biosafety advisory

Matthew Anderson, Ph.D.  Dr. Anderson is the Biosafety Officer at a land grant university.  His duties include management of the university’s biosafety program, conducting safety inspections of research, diagnostic and teaching labs, serving as the Alternate Responsible Official and program manager for the university’s Select Agent program, reviewing construction plans for new laboratories on campus, as well as administering and serving on the university’s Institutional Biosafety Committee which has oversight of research activities involving recombinant and synthetic nucleic acids, human, animal and plant pathogens and work with transgenic organisms.  He received Bachelor of Arts degrees in Biology and Chemistry from Dana College in Blair, NE and his PhD in Chemical Biology from Washington University in St. Louis.  After his PhD, he completed a post-doctoral fellowship in nanomedicine at Washington University School of Medicine, creating scaffolds for targeted drug delivery and imaging of cardiovascular disease and he subsequently completed the MRCE Biosafety Training Program post-doctoral fellowship also at Washington University.

Rob Foreman PhD. Rob Foreman, PhD, is the Associate Biosfatey Officer (ABSO) of Northwestern University.  Rob is responsible for providing guidance and consultation to identify and address the risks of working with human, animal, and plant pathogens; human tissues, fluids, cells or cell cultures; recombinant DNA materials and human gene transfer; and laboratory animals.  Rob serves as an Alternate Responsible official for the Federal Select Agent Program.  Rob is a member of the Institutional Biosafety Committee (IBC), the Institutional Review Board (IRB), and an alternate member of the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC).  Rob received his PhD in Microbiology from the University of Chicago in 2012.  The year following, Rob completed a fellowship in biosafety as a Great Lakes Regional Center for Excellence (GLRCE) Biosafety Fellow.

Amy Helgerson MS. Amy is a Biosafety Specialist at a large agricultural university which includes a veterinary school. Her duties include being an Alternative Responsible Official and program coordinator for the university’s Select Agent program, sitting on the Institutional Animal Care and Use committee and reviewing protocols for health and safety issues and in charge of the Bloodborne Pathogen program and biological waste disposal. She also has experience with verification of Biosafety Level 3 laboratories. Amy received her Bachelor of Science in Animal Science in May 2000 and Master of Science in Microbiology in May 2006 from Iowa State University.

Ted Myatt, Sc.D., RBP. Dr. Myatt is the Director of Research Compliance at a research university with oversight over the university’s Institutional Biosafety Committee (IBC).  The IBC provides National Institutes of Health mandated safety and exposure guidance to the research communities engaged in research involving recombinant DNA and infectious agents. He received in BS in microbiology from the University of Illinois and a Master’s in Environmental Management from Duke University Nicholas School of the Environment. Ted obtained his Doctorate of Science (Sc.D.) in Environmental Health from the Harvard School of Public Health. His dissertation was on infectious disease transmission in the workplace.

Alumni

Thanks to previous contributors: Stephen Rusbarsky, J Craig Reed, Marissa M. Cardwell, Amy L. Razukiewicz, Lisa Burley, Joleen Weese, Rebecca L. Moritz, Molly Stitt-Fischer, Gretchen Demmin, Todd Kuiken.