POISONOUS SCIENCE – A FIRST NOVEL

Today's guest blog is by Henry Forman, who has just published a new mystery novel I think many of you might enjoy reading.   Henry's plot dramatizes a real issue in contemporary scientific research, so there's some real food for thought in this novel.

URUGUAY HERBICIDE TEST SPURS REGIONAL INTEREST

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Here’s a very nice description of what I did in Uruguay when I wasn't trying to write and sell mystery stories and novels. [Reprinted From Global Health Matters, Fogarty International Center's newsletter, January / February 2013 | Volume 12, Issue 1]

“Focus on water”

By Cathy Kristiansen

What started as an initiative to protect Uruguayan drinking water from an herbicide commonly used by rice farmers has blossomed into an international network of budding researchers focused on solving water problems in Latin America. With Fogarty support, researchers and trainees are teaching others how to develop and use molecular-based tests to measure water purity.  Researchers in Uruguay devised a simple test to measure herbicide levels in water.

The project began in 2001, when Dr. Jerold A. Last of the University of California (UC), Davis, received his first International Training and Research in Environmental and Occupational Health grant.  This Fogarty program aims to nurture trainees from a variety of disciplines to help developing countries and emerging democracies develop capacity in both environmental and occupational health.

Uruguay and Me---a Personal Memoir

This post originated as an invited article I wrote for the Fulbright (Uruguay) Newsletter in 2005.  I've twice been a Fulbright Professor in Montevideo (the second time as a shared award with half of the time spent in Salta, Argentina), which has led me into a series of continuing collaborations with scientists there and a rich store of people and places to use as background for my novels.  The Newsletter asked for a 5-year retrospective on what my experiences during the tenure of the prestigious Fulbright award there in 1999 were like, and what has occurred since then.
 

            Besides acquiring an occasional taste for yerba mate and parrillada compleada, the Fulbright award had several other influences on my life, then and now.  Most important was the result of a promise I made to myself that relationships made during this Fulbright award, my second (the first was to Uruguay in 1982), would progress beyond the nominal exchange of Christmas cards after I returned to California. Fortunately I was at a time in my career when this commitment was possible to pursue.