(November 4, 2010 Stillwater, OK) – Oklahoma State University’s Center for Veterinary Health Sciences invites the OSU community and the public to the 11th Sitlington Lecture in Toxicology on Friday, Nov. 19, at 2:30 p.m. in McElroy Hall Auditorium. Guest speaker, Stephanie Padilla, Ph.D., neurotoxicologist in the Integrated Systems Toxicology Division of the National Health and Environmental Effects Research Laboratory, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Research Triangle Park, N.C., will present “Using Zebrafish to Screen for Developmental Toxicity.”

There are over a million different chemicals listed in the publication Chemical Abstracts, but the toxic potential of the vast majority of these chemicals has not been evaluated. Of particular concern, the EPA is developing approaches to screen and prioritize large numbers of chemicals for their ability to induce developmental toxicity. Padilla is involved in exploring methods to screen for developmentally neurotoxic chemicals using zebrafish behavior at 6 days of age. Her studies focus on visual threshold, changes in locomotion, and other behavioral changes in the zebrafish model that may be sensitive indicators of effect in higher organisms.

Carey Pope, Ph.D., head of the Department of Physiological Sciences, Regents Professor and Sitlington Chair in Toxicology at OSU’s veterinary center, is hosting the annual lecture.

“Dr. Padilla is an authority on neurotoxicology. Developing approaches for screening large numbers of chemicals for developmental neurotoxicity potential, using this relatively simple animal model, could be of great importance in protecting children’s health in the future” says Pope.

Padilla earned her Ph.D. in Biochemistry from the Medical School of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, N.C. After completing a Staff Fellowship with the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, M.D., she joined the EPA in 1981. Padilla has received numerous awards including EPA’s Scientific and Technological Achievement Awards and Silver and Bronze Medals for Commendable Service.

Photo of Dr. Stephanie Padilla available on http://www.flickr.com/photos/Padilla

The Oklahoma State University Center for Veterinary Health Sciences is one of 28 veterinary colleges in the United States and is fully accredited by the Council on Education of the American Veterinary Medical Association. The center’s Boren Veterinary Medical Teaching Hospital is open to the public and provides routine and specialized care for small and large animals. It also offers 24-hour emergency care and is certified by the American Animal Hospital Association. For more information, visit www.cvhs.okstate.edu or call (405) 744-7000.

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