NIH grant funding for perchlorate research prompts local news coverage

If you missed the front-page profile of biology professor Frank von Hippel and his current research on the environmental contaminant perchlorate and the three-spine stickleback fish that appeared in Tuesday's Anchorage Daily News, here is the link. What's happening to the endocrine system of the stickleback when exposed to perchlorate is scary -- hermaphrodite fish, disrupted hormone systems. The stickleback hormone system is very similar to the human hormone system. Is this kind of environmental contamination causing the epidemic in human reproductive disorders throughout industrialized nations? That's what von Hippel and his collaborators, including Loren Buck at UAA and Todd O'Hara of UAF, as well as other scientists from the University of Oregon, hope to discover.

And here are links to two recent opportunities that Professor von Hippel had to speak about this same research:

• Watch an audio slideshow explaining the perchlorate research.
• If you have questions on the research, you can post them in the comments section under this Facebook 'Meet the Professor' interview. Prof. von Hippel will answer them.