehi’s visit came as students on campus continued to help the protesters with contributions of food, online expressions of support and calls for Katehi to be dismissed.

The UC Student Workers Union Local 2865 issued a resolution asking for Katehi to be dismissed. The union said it represents 13,000 workers, including teaching assistants, tutors and graduate instructors.

</div>

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/news/local/education/article66269907.html#storylink=cpy</div>

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pepper spray

wiley textbook bd

<a href="http://www.sacbee.com/news/investigations/the-public-eye/article63917982.html">http://www.sacbee.com/news/investigations/the-public-eye/article63917982.html</a>

By Diana Lambert and Dale Kasler

<a href="mailto:dlambert@sacbee.com" title="">dlambert@sacbee.com</a>

</div>

UC Davis Chancellor Linda P.B Katehi received $420,000 in compensation as a board member for John Wiley & Sons, a leading publisher of science, engineering and math textbooks for universities.

Katehi served on the Wiley board from 2012 to 2014, according to Securities and Exchange Commission filings. She received $125,000 in pay and stock in 2012, $144,000 in 2013 and $151,000 in 2014.

<div data-slick-index="0" class="gallery-item image slick-slide slick-active" style=" width: 231px; height: 168px;"> Under pressure, Katehi resigned this week from the board of DeVry Education Group as the for-profit company faces scrutiny from federal officials for allegedly deceiving students about job and income prospects.</div>

</div>

Katehi’s decision in February to accept a paid board seat from DeVry prompted state Sen. Marty Block, D-San Diego, to demand information on how much she and other chancellors receive in side income at a Capitol hearing Thursday on education funding.

“It’s become apparent in the last 24 hours that some of the CEOs of these campuses have more than one job and make a lot of money in other places,” Block said during a budget subcommittee meeting Thursday afternoon. “Chancellor Katehi is the case on the front page of The Sacramento Bee today and my guess is there might be others.”

He asked representatives from the University of California, California State University and California Community Colleges to send him information about the outside jobs held by their top education leaders and the compensation they earn from them.

“If, in fact, they are making $500,000 on the side by sitting on six different corporate boards ... that is important for the Legislature to know,” Block said. “How many jobs do they have and how much time do they spend on these other jobs when they are supposed to be on the state dime?”

UC Davis officials did not respond to requests for comment Thursday afternoon.

New Jersey-based Wiley & Sons describes itself as a global provider of knowledge-based services, including scholarly journals, reference materials and textbooks. Among the business risks listed in its most recent annual report is “student demand for lower cost textbooks in higher education.”

Ed Howard, senior counsel for the Center for Public Interest Law, said the Wiley board seat potentially posed a conflict of interest for Katehi. She was “being paid a huge sum of money by a private, for-profit corporation that has business with the University of California ... It’s pretty much the dictionary definition of a conflict of interest,” he said.

The UC Office of the President considers whether board positions create a conflict before allowing chancellors to accept them. A UC Office of the President spokeswoman did not respond to requests for comment Thursday.

Katehi earns $424,360 a year as chancellor of UC Davis. DeVry board members earn $70,000 annually, as well as restricted stock units with an approximate value of $100,000, according to filings with the SEC. Katehi stepped down without pay from DeVry.

Henry Yang, president of UC Santa Barbara and a mechanical engineer, is the only other current UC chancellor to have served on a corporate board, according to a Sacramento Bee search of SEC filings.

Yang earned more than $1 million in director’s fees, stock awards and other forms of compensation while serving as board member of American Axle & Manufacturing Holdings Inc., an auto-parts maker in Detroit. Yang served on American Axle’s board from 2004 to 2013.

In response to a Bee inquiry, Yang released a statement regarding his board post. “With official approval from the UC Office of the President, I served on the board of directors and, with my engineering background, helped create a new technology committee to help revitalize competitive technology during a challenging time for the American automotive industry,” he said. “I completed my term in April 2013.”

Yang is paid $389,340 annually as UC Santa Barbara chancellor.

“Oh, my God,” Howard said. “If these two chancellors have so much free time that they are able to earn $1 million and $400,000 while moonlighting, maybe we should cut their pay and use it to help people priced out of the University of California.”

Katehi’s DeVry appointment came to light this week after critics questioned why Katehi agreed to lend the University of California’s stature to a for-profit college system trying to defend its higher education legitimacy.

Katehi resigned the $70,000-a-year seat Tuesday after a discussion with UC President Janet Napolitano. UC spokeswoman Dianne Klein said Wednesday that Katehi violated policy when she accepted the board seat without UC permission at a DeVry trustee meeting and attended an orientation in Weston, Fla., on Feb. 15-18.

The Federal Trade Commission suit filed against DeVry on Jan. 27 contends that the company made false and unsubstantiated claims when it began advertising around 2008 that 90 percent of its graduates obtain well-paying jobs in their fields within six months of graduation. Federal officials also take issue with a 2013 claim that DeVry graduates earn more than other graduates.

DeVry, which operates 13 campuses in California, said in a January statement that it “intends to vigorously contest” the FTC complaint, which it believes relies on “anecdotal examples that exaggerate the allegations but do not prove them.”

Students cannot receive Cal Grants to attend the for-profit institution, according to the California Student Aid Commission. Under state law, colleges are ineligible for Cal Grants when they have high loan default rates, low graduation rates or both.

Katehi spokesman Gary Delsohn said DeVry approached Katehi about the seat in December, before the company was sued by the Federal Trade Commission.

At the February meeting, DeVry board members voted to add Katehi and University of Arizona President Ann Weaver Hart to the board.

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Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/news/investigations/the-public-eye/article63917982.html#storylink=cpy</div>

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wiki

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Katehi has also publicly shared her experience of being a student at the National Technical University during the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athens_Polytechnic_uprising" title="Athens Polytechnic uprising">student uprisings</a> against the Greek <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_junta" title="Greek junta" class="mw-redirect">dictatorial regime</a> that was violently crushed by a combined military and police force on November 17, 1973.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-7">[7]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Color_Lines-Uprising_Ref-8">[8]</a>

After two years working as a researcher at the Ministry of National Defense's Naval Research Lab in Athens, a future mentor encouraged her to apply to graduate school at <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_California,Los_Angeles" title="University of California, Los Angeles">University of California, Los Angeles</a> and she came to the United States in 1979.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-9">[9]</a> She went on to earn her master's degree and doctorate in electrical engineering at UCLA’s <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Samueli_School_of_Engineering_and_Applied_Sciences" title="Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Sciences" class="mw-redirect">Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Sciences</a> in 1981 and 1984, respectively.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B._Katehi#cite_note-Graduation_date_and_degree-2">[2]</a>

<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ministry_of_National_Defence" title="Ministry of National Defence" class="mw-redirect">National Defence</a>'s Naval Research Lab in Athens, Greece.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B._Katehi#cite_note-Katehi.27s_UC_Davis_CV-10">[10]</a>

In her early career, Katehi worked at the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Michigan" title="University of Michigan">University of Michigan, Ann Arbor</a> from 1984 to 2001 as a professor of electrical engineering and computer science,<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-New_provost-11">[11]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Pick_for_UCD-12">[12]</a> and as associate dean of academic affairs and graduate education starting in 1994.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Chancellor_Linda-13">[13]</a> She was hired as the engineering dean at <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Purdue_University" title="Purdue University">Purdue University</a> in 2002.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-New_provost-11">[11]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Pick_for_UCD-12">[12]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-2_Women-14">[14]</a> While there, she increased both the faculty by 15% and research funding within the engineering department.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-New_provost-11">[11]</a> In 2005, Katehi became the first female provost and vice-chancellor of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Illinois_at_Urbana-Champaign" title="University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign" class="mw-redirect">University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign</a>.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-New_provost-11">[11]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-2_Women-14">[14]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Now_at_UC-15">[15]</a> After four years at the University of Illinois, Katehi became the 6th Chancellor of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_California,Davis" title="University of California, Davis">University of California, Davis</a> in 2009, succeeding <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larry_Vanderhoef" title="Larry Vanderhoef" class="mw-redirect">Larry Vanderhoef</a>.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Chancellor_Linda-13">[13]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-2_Women-14">[14]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Katehi_will_speak-16">[16]</a> She is the first female chancellor of the university.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B._Katehi#cite_note-Pick_for_UCD-12">[12]</a>

Katehi's expertise is in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circuit_design" title="Circuit design">circuit design</a> and her research focuses on <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antenna%28radio%29" title="Antenna (radio)">antennas</a>.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Pick_for_UCD-12">[12]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Chancellor_Linda-13">[13]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Katehi_will_speak-16">[16]</a> She currently holds 19 patents.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Katehi_will_speak-16">[16]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Smith:It.27s-17">[17]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Katehi_lauded-18">[18]</a> Through her academic roles she has been a mentor to over 70 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postdoctoral_research" title="Postdoctoral research" class="mw-redirect">postdoctoral fellows</a>.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Katehi_lauded-18">[18]</a>

In addition to her university roles, Katehi was appointed by <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_W.Bush" title="George W. Bush">President George W. Bush</a> to the Committee on the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Medal_of_Science" title="National Medal of Science">National Medal of Science</a>.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Chancellor_Linda-13">[13]</a> She chaired the 12-member committee, along with the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Department_of_Commerce" title="United States Department of Commerce">Secretary of Commerce’s</a> committee for the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Medal_of_Technology_and_Innovation" title="National Medal of Technology and Innovation">National Medal of Technology and Innovation</a>, until 2010.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Katehi_will_speak-16">[16]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-UC_Davis_chancellor-19">[19]</a> She was appointed to the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Bureau_of_Investigation" title="Federal Bureau of Investigation">FBI’s</a> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Security_Higher_Education_Advisory_Board" title="National Security Higher Education Advisory Board">National Security Higher Education Advisory Board</a> in 2010.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Chancellor_Katehi_appointed-20">[20]</a> Katehi is a fellow of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Association_for_the_Advancement_of_Science" title="American Association for the Advancement of Science">American Association for the Advancement of Science</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Katehi_will_speak-16">[16]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Katehi_named-21">[21]</a> and in 2011, she was elected to the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Academy_of_Arts_and_Sciences" title="American Academy of Arts and Sciences">American Academy of Arts and Sciences</a>.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Katehi_will_speak-16">[16]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Katehi_named-21">[21]</a> She is also a member of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Academy_of_Engineering" title="National Academy of Engineering">National Academy of Engineering</a> where she chaired the committee on <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K%E2%80%9312%28education%29" title="K–12 (education)" class="mw-redirect">K-12</a> engineering education for two years.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Chancellor_Linda-13">[13]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Katehi_lauded-18">[18]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B._Katehi#cite_note-Katehi_named-21">[21]</a>

For her academic work, she has received awards including the AHC Aristeio Award in Academics in 2011<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Chancellor_Linda-13">[13]</a> and a Gabby Award for her achievements in education and academia, also in 2011.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Gabby_Award-22">[22]</a>

In 2014, she received an honorary degree from the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_College_of_Greece" title="American College of Greece">American College of Greece</a> as part of their annual commencement ceremony.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B._Katehi#cite_note-23">[23]</a>

On October 4, 2015 The National Academy of Engineering presented Linda Katehi with its Simon Ramo Founders Award recognizing her “extraordinary impact on the engineering profession” and “leadership in engineering research and education.”<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B._Katehi#cite_note-24">[24]</a>

<h3>Board memberships</h3>

<ul>

<li>Member of the Board of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Wiley%26_Sons" title="John Wiley & Sons">John Wiley & Sons</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-25">[25]</a></li>

<li>Member of the Board of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Committee_on_Institutional_Cooperation" title="Committee on Institutional Cooperation">Committee on Institutional Cooperation</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B._Katehi#cite_note-26">[26]</a></li>

<li>Member of the Board of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cyprus_Institute" title="The Cyprus Institute">The Cyprus Institute</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B._Katehi#cite_note-27">[27]</a></li>

<li>Member of the Board of Valley Vision<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B._Katehi#cite_note-28">[28]</a></li>

<li>Member of the Board of the Bay Area Council Economic Institute<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B._Katehi#cite_note-29">[29]</a></li>

<li>Member of the Board of the Business Higher Education Forum<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B._Katehi#cite_note-30">[30]</a></li>

</ul>

<h2>University of Illinois</h2>

Before coming to UC Davis, Katehi served as provost and vice chancellor for academic affairs at the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Illinois_at_Urbana-Champaign" title="University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign" class="mw-redirect">University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign</a> from April 1, 2006 to June 2009. As the Provost she oversaw all Colleges and Schools, the Library, HR, IT, facilities and was in charge of the University budget. She oversaw the admissions for UIUC during part of the time period (2003-2009) that came to be investigated under of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Illinois_clout_scandal" title="University of Illinois clout scandal">University of Illinois clout scandal</a>. Katehi denied involvement, saying the "Category I" decisions were made at higher administrative levels.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B._Katehi#cite_note-31">[31]</a> That was also confirmed by the findings as described in the report published by the investigative committee.

<h2>University of California, Davis</h2>

Katehi was appointed <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chancellor%28education%29" title="Chancellor (education)">chancellor</a> by the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_California_Board_of_Regents" title="University of California Board of Regents" class="mw-redirect">University of California Board of Regents</a> on May 7, 2009, effective August 17, 2009. She holds UC Davis faculty appointments in electrical and computer engineering and in women and gender studies.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Chancellor_Linda_P.B.Katehi-32">[32]</a> Katehi charged a committee with creating a new "Vision of Excellence" for the school.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-vision-33">[33]</a> She also launched several <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_ribbon_committee" title="Blue ribbon committee" class="mw-redirect">blue ribbon committees</a>: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tech_transfer" title="Tech transfer" class="mw-redirect">tech transfer</a> and commercialization,<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-34">[34]</a> research,<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-35">[35]</a> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_technology" title="Information technology">information technology</a> excellence,<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-36">[36]</a> and organizational excellence.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-37">[37]</a> Katehi also created the Chancellor's Colloquium Distinguished Speaker Series to bring together distinguished scholars and government leaders who promise intellectual spark and enriching engagement with our academic community<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-38">[38]</a> As of 2009, Katehi's base annual salary was $400,000.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B._Katehi#cite_note-39">[39]</a>

In response to acts of hate and intolerance on campus in 2010, Katehi launched the Hate-Free Campus Initiative to reaffirm the campus’s values and commitment to one another.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B._Katehi#cite_note-40">[40]</a> The initiative included creation of "Beyond Tolerance Tuesday," collaboration with the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Museum_of_Tolerance" title="Museum of Tolerance">Museum of Tolerance</a>, and the creation of a speakers series and the Civility Project, which began with a grant from the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Endowment_for_the_Humanities" title="National Endowment for the Humanities">National Endowment for the Humanities</a>.

Under Katehi's leadership, UC Davis co-hosted the Governors' Global Climate Summit 3: Building the Green Economy in November 2010.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B._Katehi#cite_note-41">[41]</a> Participants included Governor <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arnold_Schwarzenegger" title="Arnold Schwarzenegger">Arnold Schwarzenegger</a>, the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Development_Programme" title="United Nations Development Programme">United Nations Development Programme</a>, and the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Environment_Programme" title="United Nations Environment Programme">United Nations Environment Programme</a>. The summit’s focus was to continue to build subnational collaboration on policies and strategies to stimulate economic growth, reduce dependence on fossil fuels, create green jobs, promote clean energy solutions and reduce greenhouse gas pollution.

In 2013, Katehi launched the UC Davis World Food Center, with the publicly stated goal of amplifying UC Davis' numerous programs involved in food, health and sustainability.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-42">[42]</a> In January 2015, she announced that UC Davis plans to build a new location for the The World Food Center in downtown <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sacramento" title="Sacramento" class="mw-redirect">Sacramento</a>. The location could also serve as a satellite campus for UC Davis. Katehi stated that a plan for the new location could be formed by the end of May or June.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-World_Food_Center_to_Sacramento-43">[43]</a>

In September 2014, Katehi announced a partnership between <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars,Incorporated" title="Mars, Incorporated">Mars, Incorporated</a> and UC Davis to create the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Innovation_Institute_for_Food_and_Health&action=edit&redlink=1" class="new" title="Innovation Institute for Food and Health (page does not exist)">Innovation Institute for Food and Health</a>. According to Katehi, the institute will serve as the innovation branch of the UC David World Food Center. Chief Science Officer at Mars Inc., Harold Schmitz, called the relationship both research and innovation-based.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-44">[44]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-45">[45]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-46">[46]</a> Mars has pledged to contribute 40 million dollars to the project over 10 years while UC Davis has committed to contribute 20 million dollars over 10 years.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Mars_Partnership_Dollar_Amounts-47">[47]</a> Additionally, Katehi announced a partnership with a government agency in Chile to expand research on a global level in conjunction with the UC Davis World Food Center.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Chile_Partnership_Thing-48">[48]</a>

Days after the announcement of the Mars partnership, Katehi and UC Davis announced that it will install a solar array on 70 acres of land south of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interstate_80" title="Interstate 80">Interstate 80</a>. The power plant will provide 14 percent of all UC Davis's power consumption. The array will be built in conjunction with <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SunPower" title="SunPower">SunPower</a> who previously built a 4-megawatt solar array at the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=UC_Davis_West_Village&action=edit&redlink=1" class="new" title="UC Davis West Village (page does not exist)">UC Davis West Village</a> neighborhood, which is a net-zero community.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B._Katehi#cite_note-70_Acre_Solar_Array-49">[49]</a>

Increasing the percentage of Latino students at UC Davis is a goal of the university, as stated by Katehi. UC Davis aims to become a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hispanic_Serving_Institution" title="Hispanic Serving Institution" class="mw-redirect">Hispanic Serving Institution</a> by having at least 25% of their undergraduate student body made up of Latinos by the 2018-2019 school year.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B._Katehi#cite_note-50">[50]</a>

In March, Katehi invited the public to participate in the construction of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Shrem_Museum&action=edit&redlink=1" class="new" title="Shrem Museum (page does not exist)">Shrem Museum</a> in UC Davis's Gateway District. Participants were invited to sign a steel beam that would be installed and visible after construction. Upon completion, the museum will house the UC Davis art collection which consists of over 5,000 items.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Shrem_Museum_Beam_Signing-51">[51]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Beam_Signing-52">[52]</a>

In March 2016, Katehi faced widespread criticism for her decision to join the board of the DeVry Education Group, a for-profit firm that offers online college degrees, at a time when DeVry was the subject of a federal investigation for misleading advertising practices. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-53">[53]</a> Many elected officials and fellow academics faulted Katehi for making personal profit from a firm whose practices and interests are in conflict with the values of public education that are central to the UC system, and for not seeking the required approval from her superiors before accepting the DeVry position; some saw the DeVry position as furthering a history of participation in ventures at odds with her responsibilities as chancellor of a public university.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-54">[54]</a>

<h2>Involvement in STEM</h2>

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<div role="note" class="hatnote relarticle mainarticle">Main article: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occupy_UC_Davis" title="Occupy UC Davis" class="mw-redirect">Occupy UC Davis</a></div>

On November 18, 2011, Katehi requested <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occupy_movement" title="Occupy movement">Occupy movement</a> protesters on the UC Davis campus remove their tents from the quad. When a group of non-compliant protestors refused to move, campus police officers <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray" title="Pepper spray">pepper sprayed</a> them.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-61">[61]</a> Eleven protesters received medical treatment; two were hospitalized.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-62">[62]</a> Katehi stated there had been "no option" except police action due to health and safety concerns, participation of some non-UC Davis persons in the protests, and some protestors' non-compliance with Katehi's earlier written and police's oral directions.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-63">[63]</a> The incident led to further protests and calls for Katehi's resignation from some campus departments and organizations.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-64">[64]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-65">[65]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-66">[66]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-67">[67]</a> UC Davis Academic Senate Chair Linda Bisson criticized Katehi's slow response in providing information and taking disciplinary action against police, but she said most faculty wanted Katehi to stay in her post while being held accountable in some way.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-Sakash2011-68">[68]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B._Katehi#cite_note-ganga2011-69">[69]</a>

Katehi said she took "full responsibility for the incident" and placed two officers and the chief of campus police on <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Administrative_leave" title="Administrative leave">administrative leave</a>.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-stetler2011-70">[70]</a> Katehi stated that she would not step down, and she and State Assembly Speaker <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_A.P%C3%A9rez" title="John A. Pérez" class="mw-redirect">John A. Pérez</a> requested an outside investigation. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_G.Yudof" title="Mark G. Yudof" class="mw-redirect">Mark G. Yudof</a> appointed former <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Angeles_Police_Department" title="Los Angeles Police Department">Los Angeles Police Department</a> Chief <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_J.Bratton" title="William J. Bratton" class="mw-redirect">William J. Bratton</a> to head the investigation.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-71">[71]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-gordon2011-72">[72]</a> The Reynoso Task Force Report published in April 2012 reported that Katehi "failed to express in any meaningful way her expectation that the police operation was to be sharply limited so that no use of force would be employed by police officers other than their demand that the tents be taken down."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B.Katehi#cite_note-reynoso2012-73">[73]</a> On July 31, 2012, a UC Davis spokesman announced that <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Pike%28police_officer%29" title="John Pike (police officer)" class="mw-redirect">Lt. John Pike</a>, a police officer who pepper-sprayed students, was no longer employed by the university.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_P.B._Katehi#cite_note-sac-74">[74]</a>

==

partner GLP and ucd:

http://geneticexperts.org/

eg roundup cites legit, then has 2 ~, tho do give coi

<a href="http://geneticexperts.org/researchers-call-for-review-of-ge-crop-safety-cite-public-health-concerns-over-glyphosate-24-d/">http://geneticexperts.org/researchers-call-for-review-of-ge-crop-safety-cite-public-health-concerns-over-glyphosate-24-d/</a>

seralini:

a group of researchers has called into question the validity of rodent feeding trials, used in biomedical research and in the regulation of commercial products, by analyzing the diets of control rats. The researchers found traces of pesticides, heavy metals and other chemicals in rat feed, and argue that these, along with the genetically engineered crops used in the feed, could be behind the development of cancers in control rats, thereby invalidating the feeding trials. The research, published in PLOS ONE, was from the lab of Gilles-Éric Séralini.

Dr. Carl Winter, Cooperative Extension Food Toxicologist, University of California, Davis (<a href="http://foodscience.ucdavis.edu/people/faculty/winter.html" target="_blank" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; outline: 0px; line-height: inherit;">webpage</a>):

Expertise: detection of pesticides and naturally-occurring toxins in foods, how to assess their risks and identify how to use the science in the regulatory decision-making process.

“I find the discussion of data presented in Table 2 to be misleading.  The authors contend that since the maximum dietary intake of the pesticide pirimiphos-methyl in seven of the diets exceeds the Acceptable Daily Intake, that animals fed such diets are being fed toxic levels of pirimiphos-methyl.  This conclusion is not supported for two reasons:

1) The maximum dietary intake represents an exaggeration of the true dietary intake.

2) (More important) Comparing maximum dietary intake with the Acceptable Daily Intake is not appropriate to demonstrate risk.  A more appropriate comparison would be the No Observed Effect Level (NOEL) from long-term animal toxicology studies, which represents the maximum amount given to laboratory animals on a daily basis that does NOT cause any noticeable toxicity.  In the case of pirimiphos-methyl, the lowest NOEL I was able to find was from long-term rat feeding studies, which represented a level of 500 micrograms of pirimiphos-methyl per kilogram of body weight per day (<a href="http://www.epa.gov/iris/subst/0257.htm" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; outline: 0px; line-height: inherit;">http://www.epa.gov/iris/subst/0257.htm</a>).  Even the exaggerated maximum dietary intake levels are well below the rat NOEL level.

“ADI levels represent levels considered to be safe for daily human consumption.  Calculation of ADI levels typically takes the lowest NOEL found from animal studies and applies uncertainty factors that typically include a 10-fold factor that assumes humans are 10 times more sensitive than the most sensitive animal species studied which is multiplied by another 10-fold factor assuming some humans are 10 times more sensitive than other humans.  Thus, a typical uncertainty factor is 100, so the ADI is often the NOEL divided by 100. See <a href="http://geneticexperts.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/foodrisk.pdf" data-cke-saved-href="http://geneticexperts.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/foodrisk.pdf" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; outline: 0px; line-height: inherit;">this manuscript</a> I wrote that discusses this in more detail.  Since the PLOS One study specifically considers the impacts of exposure to chemicals to laboratory animals, there is no need to apply the uncertainty factor.

“For all of the other seven pesticides detected, exposure at the exaggerated maximum dietary intake level was still below the ADI levels, (commonly 100 times lower than NOEL levels from animal studies), so it is difficult to make a valid case as to how such exposures would cause effects in the animals consuming feed containing pesticide residues.  It should also be pointed out that these were the only pesticides detected out of 262 analyzed.

“The process of comparing maximum dietary intake levels with ADI levels for other contaminants such as metals and PCDDs and PCBs is similarly misleading.”

Dr. Frédéric Y. Bois, Professor at Sorbonne UTC, and Research Director at L’Institut National de l’Environnement Industriel et des Risques (INERIS)(<a href="https://sites.google.com/site/utcchairmmbsptp/people/frederic_bois" target="_blank" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; outline: 0px; line-height: inherit;">webpage</a>):

Expertise: pharmacology, quantitative toxicology and risk assessment, with a strong emphasis on mathematical modeling and statistics

“The authors have performed an independent assessment of the contamination of lab rat diets by pesticides, heavy metals and some persistent chemicals. Some producers already check the quality of the diets they produced, according to FDA guidelines for example, but a double check is always good. Not too surprisingly, rat diet, like most of ours by the way, is contaminated with those chemicals. It would actually be interesting to compare those results with the producers’ records.

“Whether the exposed rats are likely to suffer serious damage from such exposures is not clear though. The hazard indexes computed by the authors use acceptable daily intakes (ADI) calculated for humans. Those do not really apply to rats, because safety factors are used in their derivations to specifically protect humans (assumed to be more susceptible than animals), and among humans infants etc.

“Furthermore the hazard indexes for various chemicals were summed to get an estimate of the effect of the multiple exposures. However, this is a very crude method: for example, take three chemicals that have indexes at 0.5 (no problem for them: the exposure level only half of the ADI). If you sum the indexes for those three chemicals you find a global index of 1.5 and we have a problem. But that makes sense only if the chemicals act without thresholds and on the same target, which are all assumptions.

“Using hazard indexes and summing them maybe a reasonable conservative procedure for protecting human public health. However, when assessing the actual impact of food contaminants on the health of lab animals (which is a matter of scientific precision, not of rat health protection) they are likely to overestimate the risks. Animal specific ADIs should be used.

“As to estimating precisely the effect of mixtures of chemicals, this is a hot and debated topic in food safety (the European Union has recently given the green light to a large project, EuroMix on that topic) but we do not have yet good tools to do it precisely.

“Given that, it goes very far to say that most rat feeding studies are flawed or that ‘historical control data’ are unreliable. In the case of low quality diets, some studies may have overestimated the “natural” disease background in the animals. The question is a good one, but should be answered with a more in-depth analysis of the actual risks for those animals.

“The question also of the number of chemicals whose safety evaluation has been biased by the presence of food contaminants in lab animal diets needs to be addressed with precaution, without jumping too fast to conclusions. At least the authors should be congratulated for tackling an interesting question, which, by the way, also extends to the analysis of epidemiological cohorts. In essence, what is a control group? The question again is welcome.”

Dr. Richard E. Goodman, Research Professor in the Food Allergy Research and Resource Program, University of Nebraska (<a href="https://farrp.unl.edu/fss/richard-goodman" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; outline: 0px; line-height: inherit;">webpage</a>):

Expertise: Refining methods and evaluation criteria for assessing the potential allergenicity of proteins in genetically engineered crops

“Séralini and colleagues have submitted an analytical study reporting on detection of traces of 262 pesticides, 4 heavy metals, 17 dioxins and furans, 18 PCBs and 22 GMOs in a small sample (13) of commercially prepared laboratory animal chow (diets) produced by a number of manufacturers.  The study is being reported in the open access journal PloS ONE, that has a generally favorable reputation.  But of course even the highest quality journals sometimes publish papers that report sensational findings, yet with little critical review and a lack of connectivity to biological outcomes, as appears to be the case in this study.

“The authors are using a controversial method of estimating cumulative risks (Hazard Quotients) of minor contaminants in animal feeds that have not been validated to demonstrate realistic risks, with biological proof of harm at levels of contamination that the authors found in this PLoS ONE study.  As far as I know, there have not been publications demonstrating that the method of cumulative hazard assessment, even though referenced by a paper by the US EPA and one in the EFSA Journal (11:3313), have suggested this approach might be useful for understanding risks of mixtures of chemical toxicants including pesticides, dioxins and heavy metals have accurately predicted risks or outcomes.

“The fact is that no studies I am aware of, other than the authors’ previous retracted study in Food and Chemical Toxicology in 2012 on NK603 maize and glyphosate, has shown high levels of tumors, cancers or other deleterious effects in control animals fed normal commercial rodent diets.  The authors have not cited published studies that have shown high levels of adverse effects in control animals fed commercial rodent diets.  I have been involved in monitoring rodent studies and in conducting studies of 60 and 90 days in rats and mice and am aware of many studies that are longer that have not shown anything other than occasional adverse effects in control animals that are not associated with an unintended genetic or infectious trait carried in the test animals, and those are sporadic issues that provide some of the background that the authors cite as issues.

“It is quite disturbing to me as a scientist involved in food safety evaluations of GMOs and novel food ingredients as well as all kinds of processed foods that the authors of this study are implying that food raw materials deemed acceptable and without evidence of risks for humans by scientists and regulators in the US, EU, Japan, Australia and a number of other countries are being touted as risk factors for rodents consuming those approved GM events in any toxicology study.

“All agricultural crops, including organically grown crops are ‘contaminated’ with at least low levels of metals, such as arsenic; with some level of chemical herbicide or insecticide and other compounds.  If those compounds are fed at high concentrations to animals or humans there would likely be some adverse effects.  Drinking too much water in a day (~ 4 gallons) will lead to death in a typical human.  Consumption of too many calories over time will increase the rate of developing certain types of tumors or cancers.  Consumption of some vitamins at a high dose over time will cause adverse health effects.  The authors report detection in the range of parts per billion of a number of compounds that are deemed safe by regulators at the levels found in the rodent diets.

“It seems the authors are trying to prove that their earlier reported tests with high tumor incidence in the 2012 study was due to “incidental contamination of control diets” rather than the genetic strain of rats used in their 2 year study.  Or that they want to invalidate the safety tests on many GM crops.  Yet the same tests and lab chow has been used safely to demonstrate convincing risk or safety of a number of pharmaceuticals, pesticides and other compounds.

“While their data is superficially interesting, the value really is to show that all food and feed contains small amounts of chemicals and metals, and that we should not be afraid to consume commodity crops that are grown with a wide variety of methods of cultivation, by farmers who follow appropriate guidelines for the use of chemicals. Even organic farmers use some metals legally,  and many non-organic farmers use chemicals that allow the safe and efficient production of food and feed and if they follow labeled approved dose schemes, the residues of pesticides on the food materials will be far below hazardous levels.

“If we allowed the data of these authors to scare us from using the animal safety testing methods we have used for decades, or if we allow them to “invalidate” years of testing, we will not be able to make safe decisions about our food, our pharmaceutical products or even drinking water. As with the 2012 study, the authors have chosen to put out press releases and announce their findings in controversial and alarming terms, this time before the public release of the study by the journal.  I hope the sensationalistic press conferences and hype used by the authors go out of vogue. They do not help the public or regulators decide what is safe and what is not safe.”

Reference:

‘Laboratory Rodent Diets Contain Toxic Levels of Environmental Contaminants: Implications for Regulatory Tests’ by Séralini et al, published in PLOS ONE on Thursday July 1, 2015.

Declared interests (see <a href="http://geneticexperts.org/register-of-interests-policy/%20" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; outline: 0px; line-height: inherit;">GENeS register of interests policy</a>):

Dr. Richard Goodman: Prior to my current position I worked at Monsanto from 1997-2004 on the safety evaluation of genetically modified crops (GMOs), primarily evaluating potential allergenicity, also potential transfer of DNA from GMOs to other organisms including gut microbes and livestock and to some extent on the potential toxicity of GMOs.

I am paid by the University of Nebraska from grant money and contracts that I perform for a variety of companies, governments and non-profit organizations.  I do not receive any money from companies to defend their products.

I served as an Associate Editor for the journal Food and Chemical Toxicology from late 2012 until March, 2015.  That was just after publication of a paper by Séralini describing the 2 year rat feeding study which reportedly showed tumor incidence in rats fed herbicide tolerant maize (NK603), or with glyphosate in the water, or a combination of both. After a year review, which I was not involved in, the journal (FCT) withdrew that paper.

No further interests declared

==

Robin Bisson – Director

Robin draws on past experience at the UK’s Science Media Centre and other science media relations roles. Robin is a visiting scholar at the World Food Center Institute for Food and Agricultural Literacy at the University of California, Davis, to which GENeS is affiliated. His academic focus was on mathematics and philosophy of science.

E: robin@geneticexperts.org

T: (202) 833-4613

0e907aeArvind Suresh – Science Media Liaison

Arvind is a science communicator and a former laboratory biologist with signficant experience in life sciences research. He graduated with a Masters in Cell Biology and Physiology from the University of Pittsburgh.

E: arvind@geneticexperts.org

T: (202) 974-6396

Interested in working for GENeS?

GENeS is looking for interns and will be adding staff in the near future. If you are interested please send a CV and cover letter to: info@geneticexperts.org.

==

reads live cv

srcwtch

Alison Louise Van Eenennaam is an agricultural extension agent specializing in animal biotechnology and genomics.<a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L.Van_Eenennaam#cite_note-1" style="text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap; background: none;">[1]</a> She was a temporary voting member on the <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/FDA" title="FDA" class="mw-redirect" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">FDA</a>'s <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Veterinary_Medicine_Advisory_Committee" title="Veterinary Medicine Advisory Committee" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">Veterinary Medicine Advisory Committee</a> in its September 2010 meeting on the genetically engineered <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/AquAdvantage_salmon" title="AquAdvantage salmon" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">AquAdvantage salmon</a>.<a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L.Van_Eenennaam#cite_note-2" style="white-space: nowrap; background: none;">[2]</a> In the past, she has worked for <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Monsanto" title="Monsanto" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">Monsanto</a>.<a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L.Van_Eenennaam#cite_note-3" style="text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap; background: none;">[3]</a> She also serves on the <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/USDA" title="USDA" class="mw-redirect" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">USDA</a>'s <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Advisory_Committee_on_Biotechnology_and_21st_Century_Agriculture" title="Advisory Committee on Biotechnology and 21st Century Agriculture" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">Advisory Committee on Biotechnology and 21st Century Agriculture</a> (AC21).<a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L.Van_Eenennaam#cite_note-4" style="text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap; background: none;">[4]</a>

In 2010, Van Eenennaam won a bronze award from the <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Association_for_Communication_Excellence_in_Agriculture,Natural_Resources_and_Life_and_Human_Sciences&action=edit&redlink=1" class="new" title="Association for Communication Excellence in Agriculture, Natural Resources and Life and Human Sciences (page does not exist)" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">Association for Communication Excellence in Agriculture, Natural Resources and Life and Human Sciences</a> for producing a YouTube video called “Animal Biotechnology.”<a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L.Van_Eenennaam#cite_note-5" style="text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap; background: none;">[5]</a><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#cite_note-6" style="text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap; background: none;">[6]</a> The video compares genetic engineering and cloning to traditional animal breeding, artificial insemination, and in vitro fertilization, referring to all as "biotechnology." The video oversimplifies genetic modification by describing it as cutting DNA from one genome and pasting it into another, when in fact, the actual process of genetic engineering is nowhere near this precise and orderly.

<h2 style="margin: 1em 0px 0.25em; overflow: hidden; padding: 0px; border: none; display: inline; line-height: 1.3; background: none;">Contents</h2>

[<a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#" id="togglelink" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">hide</a>] </div>

<li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-1" style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#Previous_Work_on_Transgenic_Fish" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">1 Previous Work on Transgenic Fish</a></li>

<li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-2" style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#Education_and_Employment" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">2 Education and Employment</a></li>

<li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-3" style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#Professional_Committee_Appointments" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">3 Professional Committee Appointments</a></li>

<li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-4" style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#Publications" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">4 Publications</a></li>

<li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-5" style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#Grant_Record" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">5 Grant Record</a></li>

<li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-6" style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#Articles_and_resources" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">6 Articles and resources</a>

<li class="toclevel-2 tocsection-7" style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#Related_SourceWatch_articles" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">6.1 Related SourceWatch articles</a></li>

<li class="toclevel-2 tocsection-8" style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#References" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">6.2 References</a></li>

<li class="toclevel-2 tocsection-9" style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#External_resources" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">6.3 External resources</a></li>

<li class="toclevel-2 tocsection-10" style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#External_articles" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">6.4 External articles</a></li>

</ul>

</li>

</ul>

</div>

<h2 style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 1em 0px 0.25em; overflow: hidden; padding: 0px; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-color: rgb(170, 170, 170); line-height: 1.3; background: none rgb(255, 255, 255);">Previous Work on Transgenic Fish</h2>

In light of Van Eenennaam's appointment to the FDA <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/VMAC" title="VMAC" class="mw-redirect" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">VMAC</a> committee evaluating the <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/AquAdvantage_salmon" title="AquAdvantage salmon" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">AquAdvantage salmon</a>, here are some of her previous work relating to genetically engineered fish. Van Eenennaam's publications on genetically engineered fish date from as early as 1998, when she wrote about sturgeon. She later wrote about the specific cases of zebrafish and Atlantic salmon, as well as the larger issue of genetically engineered fish in general.

In 2004, she published a fact sheet on genetically engineered fish for the University of California.<a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L.Van_Eenennaam#cite_note-7" style="text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap; background: none;">[7]</a> She reiterates many of the same points in a later, 2006 article, "Careful risk assessment needed to evaluate transgenic ﬁsh," co-authored with <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Paul_G.Olin&action=edit&redlink=1" class="new" title="Paul G. Olin (page does not exist)" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">Paul G. Olin</a>.<a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#cite_note-8" style="text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap; background: none;">[8]</a> Here, she specifically addresses the issue of fast-growing genetically engineered salmon. The paper cites a number of benefits of genetically engineered fish, including:

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">A large number of eggs laid per female</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">The fact that "fertilization and embryonic development occurs outside of the mother (in most species)"</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">The lower probability of carrying human pathogens</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">The fact that "aquaculture is a rapidly expanding market"</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Increased feed-conversion efficiency, providing "economic and potential environmental benefits such as reduced feed waste and effluent from ﬁsh farms"</li>

</ul>

However, the paper notes one downside to producing genetically engineered fish, stating, "aquatic organisms are also the most likely group to present environmental concerns if accidentally released into the environment. Unlike most other agricultural species, ﬁsh are both difficult to contain and highly mobile, and they can easily become feral and invade native ecosystems (NRC 2002)."

About the <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/AquAdvantage_salmon" title="AquAdvantage salmon" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">AquAdvantage salmon</a> specifically, the article says: "The mature weight of these ﬁsh remains the same as for other farmed salmon, but their early growth rate increases by 400% to 600%, with a concomitant 25% decrease in feed input and a shortened time to market (Du et al. 1992)... Assuming a positive regulatory approval decision and consumer acceptance, the enhanced growth rate and feed efficiency of these transgenic salmon could increase salmon aquacultural productivity significantly, and would likely necessitate that salmon aquaculturists adopt the technology to remain competitive (Aerni 2004)."

From her writing, she clearly sees many benefits to genetically engineered fish, specifically salmon, and her main - and perhaps only - concern is the possibility of the fish to escape. She continues to pursue that issue in a later article, "Transgenic Approaches for the Reproductive Containment of Genetically Engineered Fish," co-authored with <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Andrew_C.Wong&action=edit&redlink=1" class="new" title="Andrew C. Wong (page does not exist)" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">Andrew C. Wong</a> in 2008.<a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L.Van_Eenennaam#cite_note-9" style="text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap; background: none;">[9]</a> This article argues that genetically engineered fish will provide humans with benefits, provided that the fish can be "contained" (i.e. prevented from breeding with native fish populations). From the abstract: "Aquacultural applications of transgenic technologies have the potential to supply the ever growing demand for food products derived from aquatic resources. However, before any benefits of genetically engineered fish can be realized, methods for the containment of transgenic fish must be developed to help prevent their interbreeding with native populations should they be accidentally released or escape."

<h2 style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 1em 0px 0.25em; overflow: hidden; padding: 0px; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-color: rgb(170, 170, 170); line-height: 1.3; background: none rgb(255, 255, 255);">Education and Employment</h2>

Van Eenennaam began her career as an <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=International_Agricultural_Exchange_Association&action=edit&redlink=1" class="new" title="International Agricultural Exchange Association (page does not exist)" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">International Agricultural Exchange Association</a> trainee at <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Genetic_Resources_Inc.&action=edit&redlink=1" class="new" title="Genetic Resources Inc. (page does not exist)" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">Genetic Resources Inc.</a>'s bovine reproduction facility in San Marcos, TX in 1984.<a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#cite_note-10" style="text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap; background: none;">[10]</a> Following her graduation from The University of Melbourne (Australia), where she earned a Bachelor of Agricultural Science with Honors with a major in animal science in 1987, she spent nearly a year as a development scientist at <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Coopers_Animal_Health&action=edit&redlink=1" class="new" title="Coopers Animal Health (page does not exist)" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">Coopers Animal Health</a> in New South Wales, Australia from 1987 to 1988.

She then moved to the United States to pursue her graduate education, where she continued her education at <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=University_of_California,_Davis&action=edit&redlink=1" class="new" title="University of California, Davis (page does not exist)" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">University of California, Davis</a>. There she received a Master of Science in 1990. Her next employment was as a regional dairy and livestock farm advisor with the <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=University_of_California_Cooperative_Extension&action=edit&redlink=1" class="new" title="University of California Cooperative Extension (page does not exist)" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">University of California Cooperative Extension</a> in San Joaquin and Sacramento counties, California from 1991 to 1993.

She received her PhD in genetics from University of California, Davis in 1997 and then, in 1998, went to work for <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Monsanto" title="Monsanto" style="text-decoration: none; background-image: none; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Monsanto</a> in July 1998. She began as a research scientist at Monsanto's Calgene campus, and became a project leader in 2000. In 2002, she left Monsanto to serve as an Assistant Cooperative Extension Specialist in Animal Biotechnology and Genomics at the Department of Animal Science of University of California-Davis. In 2006, her title changed to "Associate Cooperative Extension Specialist in Animal Biotechnology and Genomics," and it changed again to "Cooperative Extension Specialist in Animal Biotechnology and Genomics" in 2010.

<h2 style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 1em 0px 0.25em; overflow: hidden; padding: 0px; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-color: rgb(170, 170, 170); line-height: 1.3; background: none rgb(255, 255, 255);">Professional Committee Appointments</h2>

Van Eenennaam serves on the following committees:<a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#cite_note-11" style="text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap; background: none;">[11]</a>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Appointed by the Secretary of Agriculture to the national USDA 16568 – “Advisory Committee on Biotechnology and 21st Century Agriculture (AC21)”. This committee examines “the long-term impacts of biotechnology on the U.S. food and agriculture system and USDA, and provides guidance to USDA on pressing individual issues, identified by the Office of the Secretary, related to the application of biotechnology in agriculture.” (6/2005-present)</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Appointed to be the National Cooperative Extension Representative on the National Beef Cattle Evaluation Consortium Advisory Committee (NBCEC) (6/2005-present)</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">California Beef Cattle Improvement Association (CBCIA) Advisor (2004-present)</li>

</ul>

The following are publications Van Eenennaam wrote or contributed to:<a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#cite_note-12" style="text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap; background: none;">[12]</a>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A. L., J.H. van der Werf, and M.E. Goddard. 2010. The value of using DNA markers for beef bull selection in the seedstock sector. Journal of Animal Science. Accepted</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Hagopian,K., K. L. Weber, D. T. Hwee, A. L. Van Eenennaam, G. López-Lluch, J. M. Villalba, I. Burón, P. Navas, J. B. German, S. M. Watkins, K. A. Simmons Domer, Y. Chen, A. Wei, R. B. McDonald, and J. J. Ramsey. 2010. Complex I hydrogen peroxide production is decreased and electron transport chain enzymes activities are altered in n-3 enriched fat-1 mice.PLoS ONE. Accepted.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A.L. and W.M. Muir. 2010. Animal biotechnologies and agricultural sustainability. Chapter in “The Role of Biotechnology in a Sustainable Food Supply.” Cambridge University Press. In press.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Fahrenkrug, S. C., A. Blake, D. F. Carlson, T. Doran, A. L. Van Eenennaam, D. Faber, C. Galli, P. B. Hackett, N. Li, E. A. Maga, J. D. Murray, R. Stotish, E. Sullivan, J. F. Taylor, M. Walton, M. Wheeler, B. Whitelaw, B. P. Glenn. 2010. <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://jas.fass.org/cgi/content/short/jas.2010-2847v1" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 13px; background: linear-gradient(transparent, transparent) 100% 50% no-repeat, url(" data:image="data:image" svg="svg" xml="xml" c="C" fxml="Fxml" version="version" d="D" encoding="encoding" utf-8="UTF-8" f="F" e="E" csvg="Csvg" http="http" a="A" fwww.w3.org="Fwww.w3.org" f2000="F2000" fsvg="Fsvg" width="width" height="height" cg="Cg" transform="transform" translate="translate" crect="Crect" x="x" y="y" fill="fill" fff="fff" stroke="stroke" cpath="Cpath" m831.194="M831.194" h5.234v5.391l-1.571="h5.234v5.391l-1.571" z="z" m835.424="M835.424" l.022="l.022" fg="Fg" xmlns="xmlns" xmlns:data="data">Precision Genetics for Complex Objectives in Animal Agriculture</a>. Journal of Animal Science. In press. Mar 12. [Epub ahead of print]. PMID: 20228236</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Wong, A.C., and A. L. Van Eenennaam. 2010. FLPe functions in zebrafish embryos. Transgenic Research. In press.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">W. E. Pohlmeier, R. C. Hovey, and A. L. Van Eenennaam. 2010. Reproductive abnormalities in mice expressing omega-3 fatty acid desaturase in their mammary glands. Transgenic Research. In press</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A. L., K. L. Weber, K. Cooprider, and D. J. Drake. 2010. <a rel="nofollow" class="external free" href="http://ucanr.org/repository/cao/landingpage.cfm?article=ca.v064n02p94&fulltext=yes" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 13px; background: linear-gradient(transparent, transparent) 100% 50% no-repeat, url(" data:image="data:image" svg="svg" xml="xml" c="C" fxml="Fxml" version="version" d="D" encoding="encoding" utf-8="UTF-8" f="F" e="E" csvg="Csvg" http="http" a="A" fwww.w3.org="Fwww.w3.org" f2000="F2000" fsvg="Fsvg" width="width" height="height" cg="Cg" transform="transform" translate="translate" crect="Crect" x="x" y="y" fill="fill" fff="fff" stroke="stroke" cpath="Cpath" m831.194="M831.194" h5.234v5.391l-1.571="h5.234v5.391l-1.571" z="z" m835.424="M835.424" l.022="l.022" fg="Fg" xmlns="xmlns" xmlns:data="data">http://ucanr.org/repository/cao/landingpage.cfm?article=ca.v064n02p94&fulltext=yes</a> Development and implementation of a vertically-integrated beef cattle data collection system]. California Agriculture. 64: 94-100.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A. L., and J. F. Medrano. 2008. Manipulation of Milk Fat Composition Through Transgenesis, pages 343-354 in “Bioactive Components in Milk”, Volume 606 of Advances in Experimental Medicine and Biology. Edited by Z. Bösze. Springer. 483 pp.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">W. Pohlmeier, and A. L. Van Eenennaam. 2008. Animal Biotechnology. 30 minute UC ANR peer-reviewed video. [http//animalscience.ucdavis.edu/animalbiotech/Outreach]</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Andrew C. Wong and Alison L. Van Eenennaam, <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=20218510" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 13px; background: linear-gradient(transparent, transparent) 100% 50% no-repeat, url(" data:image="data:image" svg="svg" xml="xml" c="C" fxml="Fxml" version="version" d="D" encoding="encoding" utf-8="UTF-8" f="F" e="E" csvg="Csvg" http="http" a="A" fwww.w3.org="Fwww.w3.org" f2000="F2000" fsvg="Fsvg" width="width" height="height" cg="Cg" transform="transform" translate="translate" crect="Crect" x="x" y="y" fill="fill" fff="fff" stroke="stroke" cpath="Cpath" m831.194="M831.194" h5.234v5.391l-1.571="h5.234v5.391l-1.571" z="z" m835.424="M835.424" l.022="l.022" fg="Fg" xmlns="xmlns" xmlns:data="data">"Transgenic Approaches for the Reproductive Containment of Genetically Engineered Fish"</a>, Aquaculture, 2008.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A. L., R. L. Weaber, D. J. Drake, M. C. T. Penedo, R. L. Quaas , D. J. Garrick, E. J. Pollak. 2007. <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://jas.fass.org/cgi/reprint/jas.2007-0284" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 13px; background: linear-gradient(transparent, transparent) 100% 50% no-repeat, url(" data:image="data:image" svg="svg" xml="xml" c="C" fxml="Fxml" version="version" d="D" encoding="encoding" utf-8="UTF-8" f="F" e="E" csvg="Csvg" http="http" a="A" fwww.w3.org="Fwww.w3.org" f2000="F2000" fsvg="Fsvg" width="width" height="height" cg="Cg" transform="transform" translate="translate" crect="Crect" x="x" y="y" fill="fill" fff="fff" stroke="stroke" cpath="Cpath" m831.194="M831.194" h5.234v5.391l-1.571="h5.234v5.391l-1.571" z="z" m835.424="M835.424" l.022="l.022" fg="Fg" xmlns="xmlns" xmlns:data="data">DNA-based paternity analysis and genetic evaluation in a large commercial cattle ranch setting</a>. Journal of Animal Science. 853159–3169</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A. L., J. Li, R. M. Thallman, R. L. Quaas, M. E. Dikeman, C. A. Gill, D. E. Franke, M. G. Thomas. 2007.<a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://jas.fass.org/cgi/content/full/85/4/891" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 13px; background: linear-gradient(transparent, transparent) 100% 50% no-repeat, url(" data:image="data:image" svg="svg" xml="xml" c="C" fxml="Fxml" version="version" d="D" encoding="encoding" utf-8="UTF-8" f="F" e="E" csvg="Csvg" http="http" a="A" fwww.w3.org="Fwww.w3.org" f2000="F2000" fsvg="Fsvg" width="width" height="height" cg="Cg" transform="transform" translate="translate" crect="Crect" x="x" y="y" fill="fill" fff="fff" stroke="stroke" cpath="Cpath" m831.194="M831.194" h5.234v5.391l-1.571="h5.234v5.391l-1.571" z="z" m835.424="M835.424" l.022="l.022" fg="Fg" xmlns="xmlns" xmlns:data="data">Validation of commercial DNA tests for quantitative beef quality traits</a>. Journal of Animal Science. 85891-900.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A. L., and P. G. Lemaux 2007. Cornucopia’s Challenge. 30 minute UC ANR peer-reviewed video. University of California, Division of Agriculture and Natural Resources. 6587V (VHS) or 6587D (DVD). Also available on www.YouTube.com</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">K. D. Bongiovanni, E. J. DePeters, and A. L. Van Eenennaam. 2007. <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?Db=pubmed&Cmd=ShowDetailView&TermToSearch=17667849&ordinalpos=2&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 13px; background: linear-gradient(transparent, transparent) 100% 50% no-repeat, url(" data:image="data:image" svg="svg" xml="xml" c="C" fxml="Fxml" version="version" d="D" encoding="encoding" utf-8="UTF-8" f="F" e="E" csvg="Csvg" http="http" a="A" fwww.w3.org="Fwww.w3.org" f2000="F2000" fsvg="Fsvg" width="width" height="height" cg="Cg" transform="transform" translate="translate" crect="Crect" x="x" y="y" fill="fill" fff="fff" stroke="stroke" cpath="Cpath" m831.194="M831.194" h5.234v5.391l-1.571="h5.234v5.391l-1.571" z="z" m835.424="M835.424" l.022="l.022" fg="Fg" xmlns="xmlns" xmlns:data="data">Neonatal Growth and Development of Mice Raised on Milk Transgenically-Enriched with Omega-3 Fatty Acids</a>. Pediatric Research. 62(4)412-6.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Kao, B. T., E. J. DePeters, and A. L. Van Eenennaam. 2006. <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?Db=pubmed&Cmd=ShowDetailView&TermToSearch=16981432&ordinalpos=4&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 13px; background: linear-gradient(transparent, transparent) 100% 50% no-repeat, url(" data:image="data:image" svg="svg" xml="xml" c="C" fxml="Fxml" version="version" d="D" encoding="encoding" utf-8="UTF-8" f="F" e="E" csvg="Csvg" http="http" a="A" fwww.w3.org="Fwww.w3.org" f2000="F2000" fsvg="Fsvg" width="width" height="height" cg="Cg" transform="transform" translate="translate" crect="Crect" x="x" y="y" fill="fill" fff="fff" stroke="stroke" cpath="Cpath" m831.194="M831.194" h5.234v5.391l-1.571="h5.234v5.391l-1.571" z="z" m835.424="M835.424" l.022="l.022" fg="Fg" xmlns="xmlns" xmlns:data="data">Mice Raised on Milk Transgenically-Enriched with n-3 PUFA have Increased Brain Docosahexaenoic Acid</a>. Lipids. 41(6)543-9.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Kao, B. T., K. A. Lewis, E. J. DePeters, and A. L. Van Eenennaam. 2006. <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://animalscience.ucdavis.edu/animalbiotech/My_Laboratory/Publications/3195.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">Endogenous Production and Elevated Levels of Long-Chain n-3 Fatty Acids in the Milk of Transgenic Mice</a>. Journal of Dairy Science. 893195-3201.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A. L. and P. G. Olin. 2006. <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://animalscience.ucdavis.edu/animalbiotech/My_Laboratory/Publications/riskassesstransgenicfish.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">Genetically engineered fish</a>. California Agriculture. 60(3) 126-131.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A. L. 2006. <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://animalscience.ucdavis.edu/animalbiotech/My_Laboratory/Publications/futureanimalbiotech.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">What is the future of animal biotechnology?</a> California Agriculture. 60(3) 132-139.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A. L. 2006. <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://animalscience.ucdavis.edu/animalbiotech/My_Laboratory/Publications/NBCEC-SireSelectionManualChapter.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">“DNA-Based Biotechnologies”</a> Chapter in the National Beef Cattle Evaluation Consortium (NBCEC) Beef Sire Selection Manual. Pages 66-73.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A.L. 2005. <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://anrcatalog.ucdavis.edu/pdf/8185.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">Genetic Engineering and Fish</a>. UC ANR, Agricultural Biotechnology in California Series, Publication # 8185.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A.L. 2005. <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://anrcatalog.ucdavis.edu/pdf/8184.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">Genetic Engineering and Animal Agriculture</a>. UC ANR, Agricultural Biotech in California Series, Publication # 8184.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A.L. 2005. <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://anrcatalog.ucdavis.edu/pdf/8183.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">Genetic Engineering and Animal Feed</a>. UC ANR, Agricultural Biotechnology in California Series, Publication # 8183.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Morimoto, K. C., A. L. Van Eenennaam, E. J. DePeters, and J. F. Medrano. 2005. <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://animalscience.ucdavis.edu/animalbiotech/My_Laboratory/Publications/VanEJDS1.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">Hot Topic Endogenous Production of Omega-3 and Omega-6 Fatty Acids in Mammalian Cells</a>. Journal of Dairy Science. 88(3) 88(3) 1142-1146.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Wong, A.C., and A.L. Van Eenennaam. 2004. <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://animalscience.ucdavis.edu/animalbiotech/My_Laboratory/Publications/zeb.2004.1.203.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">Gonadotropin hormone and receptor sequences from model teleost species</a>. Zebrafish. 1(3)203-221.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Deynze, A. Van Eenennaam, A.L. and Bradford, K.J. 2004. <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://anrcatalog.ucdavis.edu/pdf/8145.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">Crop Biotechnology Feeds for Livestock</a>. UC ANR, Agricultural Biotechnology in California Series, Publication # 8145.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A. L. 2004. Genetic Engineering in California Agriculture. 30 minute UC ANR peer-reviewed video. ANRUCTV 04-06. 6502V (VHS) or 6502D (DVD).</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A. L. 2004. <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://animalscience.ucdavis.edu/animalbiotech/My_Laboratory/Publications/VanEenennaamcowcalfproducer.PDF" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">DNA-based Marker-Assisted Selection in Beef Cattle</a>. Genetic Section - CL1043 in “Cow-Calf Management Guide & Cattle Producer’s Library”. University of Idaho, Moscow.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A. L., G. Li, M. Venkatramesh, C. Levering, X. Gong, A. C. Jamieson, C. K. Shewmaker, and C. C. Case. 2004. <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://animalscience.ucdavis.edu/animalbiotech/My_Laboratory/Publications/sdarticle.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">Elevation of seed α-tocopherol levels using plant-based transcription factors targeted to an endogenous locus</a>. Metabolic Engineering. 6(2)101-8.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A. L., Kim Lincoln, Timothy P. Durrett, Henry E. Valentin, Christine K. Shewmaker, Greg M. Thorne, Jian Jiang, Susan R. Norris, and Robert L. Last. 2003. <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://animalscience.ucdavis.edu/animalbiotech/My_Laboratory/Publications/3007.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">Engineering vitamin E content from Arabidopsis mutant to soy oil</a>. Plant Cell. 15 3007-3019.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A. L., J. D. Murray, and J. F. Medrano. 1999. Karyotype of the American green sturgeon. Transactions of the American Fisheries Society 128175-177.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A. L., Van Eenennaam, J.P., Medrano, J.F., and Doroshov, S.I. 1999. Evidence of female heterogametic genetic sex determination in white sturgeon. The Journal of Heredity 90 231-233.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A. L., J. D. Murray, and J. F. Medrano. 1998. <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://animalscience.ucdavis.edu/animalbiotech/My_Laboratory/Publications/VanEgenome1.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">Mitotic analysis of the North American white sturgeon, Acipenser transmontanus Richardson (Pisces, Acipenseridae), a fish with a very high chromosome number</a>. Genome 41266-271.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A. L., J. D. Murray, and J. F. Medrano. 1998. <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://animalscience.ucdavis.edu/animalbiotech/My_Laboratory/Publications/Genomesynaptonemalcomplex.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">Synaptonemal complex analysis in spermatocytes of white sturgeon, Acipenser transmontanus Richardson (Pisces, Acipenseridae), a fish with a very high chromosome number</a>. Genome 4151-61.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A. L., J. P. Van Eenennaam, J. F. Medrano, and S. I. Doroshov. 1996. Rapid verification of meiotic gynogenesis and polyploidy in white sturgeon (Acipenser transmontanus Richardson). Aquaculture 147177-189.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A. L., I. A. Gardner, J. Holmes, L. Perani, R. J. Anderson, J. S. Cullor, and W. M. Guterbock. 1995. <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://animalscience.ucdavis.edu/animalbiotech/My_Laboratory/Publications/2086.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">Financial analysis of alternative treatments for clinical mastitis associated with environmental pathogens</a>. Journal of Dairy Science 782086-2095.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Cullor, J. S., A. L. Van Eenennaam, I. A. Gardner, L. Perani, J.Dellinger, W. L. Smith, T. Thompson, M. A. Payne, L. Jensen, and W. Guterbock. 1994. Performance of various tests used to screen antibiotic residues in milk samples from individual animals. J. AOAC Int. 77 862-870.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Guterbock, W. M., A. L. Van Eenennaam, R. J. Anderson, I. A. Gardner, J. S. Cullor, and C. A. Holmberg. 1993. <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://animalscience.ucdavis.edu/animalbiotech/My_Laboratory/Publications/3437.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">Efficacy of intramammary antibiotic therapy for treatment of clinical mastitis caused by environmental pathogens</a>. Journal of Dairy Science 763437-3444.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A. L., J. S. Cullor, L. Perani, I. A. Gardner, W. L. Smith, J. Dellinger, W. M. Guterbock, and L. Jensen. 1993.<a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://animalscience.ucdavis.edu/animalbiotech/My_Laboratory/Publications/3041.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">Evaluation of milk antibiotic residue screening tests in cattle with naturally occurring clinical mastitis</a>. Journal of Dairy Science 763041-3053.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A. L., and J. F. Medrano. 1991. Milk protein polymorphisms in the California dairy cattle population. Journal of Dairy Science 741730-1742.</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Van Eenennaam, A. L., and J. F. Medrano. 1991. Differences in allelic protein expression in the milk of heterozygous Κ-casein cows. Journal of Dairy Science 741491-1496.</li>

</ul>

The following are grants Van Eenennaam received to conduct research:<a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#cite_note-13" style="text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap; background: none;">[13]</a>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Integrating DNA information into beef cattle production systems. USDA-NRI ANIMAL GENOME INTEGRATED GRANT 1/1/2009 - 12/31/2012 A. L. Van Eenennaam (PI)</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Economic analysis of integrating DNA information into beef cattle production systems. UC Davis Academic Federation Professional Development Award. 7/1/09-6/30/10. A. L. Van Eenennaam (PI)</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Whole genome associations for sire prolificacy on California commercial beef cattle ranches. University of California/California State University Collaborative Research Program. 1/1/10-12/31/10. A. L. Van Eenennaam (Co PI) and B L. Golden (Co PI)</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Alterations in membrane composition and function with calorie restriction. NIH RO1 10/1/07 - 9/30/12. Jon Ramsey (PI). Collaborator A. L. Van Eenennaam</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Assessment of the well-being and behavior of genetically engineered dairy goats. USDA–NRI 10/1/05 – 6/30/10 E. Maga, J. Murray, J. Mench and A. L. Van Eenennaam (Co-PI)</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">2009 Beef Improvement Federation Annual Research Symposium and Annual Meeting. USDA-NRI ANIMAL GENOME Conference Grant. 1/1/2009-12/31/2009 A. L. Van Eenennaam (PI)</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">2009 Beef Improvement Federation Conference. UC Davis CA&ES Programmatic Initiatives. Conference grant. A. L. Van Eenennaam (PI)</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">2009 Beef Improvement Federation Conference. California Beef Council. FY 2009 Proposal. Conference support grant. A. L. Van Eenennaam (PI)</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Development of an Integrated Animal Identification and Tracking System. University of California Core Issues Grant 3/1/07-2/28/09. A. L. Van Eenennaam (PI)</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Biological containment of genetically engineered fish. USDA – BRAG Biotechnology Risk Assessment 9/1/05-8/31/08. A. L. Van Eenennaam (PI)</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Validation of new technologies for beef cattle improvement. California Cattlemen’s Livestock Memorial Research Fund. 7/1/05 – 6/30/06. A. L. Van Eenennaam (PI)</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Animal Identification Outreach Contract. California Department of Food and Agriculture 07/01/2005 - 06/30/2006. A. L. Van Eenennaam (PI)</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Coexistence of Diverse Production Systems in California Agriculture Development of Science-based Educational Materials and Outreach Programs. UC ANR Core Issues Grant. 3/1/05 – 2/28/06. A. L. Van Eenennaam (PI)</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Functionality of recombinase/fluorescent marker fusion proteins in eukaryotes. UC Davis Academic Federation Research Grants Program Innovative Development Awards 7/1/05-6/30/2006 A. L. Van Eenennaam (PI)</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Using replacement heifers to estimate carcass quality of herdmates. California Beef Cattle Improvement Association. 5/2005. A. L. Van Eenennaam (PI)</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Pilot Study on Mammary Expression of Novel Desaturases. NIH NICHD R03 Small Grants Program. 7/1/04 – 6/30/06. A. L. Van Eenennaam (PI)</li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Identification and characterization of the lysophosphatidic acid acyltransferase from the echidna (Tachyglossus aculeatus) mammary gland. NSF Women's International Science Collaboration (WISC) Travel Grant Program. A. L. Van Eenennaam (PI).</li>

</ul>

<h2 style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 1em 0px 0.25em; overflow: hidden; padding: 0px; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-color: rgb(170, 170, 170); line-height: 1.3; background: none rgb(255, 255, 255);">Articles and resources</h2>

<h3 style=" margin: 0.3em 0px 0px; overflow: hidden; padding-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; border-bottom-style: none; line-height: 1.6; background: none rgb(255, 255, 255);">Related SourceWatch articles</h3>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/AquAdvantage_salmon" title="AquAdvantage salmon" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">AquAdvantage salmon</a></li>

<li style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Veterinary_Medicine_Advisory_Committee" title="Veterinary Medicine Advisory Committee" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;">Veterinary Medicine Advisory Committee</a></li>

</ul>

<li id="cite_note-1" style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#cite_ref-1" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;"><span class="cite-accessibility-label" style=" top: -99999px; clip: rect(1px 1px 1px 1px); overflow: hidden; position: absolute !important; padding: 0px !important; border: 0px !important; height: 1px !important; width: 1px !important; -webkit-user-select: none;">Jump up↑</a> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://www.fda.gov/downloads/AdvisoryCommittees/CommitteesMeetingMaterials/VeterinaryMedicineAdvisoryCommittee/UCM225072.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">Curriculum Vitae</a>, Accessed September 13, 2010.</li>

<li id="cite_note-2" style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#cite_ref-2" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;"><span class="cite-accessibility-label" style=" top: -99999px; clip: rect(1px 1px 1px 1px); overflow: hidden; position: absolute !important; padding: 0px !important; border: 0px !important; height: 1px !important; width: 1px !important; -webkit-user-select: none;">Jump up↑</a> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://www.fda.gov/AdvisoryCommittees/CommitteesMeetingMaterials/VeterinaryMedicineAdvisoryCommittee/ucm224765.htm" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 13px; background: linear-gradient(transparent, transparent) 100% 50% no-repeat, url(" data:image="data:image" svg="svg" xml="xml" c="C" fxml="Fxml" version="version" d="D" encoding="encoding" utf-8="UTF-8" f="F" e="E" csvg="Csvg" http="http" a="A" fwww.w3.org="Fwww.w3.org" f2000="F2000" fsvg="Fsvg" width="width" height="height" cg="Cg" transform="transform" translate="translate" crect="Crect" x="x" y="y" fill="fill" fff="fff" stroke="stroke" cpath="Cpath" m831.194="M831.194" h5.234v5.391l-1.571="h5.234v5.391l-1.571" z="z" m835.424="M835.424" l.022="l.022" fg="Fg" xmlns="xmlns" xmlns:data="data">Meeting Participants for Aquadvantage Salmon Veterinary Medicine Advisory Committee</a>, U.S. FDA, Accessed September 13, 2010.</li>

<li id="cite_note-3" style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#cite_ref-3" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;"><span class="cite-accessibility-label" style=" top: -99999px; clip: rect(1px 1px 1px 1px); overflow: hidden; position: absolute !important; padding: 0px !important; border: 0px !important; height: 1px !important; width: 1px !important; -webkit-user-select: none;">Jump up↑</a> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://www.fda.gov/downloads/AdvisoryCommittees/CommitteesMeetingMaterials/VeterinaryMedicineAdvisoryCommittee/UCM225072.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">Curriculum Vitae</a>, Accessed September 13, 2010.</li>

<li id="cite_note-4" style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#cite_ref-4" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;"><span class="cite-accessibility-label" style=" top: -99999px; clip: rect(1px 1px 1px 1px); overflow: hidden; position: absolute !important; padding: 0px !important; border: 0px !important; height: 1px !important; width: 1px !important; -webkit-user-select: none;">Jump up↑</a> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://www.fda.gov/downloads/AdvisoryCommittees/CommitteesMeetingMaterials/VeterinaryMedicineAdvisoryCommittee/UCM225072.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">Curriculum Vitae</a>, Accessed September 13, 2010.</li>

<li id="cite_note-5" style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#cite_ref-5" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;"><span class="cite-accessibility-label" style=" top: -99999px; clip: rect(1px 1px 1px 1px); overflow: hidden; position: absolute !important; padding: 0px !important; border: 0px !important; height: 1px !important; width: 1px !important; -webkit-user-select: none;">Jump up↑</a> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qCIvAuwaf-o" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 13px; background: linear-gradient(transparent, transparent) 100% 50% no-repeat, url(" data:image="data:image" svg="svg" xml="xml" c="C" fxml="Fxml" version="version" d="D" encoding="encoding" utf-8="UTF-8" f="F" e="E" csvg="Csvg" http="http" a="A" fwww.w3.org="Fwww.w3.org" f2000="F2000" fsvg="Fsvg" width="width" height="height" cg="Cg" transform="transform" translate="translate" crect="Crect" x="x" y="y" fill="fill" fff="fff" stroke="stroke" cpath="Cpath" m831.194="M831.194" h5.234v5.391l-1.571="h5.234v5.391l-1.571" z="z" m835.424="M835.424" l.022="l.022" fg="Fg" xmlns="xmlns" xmlns:data="data">"Animal Biotechnology"</a>, YouTube, Accessed September 14, 2010.</li>

<li id="cite_note-6" style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#cite_ref-6" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;"><span class="cite-accessibility-label" style=" top: -99999px; clip: rect(1px 1px 1px 1px); overflow: hidden; position: absolute !important; padding: 0px !important; border: 0px !important; height: 1px !important; width: 1px !important; -webkit-user-select: none;">Jump up↑</a> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://news.ucdavis.edu/search/news_detail.lasso?id=9560" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 13px; background: linear-gradient(transparent, transparent) 100% 50% no-repeat, url(" data:image="data:image" svg="svg" xml="xml" c="C" fxml="Fxml" version="version" d="D" encoding="encoding" utf-8="UTF-8" f="F" e="E" csvg="Csvg" http="http" a="A" fwww.w3.org="Fwww.w3.org" f2000="F2000" fsvg="Fsvg" width="width" height="height" cg="Cg" transform="transform" translate="translate" crect="Crect" x="x" y="y" fill="fill" fff="fff" stroke="stroke" cpath="Cpath" m831.194="M831.194" h5.234v5.391l-1.571="h5.234v5.391l-1.571" z="z" m835.424="M835.424" l.022="l.022" fg="Fg" xmlns="xmlns" xmlns:data="data">Recent honors for UC Davis faculty and staff</a>, August 23, 2010.</li>

<li id="cite_note-7" style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#cite_ref-7" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;"><span class="cite-accessibility-label" style=" top: -99999px; clip: rect(1px 1px 1px 1px); overflow: hidden; position: absolute !important; padding: 0px !important; border: 0px !important; height: 1px !important; width: 1px !important; -webkit-user-select: none;">Jump up↑</a> Van Eenennaam, A.L. 2005. <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://anrcatalog.ucdavis.edu/pdf/8185.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">Genetic Engineering and Fish</a>. UC ANR, Agricultural Biotechnology in California Series, Publication # 8185.</li>

<li id="cite_note-8" style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#cite_ref-8" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;"><span class="cite-accessibility-label" style=" top: -99999px; clip: rect(1px 1px 1px 1px); overflow: hidden; position: absolute !important; padding: 0px !important; border: 0px !important; height: 1px !important; width: 1px !important; -webkit-user-select: none;">Jump up↑</a> Alison L. Van Eenennaam and Paul G. Olin, <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://animalscience.ucdavis.edu/animalbiotech/My_Laboratory/Publications/riskassesstransgenicfish.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">"Careful risk assessment needed to evaluate transgenic ﬁsh"</a>, California Agriculture, 2006.</li>

<li id="cite_note-9" style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#cite_ref-9" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;"><span class="cite-accessibility-label" style=" top: -99999px; clip: rect(1px 1px 1px 1px); overflow: hidden; position: absolute !important; padding: 0px !important; border: 0px !important; height: 1px !important; width: 1px !important; -webkit-user-select: none;">Jump up↑</a> Andrew C. Wong and Alison L. Van Eenennaam, <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=20218510" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 13px; background: linear-gradient(transparent, transparent) 100% 50% no-repeat, url(" data:image="data:image" svg="svg" xml="xml" c="C" fxml="Fxml" version="version" d="D" encoding="encoding" utf-8="UTF-8" f="F" e="E" csvg="Csvg" http="http" a="A" fwww.w3.org="Fwww.w3.org" f2000="F2000" fsvg="Fsvg" width="width" height="height" cg="Cg" transform="transform" translate="translate" crect="Crect" x="x" y="y" fill="fill" fff="fff" stroke="stroke" cpath="Cpath" m831.194="M831.194" h5.234v5.391l-1.571="h5.234v5.391l-1.571" z="z" m835.424="M835.424" l.022="l.022" fg="Fg" xmlns="xmlns" xmlns:data="data">"Transgenic Approaches for the Reproductive Containment of Genetically Engineered Fish"</a>, Aquaculture, 2008.</li>

<li id="cite_note-10" style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#cite_ref-10" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;"><span class="cite-accessibility-label" style=" top: -99999px; clip: rect(1px 1px 1px 1px); overflow: hidden; position: absolute !important; padding: 0px !important; border: 0px !important; height: 1px !important; width: 1px !important; -webkit-user-select: none;">Jump up↑</a> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://www.fda.gov/downloads/AdvisoryCommittees/CommitteesMeetingMaterials/VeterinaryMedicineAdvisoryCommittee/UCM225072.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">Curriculum Vitae</a>, Accessed September 13, 2010.</li>

<li id="cite_note-11" style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#cite_ref-11" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;"><span class="cite-accessibility-label" style=" top: -99999px; clip: rect(1px 1px 1px 1px); overflow: hidden; position: absolute !important; padding: 0px !important; border: 0px !important; height: 1px !important; width: 1px !important; -webkit-user-select: none;">Jump up↑</a> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://www.fda.gov/downloads/AdvisoryCommittees/CommitteesMeetingMaterials/VeterinaryMedicineAdvisoryCommittee/UCM225072.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">Curriculum Vitae</a>, Accessed September 13, 2010.</li>

<li id="cite_note-12" style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#cite_ref-12" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;"><span class="cite-accessibility-label" style=" top: -99999px; clip: rect(1px 1px 1px 1px); overflow: hidden; position: absolute !important; padding: 0px !important; border: 0px !important; height: 1px !important; width: 1px !important; -webkit-user-select: none;">Jump up↑</a> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://www.fda.gov/downloads/AdvisoryCommittees/CommitteesMeetingMaterials/VeterinaryMedicineAdvisoryCommittee/UCM225072.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">Curriculum Vitae</a>, Accessed September 13, 2010.</li>

<li id="cite_note-13" style=" margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Alison_L._Van_Eenennaam#cite_ref-13" style="text-decoration: none; background: none;"><span class="cite-accessibility-label" style=" top: -99999px; clip: rect(1px 1px 1px 1px); overflow: hidden; position: absolute !important; padding: 0px !important; border: 0px !important; height: 1px !important; width: 1px !important; -webkit-user-select: none;">Jump up↑</a> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://www.fda.gov/downloads/AdvisoryCommittees/CommitteesMeetingMaterials/VeterinaryMedicineAdvisoryCommittee/UCM225072.pdf" style="text-decoration: none; padding-right: 16px; background: url(" http="http" upload.wikimedia.org="upload.wikimedia.org" wikipedia="wikipedia" commons="commons" icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif="Icons-mini-file_acrobat.gif" no-repeat="no-repeat">Curriculum Vitae</a>, Accessed September 13, 2010.</li>

</ol>

<h3 style=" margin: 0.3em 0px 0px; overflow: hidden; padding-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; border-bottom-style: none; line-height: 1.6; background: none rgb(255, 255, 255);">External resources</h3>

==

in JE's NAS talk:

In early September came the publication of an unprecedented study that covers literally trillions of meals. Writing in the <a href="http://www.journalofanimalscience.org/content/early/2014/08/27/jas.2014-8124" style="border: 0px none; margin: 0px; outline: none 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration: none; background: none 0px 0px repeat scroll transparent;">Journal of Animal Science</a>, University of California-Davis geneticist Alison Van Eenennaam oversaw the longest term monitoring of the health impact of GM crops in history. She reviewed 29 years of feeding data covering more than 100 billion animals, from before 1996 when feed was 100 percent non-GMO, until after its introduction when it soared past 90 percent.

<a href="http://www.geneticliteracyproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/Screen-Shot-2014-09-16-at-11.05.25-AM.png" rel="lightbox[268998]" title="GLP's Jon Entine cautions National Academy of Sciences about views of anti-science NGOs" class="cboxElement" style="border: 0px none; margin: 0px; outline: none 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration: none; background: none 0px 0px repeat scroll transparent;"><img src="/01a4b3e1-aa7e-59fd-baa9-b0e744634fbd.png"/></a>Just days ago came the publication of an unprecedented study that covers literally trillions of meals. Writing in the <a href="http://www.journalofanimalscience.org/content/early/2014/08/27/jas.2014-8124" target="_blank" style="border: 0px none; margin: 0px; outline: none 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration: none; background: none 0px 0px repeat scroll transparent;">Journal of Animal Science</a>, University of California-Davis geneticist Alison Van Eenennaam oversaw the longest term monitoring of the health impact of GM crops in history. She reviewed 29 years of feeding data covering more than 100 billion animals, from before 1996 when feed was 100 percent non-GMO, until after its introduction when it soared past 90 percent. She reviewed pre and post mortem records, as ill cattle cannot be approved for meat.

The study is unusual because of the vast trove of records examined. Van Eenennaam reviewed heath parameters including somatic cell count (SCC—an indicator of mastitis and inflammation in the udder) and pre and post mortem condemnation records in cattle, as ill cattle cannot be approved for meat, as well as mortality in the poultry industry. “It should be noted that if animals are sick they do not grow well, and growth rates have not be affected by GMO feed,” Van Eennaam told me.

The paper also summarizes the results of two thorough multigenerational studies that examined the long-term effects of feeding a GMO corn variety to food-producing animals, specifically, a German study in dairy cattle and an Irish study in pigs that included several papers looking specifically at health indicators. These studies were notable in that they included appropriate controls consuming isogenic non-GE lines of corn, and both comprehensively examined a range of phenotypes and indicators of health using sophisticated techniques including histopathology and hematological analyses. These papers found that that transgenerational consumption of these GMO corn diets was not detrimental to animal health.

It should be underscored that animal feeding studies are the basis for evaluating the safety of GMO crops; we do not do human studies on foods or drugs except for monitoring. The data also show that GM feed is safe and nutritionally equivalent to non-GMO feed. There was no evidence of any health risk to the animals and no evidence to suggest any health effect on humans who eat those animals....

==

http://www.geneticliteracyproject.org/2015/09/10/ive-been-foia-ed-alison-van-eenennaam-on-being-in-crosshairs-of-anti-gmo-activists/

hvy pathos. but does not point out that folta took 25K from monsanto then cut an paste ketchum bs on the gmo answers site under HIS name

...

On February 5, 2015, six University of California—Davis scientists, myself included, received a FOIA request from USRTK. The request was for all correspondence (letters, emails) written or received since 1/1/2012 to or from me and to or from any staff or employees of any of the following organizations: Monsanto, Syngenta, Bayer or Bayer Crop Science, BASF, DuPont or Pioneer, Dow or Dow AgroSciences, Ketchum, GMO Answers, Biotechnology Industry Organization, Council for Biotechnology Information, Grocery Manufacturers Association, Fleishman Hillard, Ogilvy & Mather, Winner & Mandabach, Bicker, Castillo & Fairbanks, and the NGO No on 37. That is more than 3 years of email traffic.

The request, written by the head of USRTK Gary Ruskin (Ruskin headed up the failed campaign to pass a mandatory labelling law in California), read:

“I am making this request on behalf of U.S. Right to Know, a 501(c)(3) non-profit food research organization. The records disclosed pursuant to this request will be used in the preparation of articles for dissemination to the public. Accordingly, I request that you waive all fees in the public interest because furnishing of the information sought by this request will primarily benefit the public.”

...

I will add that since then I received a second FOIA request from USRTK on August 3 requesting all correspondence (letters, email) from: (1) any staff or employees of any of the following organizations or (2) persons: Coalition for Safe and Affordable Food, FP1 Strategies, CMA, American Council on Science and Health, Genetic Literacy Project, Jon Entine, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and any email correspondence since January 1, 2013 to or from me to or from or cc’d to or bcc’d to any of the following domains: Cfsaf.org , Fp1strategies.com, Acsh.org, Cmabuildstrust.com, and Gatesfoundation.org.

[CMA

2900 NE Brooktree Lane, Suite 200

Gladstone, MO 64119

Phone: (816) 880-0204

Email: <a href="mailto:info@cmabuildstrust.com" target="_blank" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; transition: all 0.5s ease-out; line-height: 18.2px;">info@cmabuildstrust.com</a>]

...

[Editor’s note: This essay was written for and edited by the Genetic Literacy Project. Because of its unique perspective, it’s also been posted on Science 2.0 <a href="http://www.science20.com/alison_van_eenennaam/foiaed_life_in_the_crosshairs_of_antigmo_activists-157133" target="_blank" style="border: 0px none; margin: 0px; outline: none 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; text-decoration: none; background: none 0px 0px repeat scroll transparent;">here</a>.]

Alison Van Eenennaam, Ph.D. is an animal geneticist and Cooperative Extension specialist in the Department of Animal Science at the University of California, Davis. My Twitter handle: @BioBeef

==

acsh with many others  [incl offit slaone kettering ~ vaxer]

<li style=" margin: 0px 0px 8px; padding: 0px; list-style: disc; line-height: 1.1em;">Judith S. Stern, Sc.D., R.D.

University of California, Davis</li>

</ul>

===

<div style=" text-align: left;"><strong style="line-height: 22.1px; text-align: center; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"><strong style="line-height: 22.1px; text-align: center; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Many other letter writers also have undisclosed industry links. Take, for instance, Martina Newell-McGloughlin. <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0278691512007922" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: 0px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">She identifies herself </a>as the director of the International Biotechnology Program at the University of California/Davis, but fails to mention that <a href="http://www.citywatchla.com/4box-left/3879-damning-report-questions-monsanto-genetically-modified-corn-study" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: 0px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">the Program is funded by the likes of Monsanto, Syngenta, DuPont and Bayer</a>. Another letter writer and a colleague at UC Davis, Kent Bradford, <a href="http://www.sacbee.com/static/live/news/projects/biotech/c3_3.html" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: 0px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">has consulted for Monsanto</a>. Lucia de Souza<a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0278691512008022" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: 0px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"> wrote to the journal </a>with Leila Macedo Oda on behalf of <a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/ANBio" style="text-decoration: none; font-weight: bold; outline: 0px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">ANBio – the Brazilian Biosafety Association</a>, without mentioning that ANBio's funders include Monsanto, Bayer, and DuPont. </div>

<strong style="line-height: 22.1px; text-align: center; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"><strong style="line-height: 22.1px; text-align: center; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">==

GLP:

Caroline Lieber, Director, Human Genetics Graduate Program, Sarah Lawrence College

Caroline is head of the largest genetic counseling training program in the United States, with more than 600 graduates and links to 50 genetic centers around the country. She received her MS in Human Genetics from Sarah Lawrence and her BS from the University of California-Davis. She is also an ABGC licensed genetic counselor and member of the Transnational Alliance for Genetic Counseling.

---

==

GMO

<a href="http://www.indymedia.ie/article/104406?print_page=true">http://www.indymedia.ie/article/104406?print_page=true</a>

<h1 class="article-title" style="margin-bottom: 4px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">SFI, Martina Newell Mcloughlin, And GM Crops. A Blatant Conflict Of Interest?</h1>

<div class="article-subtitledetails" style="margin-bottom: 1em; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><img class="icon" src="file:///C:/DATAleno/BRAINS/webodec3_brain/Files/AF4C73AD-E816-59D0-3552-976990B4D004/PersonalBrain Notes/downloadedimagefile0.gif" alt="category" style=" border: 0px;" /> national | environment | opinion/analysis <img class="icon" src="file:///C:/DATAleno/BRAINS/webodec3_brain/Files/AF4C73AD-E816-59D0-3552-976990B4D004/PersonalBrain Notes/downloadedimagefile1.gif" alt="author" style=" border: 0px;" /> Monday January 06, 2014 15:29<img class="icon" src="file:///C:/DATAleno/BRAINS/webodec3_brain/Files/AF4C73AD-E816-59D0-3552-976990B4D004/PersonalBrain Notes/downloadedimagefile2.gif" alt="author" style=" border: 0px;" /> by Nick Cullen</div>

<blockquote class="article-intro" style="font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Ireland's future agricultural interests are clearly best served by promoting and producing clean organic GM free food for which there is an increasing market and higher margins. So why are key figures pushing a pro GM agenda?</blockquote>

From a farming perspective, it is the conflict of interest of Martina Newell Mcloughlin with regard to the growing of GM crops that is most striking.

The high level Bord Bia report ‘Pathways for Growth’, states that ''Ireland has an enviable agricultural situation that almost every other country would kill for'''... ''in the race to produce exactly the type of food that a growing number of consumers are demanding''......''natural and we can prove it''....which is required by the modern consumer who...''rebels against “multinationals” who they think are adulterating the food we eat'' the report adds that '' Given its lack of scale and cost disadvantages, Ireland is not going to win the commodity game. It must have a high margin export strategy''.

However promoting GM crops globally is a strategic imperative for the US government who do so with the aid of not only their public Representatives and diplomats but also their military intelligence services (Süddeutsche Zeitung, July 13 2013)

Aside from chairing the S.F.I. committee responsible for awarding our billion euro budget Newell Mc Loughlin promotes GM crops globally on behalf of the US Dept of Agriculture, the US State Department, and the controversial ILSI (see Guardian newspaper 9 January 2003 '' W.H.O. infiltrated by food lobby''). McLoughlin was appointed to an advisory board of a US based group (pipra) which sought to overcome the legal barriers that slow development of biotech crops. Newell-McLoughlin helped design EU safety assessments of genetically modified foods as part of an ILSI Task force whose members included representatives of all the big GM seed/agrochemical firms:

She is also in charge of a US based programme whose International collaborators include Teagasc Oak Park, U.C.D., N.U.I.M. and N.U.I.G. The programme has the overarching theme of the development and utilization of plants for the production of biofuels, industrial non-food products biopharmaceuticals, and agricultural products (food, feed & fiber), ..... to prepare the research, educational, business, regulatory, and policy leaders of the future.''

She co-authored a report on technical developments in Biotech for Forfas and Teagasc (where she was employed as a consultant) She also was one of those who gave a presentation at a forum of Ireland’s Advisory Science Council, the outcomes and decisions from which'' will inform the activities and advice of the Advisory Science Council''.

Bill Harris (formerly of the US Science Foundation) says that Science Foundation Ireland is a tool to implement policy. As SFI has funded the genetic modification of agricultural crops in Ireland, new less restrictive methods of G.M., and works to highlight the environmental ''benefits'' of GM crops, this begs the question, which nations policy is being implemented?

The further work of SFI personnel through ''Innovation Advisory Partners'' in Skolkova appears to have implications for GM cropping in the Russian Federation

(See <a href="http://www.slideshare.net/igorod/igor-goryanin-biomedical-technologies-at-skolkovo" title="http://www.slideshare.net/igorod/igor-goryanin-biomedical-technologies-at-skolkovo" style=" font-weight: normal;">http://www.slideshare.net/igorod/igor-goryanin-biomedical-technologies-at-skolkovo</a> ).

The Skolkovo project appears to have strategic significance for the U.S.

<a href="http://www.aaas.org/page/unique-us-russian-relationship-biological-science-and-biotechnology-2013" title="http://www.aaas.org/page/unique-us-russian-relationship-biological-science-and-biotechnology-2013" style=" font-weight: normal;">http://www.aaas.org/page/unique-us-russian-relationship...-2013</a>

The establishment of an Irish arm of a US body (US Science Foundation / SFI) before venturing further into Europe is mirrored in the case of our economic modelling and analysis system for food and agriculture (FAPRI Ireland/FAPRI US), whose staff have been involved in a report for our Department of Agriculture which showed GM crops to be more lucrative than the alternatives by using a methodology which precludes any other outcome.(''The Economic Evaluation of a GM Free Country: an Irish Case Study'', confidential report commissioned by the DAF). FAPRI went on to be given the contract for economic modelling at EU level.

McLoughlin has told us that it was the major universities who were at the epicentre of the rapid growth of the biotech industry in the U.S. and the possibility must be considered that Ireland long marketed as the US’s gateway into Europe is being used as such in the case of the US's ambitions for GM crops and that the university system is being used as the Trojan horse to deliver this expansion.

The development of GM crops here is a clear repetition of the mistakes identified in the analysis of the banking sectors demise.

The Keynote speaker at the 'Regulation in the Age of Crisis' conference, held in UCD in 2010, identified a '07 statement from Ben Bernanke as being one of those which sums up the complacent attitude which landed us in the mess we are in. Bernanke stated that the economic benefits that flow from financial innovation should be always kept in view when addressing the risks. Bizarrely Bernanke's words are echoed in a later presentation dealing with the regulation of genetically modified food, in the suggestion that ''a more appropriate regulatory framework..., would focus on comparatively assessing the...health risks versus the benefits of a product, rather than overly focusing on (often hypothetical) risks''. The authors of this work were Ewen Mullins (developer and promoter of Teagasc’s genetically modified potato, and member of the GMO sub-committee of the Food Safety Association of Ireland and the GMO Advisory Committee of the Environmental Protection Agency, and responsible for GM risk assessment activities at Teagasc) and Shane Morris the former Canadian National Biotechnology Operations Coordinator.

Their opinions echo McLoughlin’s work at ILSI which tells us that '‘During risk analysis, the risks are to be weighed against other issues, such as the benefits''

. What better example could there be than that of McLoughlin's of the banking failings outlined in the OECD document :

( <a href="http://search.oecd.org/officialdocuments/displaydocumentpdf/?cote=GOV/PGC/ETH%282009%292/REV1&docLanguage=En" title="http://search.oecd.org/officialdocuments/displaydocumentpdf/?cote=GOV/PGC/ETH%282009%292/REV1&docLanguage=En" style=" font-weight: normal;">http://search.oecd.org/officialdocuments/displaydocumentpdf/?cote=GOV/PGC/ETH%282009%292/REV1&docLanguage=En</a> )

which looked issues such as conflict of interest, (our interests re. GM crops are incompatible with those of the US) and regulatory capture? (She helped to write the rules for the EU regulators). The OECD document states that these problems were not confined to the banking industry specifically pointing out conflicts of interest within the scientific industry.

. If the risks of GM food are acceptable, then this is something that McLoughlin should be telling the people who fund her work in the US government and Monsanto (Sacramento bee June 6 to 10 2004)

Monsanto exists in its present form due to an exercise in risk avoidance where the parent company Pharmacia absorbed valuable assets; leaving “new Monsanto” to sink or swim with the GM project (David Barboza, 20,12,1999 New York Times)+(Can You Afford GM Agriculture? E. Ann Clark). Monsanto have said re. GM food "Our interest is in selling as much of it as possible. Assuring its safety is the FDA's job." The FDA in turn avoids liability by relying on the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic act section 402(a) (1). The risk is described by Robert Hartwig, chief economist for the Insurance Information Institute: “Genetically engineered foods are among the riskiest of all possible insurance exposures that we have today”.

A problem with SFI can be traced back through the ''Technology Foresight fund' to the Forfas ''Technology Foresight Reports''. The Forfas report (health and life sciences) contains the lie upon which the U.S. regulatory system is still based. The report states; ''the Human Genome Project,... will ... reveal the basic structure of at least 100,000 new genes which specify 100,000 new biological chemicals’’. The significance of these miscalculations is dealt with by Denise Caruso in the New York Times July 1 2007, Stephen Leahy in ''Macleans'' magazine September 30, 2002 and in an interview with Dr. Thierry Vrain on the gmwatch site.

That SFI continued to fund research into the agricultural applications of GM long after the Human Genome Research Institute published findings that disproves the scientific principles on which the presumption of GM crop safety is based is a scandal.

We are being told, as are those in the Russian Federation that we can be world leaders in these areas. But in the case of agricultural applications, there can only be one leader namely the multi-national companies involved in GM who have effectively bought out the global seed industry and therefore control the vital raw materials.

Monsanto's ability to identify and market the most productive seed for any given location is explained by their head Hugh Grant. “It is the mother and father of all dating agencies: we can analyse every single seed we harvest, do a health check, guess what its grandchildren will be like, send it anywhere in the world,”

Monsanto has designated their Woodland facility as its global headquarters for vegetable seed research. ''The region was chosen because of its mild climate, its location in the heart of California vegetable production and proximity to the University of California-Davis,'' said Marlin Edwards, global vegetable technology lead. “It’s just a great place to operate,” he said.

It's not hard to see the attraction of U.C. Davis to Monsanto.

A referendum (prop. 37) in California aimed at forcing the food industry to label it's GM foods as such saw support slip from more than a 90% majority to being narrowly defeated following a 40 million dollar campaign by the 'NO' side and help from professors at UC Davis. Alexis Baden-Mayer of Organic Consumers Association in ''Unmasking the No on Prop 37 Lies and Dirty Tricks'' (October 31, 2012) writes;

'' Lies about Costs to Farmers and Processors:

TRICK: UC Davis Professors of agricultural economics released a report that showed Proposition 37 would increase costs for California farmers and food processors by $1.2 billion.

TRUTH:The No campaign paid the authors of this study, Julian Alston and Daniel Sumner, at least $30,000. The study assumes that farmers and food producers will respond to Proposition 37 by switching from genetically engineering to organic to avoid the labeling. The authors don't devote much attention to the possibility that producers will respond to the labeling mandate by simply relabeling.''

''Scientists as Sock Puppets:

TRICK: An anti-Prop 37 op-ed is authored by Kent J. Bradford, a professor of plant sciences at the University of California, Davis, and the director of the Seed Biotechnology Center.

TRUTH: The words Bradford uses to describe Prop 37 are taken verbatim from the No on 37 website. The Daily Democrat and The Reporter (Vacaville) published Monsanto's talking points disguised as legitimate opinion from a university professor of plant biology.''

''Scientists with Hidden Strings:

TRICK: Martina Newell-McLoughlin, D.Sc., is the director of the International Biotechnology Program and an Adjunct Professor of Plant Pathology at the University of California, Davis. When she acts as a proponent for genetic engineering, as she did recently on the Dr. Oz Show, she presents herself as an independent academic scientist.

TRUTH: Martina Newell-McLoughlin's work is funded by the same pesticide company that backs the No on 37 campaign, but the strings that attach her to Monsanto are rarely reported along with her pro-GMO views.''

The Institute for responsible technology referred to the above interview;

''Dr. Oz revealed that the pro-GMO scientists invited to his show were unwilling to share the stage with Jeffrey. They would only appear after Jeffrey and Dr. Burnhoft finished their interview and walked off. The reason for this demand became immediately obvious when Martina Newell-McLoughlin spoke to Dr. Oz. So much of she said was demonstrably false or misleading. You are welcome to "Spot the Lies" and write them in as comments below the video on Dr. Oz's site'

Newell-McLoughlin is described as being the "driving force" of biotechnology education at the University of California, Davis where she developed ''the groundbreaking trans-disciplinary Designated Emphasis in Biotechnology,''

Davis was also a base to Professor Burke with whom she co-authored a book on the regulation and future direction of agricultural biotechnology. Burke joined Teagasc where he became Head of the National Crops and Plant Biotechnology Centre at Oak Park where he set up a new biotechnology facility and plant biotechnology research programme which developed Teagasc's GM potato. Burke also sat on various panels promoting and guiding the control of biotechnology in Ireland.

McLoughlin and Burke appear to be joined by many others in a country where government policy appears to dictate that boundless enthusiasm for biotechnology in all its manifestations is an essential prerequisite for career advancement. The current head of Teagasc, Gerry Boyle is an adjunct professor at the University of Missouri (MU) where FAPRI is based (known as FAPRI MU). The university has a partnership arrangement with Monsanto leading to its alternative title of 'The University of Monsanto'.

Professor Mike ''I can't see any dangers whatsoever in genetically

modified foods'' Gibney of the Food Safety Authority of Ireland has worked with the ILSI and is on its science advisory board. Also within the university system is the aforementioned Shane Morris, (former Canadian National Biotechnology Operations Coordinator) whose work Miriam Lord described in the Irish Times as being Fine Gael’s GM strategy (13 October 2007):.Morris tells us that it was under political pressure and direct suggestion from Fine Gael that the Inter-Departmental Group on Modern Biotechnology had been established which recommended that; '' the Department of Agriculture, Food, and Rural Development should, in cooperation with other bodies, devise a program for the managed development of GM crops that would provide for a phased, monitored progression to full commercial cultivation''

Michael Carey, chairman of Bord Bia is a shareholder and board member of Valeo foods. Professor Burke is chair of the research and development strategy board set up to guide the future development of ‘Agrii’. Agrii is the UKs leading agronomy company, offering ‘independent and innovative’ advice to arable, fruit and vegetable growers. Agrii and Valeo are part of the one group ‘Origin enterprises’. The big six global GM chemical companies have joined the Agrii group as research and development partners.

Would no Irish scientist dare challenge the illusion of GM Crop safety which is a swaying house of cards kept upright by the relentless huffing and puffing by characters who can maintain a serious expression while delivering utter 'scientific' gibberish in a manner which would allow them to walk onto the set of any Monty python sketch without audition. A more credible view of the safety issue is presented in a review of GM animal feed studies, by Donna and Arvanitoyannis, and published in “Critical Reviews in food Science and Nutrition Feb 2009, which concludes that;

“the results of most of the rather few studies conducted with GM foods indicate that they may cause hepatic, pancreatic, renal and reproductive effects and may alter haematological, biochemical and immunologic parameters, the significance of which remains unknown. The above results indicate that many GM foods have some common toxic effects. Therefore, further studies should be conducted in order to elucidate the mechanism dominating this action”.

In contemplating this perilous path for the future it appears that Dean Swifts 'modest proposal' may have been accepted by our systems of governance, shamelessly dysfunctional when viewed from below but working perfectly for those who actively manage it from above.

</div>

==

<a href="http://www.monsanto.com/newsviews/pages/plant-biotechnology-companies-launch-gmo-answers.aspx">http://www.monsanto.com/newsviews/pages/plant-biotechnology-companies-launch-gmo-answers.aspx</a>

<h1 style=" font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.2em;">Plant Biotechnology Companies Launch "GMO Answers"</h1>

7/29/2013

The following release was issued by the Council for Biotechnology Information (CBI). Monsanto is a member of CBI.

Washington, DC (July 29, 2013) – The agricultural biotechnology companies that develop genetically modified seeds — or GMOs — are coming together to launch a broad, new initiative to provide accurate information and answer the toughest questions about GMOs and how our food is grown. GMO Answers (<a href="http://www.gmoanswers.com/">www.GMOAnswers.com</a>) is a new conversation, public Q&A, and central online resource for information on GMOs, their background, use in agriculture, and research and data in one easy-to-access public resource for the first time.

“GMOs are a growing topic of discussion today, with a wide range of questions and emotions<a id="GoBack" name="GoBack">,” Cathleen Enright, Ph.D., spokesperson for GMO Answers, said. “Food is personal, so we want to open the door for personal discussions. We recognize we haven’t done the best job communicating about GMOs—what they are, how they are developed, food safety information—the science, data and processes. We want people to join us and ask their tough questions. Be skeptical. Evaluate the information and decide for yourself. We look forward to an open conversation.”</a>

As the public discussion on GMOs continues, the scientists who develop biotech seeds along with farmers who grow them want to make information about GMOs easier to find and understand.

“This type of open conversation, connecting consumers to experts in academia, government and the industry, is absolutely necessary to advance food and agriculture research to ensure that everyone has access to the highest quality most sustainably produced food. Having grown up on a small farm and spent much of my life in academia I can relate to the issues on several levels.  I’ve offered to address questions submitted to GMO Answers openly, based on my personal insights, experience and research,” Professor Martina Newell-McGloughlin, director, International Biotechnology Program, University of California Davis said. “I know that many of my colleagues have committed to do the same because we feel consumers have every right to ask questions about how their food is grown, and they deserve an open and honest response so that they can make informed decisions.”

GMO Answers is produced by the members of The Council for Biotechnology Information, which includes BASF, Bayer CropScience, Dow AgroSciences LLC, DuPont, Monsanto Company and Syngenta. Together, their commitment to openness and access to information is outlined in the GMO Answers five core principles:

<li style=" padding: 2px 2px 3px 30px; margin: 0px 0px 8px; list-style-type: none; line-height: 1.6em; background-image: url(http://www.monsanto.com/style%20library/images/bullet2.gif); background-position: 12px 10px; background-repeat: no-repeat;">Respecting people around the world and their right to choose healthy food products that are best for themselves and their families</li>

<li style=" padding: 2px 2px 3px 30px; margin: 0px 0px 8px; list-style-type: none; line-height: 1.6em; background-image: url(http://www.monsanto.com/style%20library/images/bullet2.gif); background-position: 12px 10px; background-repeat: no-repeat;">Welcoming and answering questions on all GMO topics</li>

<li style=" padding: 2px 2px 3px 30px; margin: 0px 0px 8px; list-style-type: none; line-height: 1.6em; background-image: url(http://www.monsanto.com/style%20library/images/bullet2.gif); background-position: 12px 10px; background-repeat: no-repeat;">Making GMO information, research and data easy to access and evaluate and supporting safety testing of GM products, including allowing independent safety testing of our products by validated science-based methods</li>

<li style=" padding: 2px 2px 3px 30px; margin: 0px 0px 8px; list-style-type: none; line-height: 1.6em; background-image: url(http://www.monsanto.com/style%20library/images/bullet2.gif); background-position: 12px 10px; background-repeat: no-repeat;">Supporting farmers as they work to grow crops using precious resources more efficiently, with less impact on the environment and producing safe, nutritious food and feed products</li>

<li style=" padding: 2px 2px 3px 30px; margin: 0px 0px 8px; list-style-type: none; line-height: 1.6em; background-image: url(http://www.monsanto.com/style%20library/images/bullet2.gif); background-position: 12px 10px; background-repeat: no-repeat;">Respecting farmers’ rights to choose the seeds that are best for their farms, businesses and communities and providing seed choices that include non-GM seeds based on market demands.</li>

</ul>

“We are inviting questions and providing accurate information about GMOs. Go to GMOAnswers.com today and submit your questions. Scientists, health and safety professionals, farmers, and other independent experts are excited to share their answers,” Enright said. “In addition to collecting questions online, we will be conducting a nationwide survey to find out the top 10 questions consumers have about GMOs, then we will answer them publicly. We hope to be a reliable resource on how our food is grown.”

For more information or to ask your questions go to <a href="http://www.gmoanswers.com/">www.GMOAnswers.com</a>.

About GMO Answers

GMO Answers is committed to responding to your questions about how our food is grown. Our goal is to make information about agricultural biotechnology easier to access and evaluate. The members of GMO Answers commit to five core principles —welcoming and answering questions on all GMO topics; making GMO information, research and data easy to access and evaluate, and supporting independent safety testing of GM products  using validated science-based methods; supporting farmers as they work to grow crops using precious resources more efficiently,  with less impact on the environment and producing safe, nutritious food and feed products; respecting farmers’ rights to choose the seeds that are best for their farms, businesses and communities and providing seed choices that include including making non-GM seeds based on market demands; and respecting people around the world and their right to choose healthy food products that are best for themselves and their families. GMO Answers is produced by the members of The Council for Biotechnology Information, which includes BASF, Bayer CropScience, Dow AgroSciences LLC, DuPont, Monsanto Company and Syngenta. Our members are dedicated to the responsible development and application of plant biotechnology. Visit <a href="http://www.gmoanswers.com/">www.GMOAnswers.com</a>.

</div>

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http://www.spinwatch.org/index.php/issues/science/item/164-smelling-a-corporate-rat

Tuesday, 11 December 2012 21:17

<h2 class="itemTitle" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 10px 0px 4px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; line-height: 35.2px; text-shadow: rgb(255, 255, 255) 1px 1px 1px; display: inline-block; border-radius: 0px 3px 3px 0px; position: relative; z-index: 2; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: 0px 0px; background-repeat: repeat-x;">Smelling a corporate rat</h2>

<span class="itemAuthor" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; display: block; line-height: 22.1px; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">By <a rel="author" href="http://www.spinwatch.org/index.php/jonathan-matthews" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; transition: color 0.1s ease-in; background: transparent;">Jonathan Matthews</a>

<p style=" margin: 0px 0px 15px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"><strong style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">new study suggesting a Monsanto GM maize and the company's Roundup herbicide may pose serious health risks has been widely attacked, not just by scientists and commentators but also by scientific bodies and regulators. Here, Jonathan Matthews of GMWatch looks at the role of industry-linked scientists and lobbyists in a campaign aimed at getting the paper retracted. You can also<a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/116473155/Smelling-a-corporate-rat" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; transition: color 0.1s ease-in; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">download this article as a PDF</a>.

At the end of November Reuters ran the headline <a href="http://uk.reuters.com/article/2012/11/30/us-science-gm-journal-idUKBRE8AT10920121130" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Science Journal Urged to Retract Monsanto GM Study</a> and New Scientist <a href="http://www.newscientist.com/blogs/shortsharpscience/2012/11/retraction-gm-crop-cancer-study.html" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">also reported</a> the growing pressure for retraction. These articles marked the latest stage in a campaign that kicked off the moment the study was published in mid-September, when researchers led by Prof. Gilles-Eric Seralini at the University of Caen in France announced <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0278691512005637" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">their findings</a> of serious health problems in rats that had been fed a Monsanto maize genetically engineered to be resistant to the company's herbicide Roundup, as well as in rats just fed low doses of the herbicide itself. In both cases the rats fed with the GM maize and/or minute amounts of the herbicide in water were several times more likely to develop lethal tumours and suffer severe liver and kidney damage when compared to the controls.

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<p style=" margin: 0px 0px 15px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"><strong style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Science Media Centre spearheads the attack

Although the publication of the results of the long-term feeding trial in Food and Chemical Toxicology made front page news in France, it got a very different reception in the English-speaking world. This was thanks to the rapid rebuttal efforts of the London-based Science Media Centre (SMC), which almost as soon as the study was published began <a href="http://www.sciencemediacentre.org/expert-reaction-to-gm-maize-causing-tumours-in-rats/" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">spoon-feeding journalists with ready-made quotes from scientists</a> savaging the study.

The SMC's director Fiona Fox was subsequently <a href="http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/story.asp?storycode=421361" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">reported as saying</a> that she took pride in the fact that the SMC's "emphatic thumbs down had largely been acknowledged throughout UK newsrooms: apart from the Mail, only the Daily Telegraph and the Financial Times covered the story in their print editions – and both used quotes supplied by the Science Media Centre.” She added that several television news programmes had also rejected the story after reading the quotes

The SMC's quotes were pumped out internationally via its clones, like <a href="http://www.smc.org.au/2012/09/rapid-reaction-long-term-toxicity-of-gm-maize-food-and-chemical-toxicology-experts-respond/" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">the Australian Science Media Centre</a>, with like-minded local experts layered on the top. The quotes were also <a href="http://corporateeurope.org/news/study-monsantos-gm-maize-intensifies-concerns-about-efsas-reliability-monsanto-strikes-back-pr" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">circulated to the media by Monsanto and other GM lobby groups</a>. As a result, the quotes ended up in a lot of media coverage worldwide. One even <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/20/business/energy-environment/disputed-study-links-modified-corn-to-greater-health-risks.html" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">popped up in the New York Times</a> along with the scathing comments of Bruce M. Chassy, professor emeritus of food science at the University of Illinois.

<strong style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Retraction campaign kicks in

Another key player in whipping up hostility to the paper was the American business magazine Forbes. In the ten days following the study's release, Forbes published no less than six separate attack pieces targeting not just the research but also the researchers. The first two pieces drew extensively on the quotes from the Science Media Centre and ran with them, but the Forbes piece that grabbed the most attention, particularly on social media, was one that kicked off with a headline that <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/henrymiller/2012/09/25/scientists-smell-a-rat-in-fraudulent-genetic-engineering-study/" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">labelled the paper a fraud</a>. The article went on to accuse Prof. Seralini not just of "gross scientific misconduct" but also of having "a long and sordid history" of "activism". The article concluded by bluntly telling the editors of Food and Chemical Toxicology that the only "honorable course of action for the journal would be to retract the paper immediately".

The retraction campaign was by then well under way. An <a href="http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/dr-seralini-please-release-data/" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">online petition </a>was up and running, demanding in the name of "the scientific community" that Seralini hand over all his raw data. The petition was aggressively promoted via social media, often with <a href="https://twitter.com/mark_lynas/status/250151291022626817" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">the implication that the researchers had something to hide</a>. The assertion that the study was "fraudulent" obviously played well into this campaign, which culminated in the Reuters and New Scientist pieces reporting the retraction calls. Both these articles reported on the petition, as well as containing lacerating comments from two UK scientists – <a href="http://www.sciencemediacentre.org/expert-reaction-to-efsa-report-conclusion-that-seralini-study-conclusions-were-not-supported-by-data/" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">comments once again provided by the Science Media Centre</a>.

One of the published comments – from Prof. Maurice Moloney – said it was "appalling" that such a study should ever have been published in a respected journal. And a researcher from the UK's John Innes Centre demanded to know whether it was not "time for Food and Chemical Toxicology to retract the manuscript?" The only other scientist quoted claimed the publication of the paper was more than just "a dangerous case of failure of the peer-review system." It represented a threat to not just the credibility of the journal but "the scientific method overall". This apocalyptic claim was backed up by the news that hundreds of outraged scientists had signed the online petition.  

<a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/sep/28/study-gm-maize-cancer" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Writing in The Guardian </a>at the end of September, John Vidal described the attacks already raining down on Seralini and his team as "a triumph for the scientific and corporate establishment which has used similar tactics to crush other scientists". These included, Vidal said, "Arpad Pusztai of the Rowett Institute in Scotland, who was sacked after his research suggested GM potatoes damaged the stomach lining and immune system of rats, and David Quist and Ignacio Chapela", who studied the flow of genes from illegally planted GM maize to Mexican indigenous maize.

The vociferous attacks on Quist and Chapela resulted in the apparent retraction of their paper by the journal Nature, even though <a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/Immoral_Maize:Extract_from_Don't_Worry,It's_Safe_to_Eat_by_Andrew_Rowell" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">such a move was not supported by the majority of its reviewers </a>and subsequent research <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2009/02/24/2499950.htm" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">confirmed the paper’s main finding</a>. But, as the French journalist Benjamin Sourice <a href="http://gmwatch.org/latest-listing/51-2012/14424" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">has pointed out</a>, the simplest way to definitively discredit a study and nullify its impact is to pressurise the journal that published it to retract it from its list of publications.

In the case of Quist and Chapela, <a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/Immoral_Maize:Extract_from_Don't_Worry,It's_Safe_to_Eat_by_Andrew_Rowell" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">an investigation that I undertook with the journalist and author Andy Rowell of Spinwatch</a> revealed how the campaign of retraction had been carefully orchestrated from the start by Monsanto's PR people. It used proxies to whip up feeling against the lead author by branding Dr Chapela an "activist" rather than a scientist and by maintaining his findings were bogus and arrived at through collusion with environmental NGOs. Our research, which was <a href="http://ngin.tripod.com/deceit_index.html" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">widely reported in both print and broadcast media</a>, suggested that at the heart of that retraction campaign sat Monsanto's former chief internet strategist and director of corporate communications. <a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/Jay_Byrne" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Jay Byrne</a> had gone on to found his own internet PR company v-Fluence, based like Monsanto in the corporation's home town of St Louis.

Although Byrne <a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/Immoral_Maize:Extract_from_Don't_Worry,It's_Safe_to_Eat_by_Andrew_Rowell" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">appeared to be the campaign's chief architect,</a> its principal conduit was the lobby group AgBioWorld, overseen by the GM scientist CS Prakash.  The <a href="http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/dr-seralini-please-release-data/" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">"ipetition" </a>on Seralini contains no information as to who sponsored it, but its first signatory is CS Prakash. Prakash also seems to have set up <a href="http://www.change.org/petitions/global-scientific-community-urge-dr-seralini-to-release-data-from-studies-on-biotech-corn-with-rats" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">an earlier more primitive version of the petition</a>, which clearly identifies him as its sponsor.

Some time after GMWatch <a href="http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/51-2012/14235" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">flagged up </a>the likely role of Prakash and AgBioWorld in the ipetition, the organisation acknowledged its authorship <a href="http://presswire.einnews.com/247pr/309289" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">in a press release </a>which asserted that "the petitioning scientists are calling on the publishing journal editors to retract the Seralini study" if he failed to give in to their demand that he hand over all his data.

The AgBioWorld press release contained a quote by Bruce Chassy, who was also <a href="http://www.change.org/petitions/global-scientific-community-urge-dr-seralini-to-release-data-from-studies-on-biotech-corn-with-rats" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">the first signatory of the earlier Seralini petition</a>. Chassy was also<a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/henrymiller/2012/09/25/scientists-smell-a-rat-in-fraudulent-genetic-engineering-study/" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"> the co-author of the Forbes piece</a>accusing Seralini of fraud.

The article's other author was Henry Miller, a darling of the rightwing press who operates out of the Hoover Institution, among <a href="http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/51-2012/14255" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">other industry backed lobby groups</a>. Miller, like Chassy, has long been associated with Prakash's AgBioWorld. Miller recently co-authored<a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/henrymiller/2012/10/22/the-roots-of-the-anti-genetic-engineering-movement-follow-the-money/" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">another vitriolic piece on GM for Forbes</a>, denouncing the "fear profiteers" of the anti-GM "protest industry". Miller's co-author on that occasion was none other than former Monsanto PR boss Jay Byrne of v-Fluence. Tellingly, Michael Pollan, the renowned New York Times food writer and professor of journalism at the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism, described the piece by Byrne and Miller as <a href="https://twitter.com/michaelpollan/status/260791206412423168" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">a breathtaking example of "the Big Lie"</a>.

Byrne hasn't published any media pieces on Seralini. But it is apparent from <a href="https://twitter.com/vJayByrne" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Byrne's Twitter account</a> that he was almost solely preoccupied with discrediting the Seralini study from the day of its publication for about the next month. Byrne describes himself on Twitter as v-Fluence CEO and  as "Contributing author, Let Them Eat Precaution", a book on GM edited by Jon Entine. Entine, as it happens, is the author of probably more articles to date attacking Seralini than any other commentator.

Entine's book emerged out of an <a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/American_Enterprise_Institute" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">American Enterprise Institute </a>conference overseen by Entine at which Byrne was an invited speaker. And Byrne's v-Fluence turns up again in company with Entine at another AEI conference he oversaw – this one attacking corporate social responsibility (CSR). <a href="http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/44-2005/7898" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">According to Business Ethics</a>: "A second AEI conference featured AEI fellow Jon Entine – a long-time critic of SRI [socially responsible investing] – and Sarah Fuhrmann of v-Fluence Interactive Public Relations.Several v-Fluence employees are ex-public affairs staffers for Monsanto – where they honed skills fighting CSR initiatives that targeted genetically modified foods."

Entine hasn't just worked with Byrne and v-Fluence, but has also done paid work for Byrne's company. In a piece about Entine by the food and farming commentator Tom Philpott, <a href="http://www.motherjones.com/tom-philpott/2012/02/atrazine-syngengta-tyrone-hayes-jon-entine" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">The Making of an Agribusiness Apologist</a>, Entine denies being a hired gun for Syngenta in his work defending pesticides and downplays the fact that his company (ESG MediaMetrics) lists Monsanto as a client. This is how he explains it: "Nine years ago, I did a $2000 research project for v-Fluence, a social media company formed by former Monsanto executives. That's the entirety of my Monsanto relationship." Presumably Entine <a href="http://www.esgmediametrics.com/clients.htm" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">lists Monsanto and not Jay Byrne's firm as his company's paymaster </a>because he recognises that what he does for v-Fluence he's really doing for Monsanto.

Entine's <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/jonentine/2012/09/20/scientists-savage-study-purportedly-showing-health-dangers-of-monsantos-genetically-modified-corn/" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">first attack</a> on Seralini came out on Forbes within 24 hours of the paper's publication. His <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/jonentine/2012/09/30/does-the-seralini-corn-study-fiasco-mark-a-turning-point-in-the-debate-over-gm-food/2/" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">second piece </a>a few days later contained further attacks, not just on Seralini, whom he accused of steadfastly refusing to share his raw data, but on almost anyone who attempted to defend the study.  Entine also published <a href="http://www.geneticliteracyproject.org/2012/11/19/anti-gm-corn-study-reconsidered-seralini-finally-responds-to-torrent-of-criticism/" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">a third more recent article</a> which focuses particularly on letters to Food and Chemical Toxicology requesting Seralini's paper be retracted. In this he notes, "More than two dozen scientists from around the world co-signed a stinging rebuke of the Seralini study, concluding: 'We appeal to you to subject the paper to rigorous re-review by appropriate experts and promptly retract it if it fails to meet widely held scientific standards of design and analysis, as we believe it fails to do.'"

<a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0278691512007922" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">The letter </a>Entine is referring to was signed by, among others, CS Prakash, Henry Miller and Bruce Chassy. Several of the other signatories also have connections to AgBioWorld. Entine's <a href="http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/44-2005/5314" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">book on GM</a>, incidentally, also has contributions from CS Prakash and his AgBioWorld co-founder, Greg Conko of the Competitive Enterprise Institute.

Another signatory of this joint letter to Food and Chemical Toxicology is Prof. Anthony Trewavas. Trewavas was also one of the experts quoted by the SMC<a href="http://www.sciencemediacentre.org/expert-reaction-to-gm-maize-causing-tumours-in-rats/" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"> in their media release</a>that had such an impact on the reporting of the Seralini study.

In his SMC comments, which ended up being <a href="http://www.research.ed.ac.uk/portal/en/clippings/professor-anthony-trewavas-comments-on-controversial-scientific-paper-on-gm-corn%285703ab8a-99b1-4eef-8f2a-e6da273c7fa4%29.html" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">quoted in well over 20 different publications</a>worldwide, Trewavas accuses the researchers of using a cancer-prone rat and claims: "[A] line [of rats] which is very susceptible to tumours can easily bias any result." This line of argument was also developed for the SMC by another expert, Maurice Moloney who says Sprague-Dawley rats frequently develop mammary tumours

It is this cancer-prone rat claim, which Trewavas and Moloney first set running, that more than any other underpins the Chassy-Miller allegation of fraud. The suggestion is that the study was deliberately designed to generate tumours, i.e. that Seralini and his team intentionally chose the Sprague-Dawley rat for their research in order to produce exactly the result they wanted - cancer!

But although variants on this claim have been widely reported, there are a number of problems with it. Not only is this line of rats the same one that <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0278691504000547" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Monsanto used for the study</a> that underlies the regulatory approval of this GM maize (NK603), but Sprague-Dawley rats have also been used repeatedly in toxicology and carcinogenesis trials, <a href="http://www.ensser.org/democratising-science-decision-making/ensser-comments-on-seralini-study/" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">including long-term ones</a>. They were even <a href="http://earthopensource.org/files/pdfs/Roundup-and-birth-defects/VOLUME3-1_GLYPHOSAT_04.PDF" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">used in industry’s own two-year research studies</a> submitted to regulators to support the regulatory approval of glyphosate – the active ingredient in Monsanto's Roundup, one of the two substances that Seralini's team were researching.

And the fact that this strain of rat has <a href="http://www.ramazzini.it/ricerca/pdfUpload/Cancer%20Medicine%2049-64_2006.pdf" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">a 30%-plus tendency to “spontaneous” cancers across its lifetime actually means it a good model for humans</a>, who have a similar susceptibility to the disease. What's more, even allowing for the Sprague-Dawley rats having a tendency to spontaneous tumours, Seralini's team found the rats fed on either the GM maize or the herbicide suffered an increase in the number of tumours and they had an earlier onset when compared to those in the control group. The researchers also took account of the spontaneous tumour issue by comparing their results to the rates of similar types of tumour in other published studies using the same strain of rat.

This is not say that the Seralini study does not have its shortcomings. It's true that the study had fewer rats than are recommended for cancer studies, but Seralini did not set out to look for tumours. His study was a chronic toxicity one that unexpectedly found striking evidence of increased tumours in the treated rats. Given this finding, the onus should now be on Monsanto to fund a full-scale carcinogenicity study using larger groups of rats to prove that its products are safe – something it has so far failed to do.

Angelika Hilbeck of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH Zurich) describes the "wrong rat" argument first put forward by Trewavas and Moloney as "absurd". <a href="http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/51-2012/14451" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Hilbeck says</a>, "Seralini chose the same strain of rat as Monsanto. Do we really think that a substance should be tested on an animal that is not sensitive to it? With these defamations they wanted to distract us from the fact that Seralini used the same methodology as Monsanto. Because if you take Seralini seriously as a researcher, you have to take seriously his study and the comparison with Monsanto's study. That would put into question Monsanto's study and hence the approval of GM maize."

In fact, many of the charges that have been made against the Seralini study could be levelled against the studies that have been used to approve GM crops, which are less detailed than Seralini's and typically shorter-term. This is why <a href="http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/51-2012/14288" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">a report by the European Network of Scientists for Social and Environmental Responsibility (ENSSER)</a> concluded that a careful comparison of the Seralini rat feeding trial with Monsanto trials shows that if the Seralini experiments are considered insufficient to demonstrate harm, then those carried out by Monsanto cannot prove safety. This is because, whatever its limitations, Seralini's study was conducted to generally higher scientific standards than the studies underlying GM food approvals.

ENSSER highlights the double standards whereby studies on GM crops like Seralini's that show adverse effects are subjected to obsessive yet often poorly justified criticism of their experimental and statistical methods, while those like Monsanto's that claim safety are taken at face value. In this way risk is assessed in an asymmetrical fashion so that the burden of proof is not on the biotech industry to provide adequate evidence of the safety of its products, but is on public researchers like Seralini to prove harm beyond any doubt.<a href="http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/51-2012/14372" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Other experts</a> have echoed the charge of double standards, including around 140 French scientists who, <a href="http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=14434" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">in a public statement published in Le Monde</a>, declared that it was contrary to scientific ethics to damn an experimental protocol when it gave results that were not wanted, while accepting it when it gave results that were.

These double standards can also be seen in the ipetition demanding that Seralini hand over all of his raw data to his critics. Those championing the petition have no history of demanding from Monsanto full public disclosure of all the raw data underlying its studies supporting safety (the industry studies on glyphosate, for example, are <a href="http://www.omicsonline.org/2161-0525/2161-0525-S4-006.php?aid=7453" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">kept secret under 'commercial confidentiality' agreements between industry and regulators</a>). This is why Seralini has said he will undertake full disclosure when the same level of disclosure takes place for all the studies underlying GM food approvals, so that like can be compared with like.

One of the early UK signatories of the ipetition, as well as a co-signatory, like Prof. Trewavas, of the letter to Food and Chemical Toxicology from Prakash, Chassy and Miller, is <a href="http://powerbase.info/index.php/Chris_Leaver" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Prof. Chris Leaver</a>. Leaver, like Trewavas,  is a GM scientist. He is also a former advisor to the Science Media Centre and a former consultant to the GM/agrochemical giant Syngenta. Since 1984 Prof. Leaver has also been<a href="http://www.jic.ac.uk/corporate/about/organisation/gov-council.htm" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"> on the Governing Council </a>of the UK's leading public plant biotechinstitute, <a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/John_Innes_Centre" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">the John Innes Centre</a> – something else he has in common with Prof. Trewavas, who was also for several years on the JIC's Governing Council.

The JIC has been a key player in the criticism of Seralini. This is apparent as soon as you look at the SMC's three media releases on the study. <a href="http://www.sciencemediacentre.org/expert-reaction-to-gm-maize-causing-tumours-in-rats/" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">The first</a> quoted eight experts including a senior scientist at the JIC and a former member of its Governing Council (Trewavas). <a href="http://www.sciencemediacentre.org/expert-reaction-to-efsa-initial-review-of-gm-maize/" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">The second </a>quoted just one expert, Cathie Martin of the JIC. <a href="http://www.sciencemediacentre.org/expert-reaction-to-efsa-report-conclusion-that-seralini-study-conclusions-were-not-supported-by-data/" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">The third </a>quoted five experts, of which three, including Cathie Martin, were from the JIC.

What makes this predominance particularly revealing is that the scientists in question are not experts on toxicology or animal studies. Their expertise is in plant genetics and GM. What's more, the JIC and its Sainsbury Laboratory have had tens of millions of pounds in investment from GM giants like Syngenta. In fact, they are so dependent on the public acceptance of GM that a previous acting director of the JIC<a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/John_Innes_Centre" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"> confided to his local paper </a>that any major slowdown or halt in the development of GM crops "would be very, very serious for us".

These vested interests are personal as well as institutional. Cathie Martin, for instance, says in <a href="http://www.jic.ac.uk/profile/cathie-martin.asp" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">her JIC profile</a>, "I am inventor on seven patents and I recently co-founded a spin-out company (Norfolk Plant Sciences) with Professor Jonathan Jones FRS, to bring the benefits of plant biotechnology to Europe and the US." <a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/Jonathan_Jones" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Jones</a>, who is quoted along with Martin in one of the SMC releases, co-founded another biotech firm, <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Mendel_Biotechnology" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Mendel Biotechnology</a>, which has Monsanto as its "most important customer and collaborator".

The failure of Jones, who is also an advisor to Mendel Biotechnology, to be more explicit about his industry links, has <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/jul/18/gm-scientist-defends-monsanto-links" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">generated controversy</a>.  Yet journalists are given no indication of these kind of conflicts of interest by the SMC's releases, as <a href="http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/51-2012/14267" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">the journalist Joanna Blythman has noted</a>: "The SMC introduced these experts to the media solely by listing the universities and public institutions that employ them, failing to give the full flavour of their interests." And the problem goes much wider than the JIC, as <a href="http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/51-2012/14267" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Blythman notes with regard to the experts quoted in the SMC's first media release</a>: "seven out of eight are either evangelical advocates of GM food, or have received funding from, or worked with, prominent biotech corporations."

Take, for instance, the very first expert quoted by the SMC, Prof. Maurice Moloney. This year, the SMC has featured Moloney <a href="http://www.sciencemediacentre.org/?s=moloney&cat=" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">in no fewer than four different media releases on GM</a>. They typically identify him only as "Institute Director and Chief Executive, Rothamsted Research", which is an independent charitable agricultural research centre. What journalists aren't told is that Moloney is so enamoured of GM that <a href="http://www.spinwatch.org.uk/-articles-by-category-mainmenu-8/46-gm-industry/5505-science-one-whining-greenies-nil" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">he drives around in a Porsche with a GMO number plate</a>, and has a CV to match. He is the inventor on more than 300 patents and his GM research underpins one of Monsanto's main GM crops. He has also founded his own GM company in which the GM giant Dow AgroScience was an investor. The fact that Prof. Moloney's career and business interests have long been centered around GM is not something the SMC seems to think journalists need to know.

This pattern of significant but undisclosed conflicts of interest is relevant to not only the majority of the SMC's experts but also to many of Seralini's other critics, including those responsible for the twenty or so letters published by Food and Chemical Toxicology in response to Seralini's paper. Some of the letter writers are, in fact, exactly the same people that the SMC quotes. They are also often to be found amongst<a href="http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/dr-seralini-please-release-data/signatures" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"> the earliest signatories of the AgBioWorld ipetition</a>. Maurice Moloney, for example, not only turns up twice in the SMC's media rebuttals of Seralini, but comes in at no. 11 on the list of ipetition signatories, and <a href="http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/features/online/6048/gm-corn-and-cancer-s%C3%A9ralini-affair?page=0%2C2" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">he wrote a letter to the journal</a>.

Another <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0278691512007910" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">letter writer demanding retraction is Prof. Mark Tester</a>. Like Moloney and the JIC, Tester is a firm favourite with the SMC, <a href="http://www.sciencemediacentre.org/?s=mark%20tester&cat=" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">featuring in three of this year's SMC's media releases </a>and in many more over the years. He was already a favoured expert a decade ago when the SMC was<a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2002/jun/07/bbc.medicalscience" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"> accused of orchestrating a spin campaign</a> to discredit a BBC drama on GM crops. <a href="http://www.adelaide.edu.au/directory/mark.tester" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">The University of Adelaide staff directory</a> broadens out Prof. Tester's academic profile in a way the SMC never has: "His commercial acumen is clear from his establishment of private companies and successful interactions with multinational companies such as Monsanto, Syngenta, Bayer and Pioneer-DuPont."

Many other letter writers also have undisclosed industry links. Take, for instance, Martina Newell-McGloughlin. <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0278691512007922" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">She identifies herself </a>as the director of the International Biotechnology Program at the University of California/Davis, but fails to mention that <a href="http://www.citywatchla.com/4box-left/3879-damning-report-questions-monsanto-genetically-modified-corn-study" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">the Program is funded by the likes of Monsanto, Syngenta, DuPont and Bayer</a>. Another letter writer and a colleague at UC Davis, Kent Bradford, <a href="http://www.sacbee.com/static/live/news/projects/biotech/c3_3.html" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">has consulted for Monsanto</a>. Lucia de Souza<a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0278691512008022" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"> wrote to the journal </a>with Leila Macedo Oda on behalf of <a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/ANBio" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">ANBio – the Brazilian Biosafety Association</a>, without mentioning that ANBio's funders include Monsanto, Bayer, and DuPont.

Then there are the letter writers who fail to mention their previous employers, <a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/Sense_about_Science#Monsanto_scientist_named_on_early_draft_of_SAS_guide_to_GM" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">like Andrew Cockburn</a>, Monsanto's former director of scientific affairs (Europe and Africa); <a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/L._Val_Giddings" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">L. Val Giddings</a>, former Vice President of the <a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/BIO" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Biotechnology Industry Organisation</a>; and <a href="http://www.zoominfo.com/#!search/profile/person?personId=90497954&targetid=profile" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Sivramiah (Shanthu) Shantharam</a>, former Syngenta man and until recently head of the biotech industry's main lobby group in India.

Even letter writers who at first glance seem like they must be entirely independent of the biotech industry can turn out to have links. Take, for instance, <a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/Erio_Barale-Thomas" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Erio Barale-Thomas</a>, one of the few toxicologists <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0278691512007867" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">to criticize the Seralini paper in the journal</a>. Barale-Thomas, who says he writes on behalf of the Administrative Council of the French Society of Toxicological Pathology, takes Seralini to task for his failure to declare a conflict of interest in his paper, namely that Seralini is president of CRIIGEN, an independent research group with concerns about GM, which contributed funding to the research. Yet CRIIGEN's contribution to funding the study was declared in the paper, while Barale-Thomas does not disclose in his letter <a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/Erio_Barale-Thomas" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">his own biotech interests</a>. He is not only principal scientist at Janssen Biotech, but immediately prior to that he worked for the GM crop and agrochemical giant Bayer CropScience (1998-2003).

Another French scientist among the letter writers is Prof. Marc Fellous, whose declared connections are academic posts in the sphere of human genetics. What he doesn't mention is that he heads up the <a href="http://gmwatch.org/latest-listing/51-2012/14362" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">French Association of Plant Biotechnology</a>, which lobbies for GM crops and has been so aggressive in its attacks on Seralini that last year he successfully sued Fellous for defamation.

Another letter writer <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0278691512007983" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">is the pathologist Sir Colin Berry</a>. Like Trewavas, <a href="http://www.scientific-alliance.org/scientific-advisory-forum" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Berry is an advisor to the Scientific Alliance</a>, an organization which campaigns on environmental issues, particularly climate change, energy policy and agriculture. It is pro-GM, pro-nuclear and sceptical about climate change. Its director, <a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/Martin_Livermore" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Martin Livermore</a>, runs an agri-food PR consultancy, prior to which he did PR for the GM giant DuPont. <a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/Scientific_Alliance" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">The Alliance</a> was established by the lobby firm Foresight Communication with money from right-wing business interests.

Trewavas is one of only a couple of scientists who not only signed onto the Prakash, Chassy, Miller letter but also sent <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0278691512007958" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">their own letter of complaint to the journal</a>. Trewavas concludes it like this: "this paper and this journal have dealt the value of evidence-based knowledge a serious blow and it can only be rectified if the paper is withdrawn by the authors with an apology for misleading the public and the scientific community alike… Ideology and politics must be kept out of scientific study or we all suffer."

It is revealing that critics like Berry and Trewavas claim to champion an evidence-based approach while operating out of lobby groups that attack the scientific consensus on issues like climate change. <a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/Colin_Berry" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Berry</a>, incidentally, is also a shareholder in the company that owns the aggressively libertarian online magazine <a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/Spiked" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Spiked</a>, which also promotes climate scepticism.<a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/Fiona_Fox" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Fiona Fox</a>, the director of the <a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/Science_Media_Centre" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Science Media Centre</a>, was a long-time affiliate of <a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/LM_network" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">the anti-environmental LM network</a> that are behind Spiked.

The network around AgBioWorld also contains people with similar attitudes on environmental issues. These include <a href="http://gmwatch.org/latest-listing/51-2012/14330" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Henry Miller</a>, who co-wrote the article accusing Seralini of fraud, and AgBioWorld's co-founder <a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/Gregory_Conko" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Greg Conko</a> of the Exxon-funded<a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/Competitive_Enterprise_Institute" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Competitive Enterprise Institute</a>, which <a href="http://gmwatch.org/latest-listing/51-2012/14330" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">specializes in</a> denialist "straight talk on global warming."

Given this, it is ironic that AgBioWorld's Seralini petition was set up in the name of "the scientific community." Similarly, <a href="http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/features/online/6048/gm-corn-and-cancer-s%C3%A9ralini-affair?page=0%2C2" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Maurice Moloney says in his letter </a>to Food and Chemical Toxicology that he thinks he can speak "for the vast majority of the biological sciences community." But as we have seen, Moloney and many of the other letter writers link to a narrow and heavily commercialised sector of the biological sciences, albeit one with powerful backers. And some in this community have links to extremist lobby groups more concerned with ideology than evidence.

Identifying the real forces behind the front-men and carefully selected experts of "the scientific community" can be like peeling back the layers of an onion. Take Anthony Trewavas, the scientist who first helped get the cancer-prone rat claim into circulation. In 2001 Prof. Trewavas was named in the High Court in London as the source of a letter published in a Scottish newspaper that made libelous claims against GM critics (<a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2001/oct/08/research.highereducation" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Greenpeace wins damages over professor's "unfounded" allegations</a>). Trewavas subsequently denied being the author of the libel letter published under his name, though he did admit circulating the material, which he said he had got from AgBioWorld. He said it had been written by a "lady in London" but "she" later turned out to be<a href="http://artsci.wustl.edu/_{anthro/bnc/readings/Monbiot%20The%20fake%20persuaders.htm}" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"> a front for the same Monsanto PR people</a> who <a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/Immoral_Maize:Extract_from_Don't_Worry,It's_Safe_to_Eat_by_Andrew_Rowell" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">covertly directed the campaign</a> that resulted in Nature's apparent retraction of Chapela's GM maize paper.

Trewavas, a long-time associate of Prakash and AgBioWorld, also <a href="http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/51-2012/14211" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">played a notable role</a> in that campaign. In that case, Trewavas <a href="http://www.gmwatch.org/latest-listing/51-2012/14211" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">encouraged people to demand</a> Chapela be fired by the University of California, Berkeley, unless he handed over his maize samples for checking: "We should be asking Berkeley to request Chapela to release his samples so that they at least can be checked... Refusal to do so should then be used to request Berkeley to relinquish Chapella's [sic] position." Such calls to arms against Chapela were mostly posted on the AgBioWorld listserv. This use of the listserv eventually enabled Monsanto's <a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/Immoral_Maize:Extract_from_Don't_Worry,It's_Safe_to_Eat_by_Andrew_Rowell" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">covert orchestration</a> of the campaign to be exposed.

Interestingly, as the attacks on Prof. Seralini and his paper spread across both mainstream and social media, AgBioWorld's listserv went missing. In the two months following the publication of Seralini's paper, <a href="http://www.agbioworld.org/newsletter_wm/index.php?caseid=archive" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">not a single bulletin went out on the listserv</a> that <a href="http://www.powerbase.info/index.php/Immoral_Maize:Extract_from_Don't_Worry,It's_Safe_to_Eat_by_Andrew_Rowell" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">played such a pivotal role</a> in achieving retraction of the Mexican maize paper.

AgBioWorld's sudden silence calls to mind a famous exchange in The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes:

Detective: "Is there any other point to which you would wish to draw my attention?"

Holmes: "To the curious incident of the dog in the night-time."

Detective: "The dog did nothing in the night-time."

Holmes: "That was the curious incident." 

With Seralini, it's the curious silence of Monsanto's attack dog that suggests that this time the covert PR war is being conducted by other means.

If the silence of AgBioWorld's listserv is suggestive, so too is the attempt to silence<a href="http://www.gmwatch.org/" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">GMWatch</a>. Within days of the publication of the Seralini paper, our website came under major DDOS (Distributed Denial of Service) attacks. The contours of the attacks followed the peaks of the controversy, with the two biggest and most debilitating attacks coinciding with days on which the major rebuttals of Seralini's paper were published. <a href="http://www.gmwatch.org/" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">The GMWatch website</a> had by then become a clearing house for rapid responses in English to the attacks on Seralini. We have no proof as to who was behind the attacks – that's hard to establish with DDOS. But oddly enough, <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2002/may/29/research.highereducation" style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">an article in the Guardian</a> about the retraction campaign against Quist and Chapela noted, "Just before the [Mexican maize] paper in Nature was publicly challenged, the server hosting the accounts used by its authors was disabled by a particularly effective attack which crippled their capacity to fight back."

More than a decade later history seems to be repeating itself in the covert war over GM crops.

<em style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Jonathan Matthews is the founder and director of <a href="http://www.gmwatch.org/" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">GMWatch</a> and has written numerous articles on <a href="http://www.spinwatch.org/-articles-by-category-mainmenu-8/46-gm-industry/157-genetically-modified-language-professor-bullsht-unspun" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">the politics and spin</a> around GM crops. He's a contributing author to <a href="http://www.spinwatch.org/test/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=5161:thinker-faker-spinner-spy&catid=314:books&Itemid=120" style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; text-decoration: none; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Thinker, Faker, Spinner, Spy: Corporate PR and the Assault on Democracy</a><em style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">,<em style=" font-weight: normal; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; outline: 0px; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;"> eds Dinan and Miller (Pluto Press). Additional research: Claire Robinson, co-editor, GMWatch.

*<strong style=" margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">Spinwatch plans to publish a separate piece looking at some of the study's European critics, including science academies and the European Food Safety Authority.

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