The first big news is the ACS National in Boston that our Division participated in. By all counts this was a very successful meeting for us. We had a full schedule of excellent symposia and talks plus posters (total of 145 presentations). I personally thought the student and postdocs talks and posters were of very high quality. See the article below about the winners in the competition, which of course was very keen.

Next year the Division will not have programming at the Spring ACS meeting but will be there in Philadelphia for the national meeting 17 - 20 August 2008 (we will probably not program through Thursday the 21st).

Many people helped with the meeting in Boston, but I would particularly like to thank several. Kent Gates, as chair of the Program Committee, did a terrific job. Scott Daniels, chair of the Membership Committee, worked hard on getting the word out that TOXI is a good Division to be in. Thanks also to Merck and Pfizer for some helpful funding. Stephen Doster, from Chemical Research in Toxicology, was at the meeting and helped with several logistical aspects (he and Tom Spratt also took the many photos that accompany this quarter's newsletter). Finally, I would like to thank all the Executive Committee for participating in a very useful meeting Saturday night that cannot help but stimulate activities.

Next year we will be giving our Division members the option to have their posters up on a secure website (available to Division members). This will be optional (and any sensitive portions can be omitted), and the time they are posted will be restricted.

Our officer elections are coming up very soon. See the biographical sketches in this newsletter. Your ballots will be sent by mail (we are moving to an electronic system with the ByLaws changes). I want to emphasize the importance of having good officers for our Division; TOXI just doesn't run itself. In my experience thus far, I find a very enthusiastic membership but it does need some leadership. It is very important that our members vote! We have an excellent slate of candidates, and I thank all who agreed to run for office. I would also like to thank Lisa Peterson, chair of the Nominating Committee, and the other members (Judy Bolton, Nick Geacintov) for their work. Vote!

Please provide your suggestions for programming for next fall's meeting to Kent Gates as soon as possible. We already have several things lined up. One major change, which came out of the Executive Committee meeting in Boston, involves a change in the keynote lecture, which had been held on Sunday evenings. The TOXI Division will be initiating an award called the Founders' Award, to acknowledge those individuals who started this Division, and a committee will select the awardee from open nominations (see elsewhere in this newsletter). The awardee will give a lecture and select three others of his or her choosing to lecture in a morning or afternoon special symposium. This approach has been used for awards in other ACS divisions. We have decided to restrict the nominations to members of the ACS Chemical Toxicology Division (someone can join now!) and emphasize the innovative scientific contributions to the field of chemical toxicology. Please nominate outstanding candidates. We will be campaigning to obtainfunds to support this award, preferably in the long term.

Another thing I would like to encourage is more Division participation in our committees. See the website for lists and contacts. This is a great way for younger members to become involved, and we can use graduate students and postdocs on some of these. A good way to meet people!

Finally, I encourage you to pay attention to some upcoming changes at Chemical Research inToxicology. We will publish special issues in both November and December 2007. In January we will have additional features in the journal plus a revamped website.

Great things are happening in the Division-stay tuned!

New Division Award to be Given in 2008-Nominations Solicited

Fred Guengerich, Division Chair, has reported that the Division will give a new award beginning in 2008. Following discussion at the meeting of the Executive Committee, we are changing our program in the Division. Instead of selecting an individual for a Sunday evening lecture, we decided to institute an award, to be called the Founders' Award to honor the vision and contributions of the individuals who worked to get the division started in the mid -1990's. The selected awardee will be asked to present a lecture and also invite three other speakers, to all speak in a morning or afternoon session designated as the Founders' Award Lecture Symposium. We hope to solicit funds to support this award. Several of the original proponents of the Division have agreed to serve on the selection committee.

Nominations for the award are currently being solicited. Nominees are restricted to TOXI Division members who have made innovative research contributions in the general field of chemical toxicology. Please send a letter of nomination, a CV of the nominee, and three supporting letters to the Secretary, James C. Fishbein, Professor, (Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry University of Maryland, Baltimore County 1000 Hilltop Circle, Baltimore, MD, 21250 tel. 410-455-2190 fax 410-455-2608, email jfishbei@umbc.edu by November 1, 2007. The committee plans to make its choice by November 15.

Changes and Expansion of Chemical Research in Toxicology

Larry Marnett, Editor, and Carol Rouzer, Managing Editor, report that Chemical Research in Toxicology is moving ahead with its plans for expansion of the journal. Beginning with the January 2008 issue, CRT will include two new features, "In This Issue" which will highlight up to four articles in the current issue of CRT, and "Spotlights" which will highlight particularly interesting articles from other journals as well as news in the field from the popular press.

The journal is taking steps to increase its readership and authorship, especially outside of the U.S., and will begin a series of articles, "Toxicology: A Global Perspective", focusing on the field of toxicology worldwide. In addition, the scope of the journal is being expanded in order to welcome articles related to the study of the role of endogenously generated toxicants and the role of toxicologic mechanisms in the pathogenesis of disease.

Finally, following the great success of the "Future of Toxicology" series, CRT will begin a new series of perspectives highlighting the work of its editorial advisory board members. The kickoff of the expanded journal will coincide with the publication of its celebratory 20th anniversary issue, which will be a compendium of review articles by many of the top researchers in the field. As it works to expand its service to the community, CRT will continue to strive to maintain high standards in publication of articles in chemical and mechanistic toxicology. CRT welcomes input from Division members. Please contact Managing Editor, Carol Rouzer with ideas for journal features or topics, or with news appropriate for the "Spotlights" feature.

Larry Marnett has also informed us that the 20th Anniversary issue of CRT to be published in January of 2008 will be available free through the internet. This idea arose in the TOXI Executive Committee meeting as a perk for members. Particulars will be announced at a later date. Keep your eye on CRT.

ACS Meeting in Boston

The Division of Chemical Toxicology strives, as its principal Division activity, to present excellent programming at National ACS meetings. We have been aided in the quest by both a series of excellent program chairs and symposium organizers. This year was no exception (see Chair's message). In addition to our current Program Chair Kent Gates' excellent efforts in organizing the program, as well as the Symposium Chairs, Amanda Bryant-Friederich, Peter Dedon, Larry Marnett, Fred Guengerich, Yinsheng Wang, and Joanne Kotz, some of whom obtained funding by way of a successful competitive grant application to NIH (PI Amanda Bryant-Friederich), we need to thank the National Cancer Institute, Chemical Research in Toxicology, Nature Chemical Biology, Merck and Pfizer for supporting our programming and awards. By the way, at each fall ACS meeting we sponsor a joint one day symposium with the Division of Medicinal Chemistry on "Drug Safety". These talks are exceptionally well attended. If you see programming needs or have suggestions don't hesitate to convey them to Professor Gates.

Young Investigator Awards

Awards for presentations at the Boston ACS meeting were given by the Division. Again this year the judges had to choose from a large and excellent group of oral and poster presentations. The cash awards were graciously provided by grants form Merck and Pfizer. The award winners and their abstracts (link through titles) are given below.

Oral Presentation Awards

1. Jim Delaney, MIT.
Influence of AlkB on 1,N2-ethenoguanine genotoxicity and mutagenicity in E. coli.

2. (tie) Derrick Seiner, University of Missouri.
Inactivation of protein tyrosine phosphatase 1B (PTP1B) by the endogenous/dietary aldehyde acrolein.

2. (tie) Kyle Brown, Vanderbilt University.
Solution structure of the alpha-N7-dG aflatoxin B1 formamidopyrimidine (FAPy) adduct in duplex DNA.

The Pfizer Graduate Student Poster Awards

1. Ricardo Vadales, MIT.
Development of an in vitro model for the study of drug-induced bile acid synthesis and transport dysfunction in a 3D tissue engineered liver microreactor culturing system.

2. Derrick Seiner, University of Missouri.
Effect of sequence context on rate and yield of interstrand crosslinks generated by abasic sites in duplex DNA.

The Merck Post-doc Poster Awards

1. Jennifer Seal, MIT.
Identification of nitrated proteins from iNOS-induced macrophages using biotin labeling and capture.

2. Kun Song, SUNY Stony Brook.
Computational analysis of the lesion recognition mechanism of formamido-pyrimidine DNA glycosylase.

From left to right are pictured Kent Gates, Ricardo Vadales,Derrick Seiner, Jim Delaney, Kun Song,
Jennifer Seal,and Fred Guengerich

Lawrence Loeb gives Award Lecture

Lawrence Loeb, M.D., Ph.D., Professor of Pathology and Biochemistry at the University of Washington, gave the Award Lecture entitled "Random Mutations in Human Cancer." His research in this area may have significant consequences in the ways that both cancer prevention and treatment are approached and clinically applied. Much recent research has developed around the postulate that tumors result only from the clonal expansion of an aberrant cell. For example, identification of the key mutations in these tumor cells has led to the development of specific drugs directed at specific protein targets that arise from these mutations. Yet, resistance to even the most successful of these modern drugs occurs in time.

Loeb presented his hypothesis that this largely arises from high frequency random mutations that occur after clonal expansion because of the development of a mutator phenotype within the cell. The mechanism of this phenotypic development remains to be determined, but it results in numerous point mutations as a result of genomic instability. Thus, a tumor actually consists of many different kinds of cells, many of which are mutating rapidly. These mutations permit, for example, escape from drug- and radio-therapy. Support for this hypothesis was made possible by the Loeb group's development of a highly sensitive and selective assay that permits the mutations (base changes) in a single DNA molecule to be determined. Loeb has found that normal cells have a random mutation frequency of less than 10-8, while the average random mutation frequency of significantly developed tumor cells is on the average 200 times greater ("Human cancers express a mutator phenotype," Jason H. Bielas, Keith R. Loeb, Brian P. Rubin, Lawrence D. True, and Lawrence A. Loeb, PNAS, (2006) 103, 18238-18242). For more information about the research of the Loeb group see: http://depts.washington.edu/loeblabs/.

Report from Our Councilor

Division Councilor, Patrick Hanna, reported on several items from the ACS Council meeting in Boston that he believes may be of interest to the membership.

The Committee on Meetings and Expositions announced that the abstracts of withdrawn papers are being gleaned from the CAS data base. Also, the Committee has been tracking presenter "no shows" at the San Francisco, Chicago and Boston meetings and will collaborate with the Committee on Divisional Activities to develop policies to address the problem. It appears that some people are "gaming the system" by submitting abstracts without having any intention of attending the meeting to present their talks or posters. Chairs complained of having to deal with large gaps in their sessions because of having as many as two or three no shows. Even more flagrant abuses were noted.

The Committee on Meetings and Expositions stated that it received a "barrage" of complaints about McCormick Place, especially its remoteness from Chicago Hotels and restaurants. The Committee then conducted a random survey of attendees of the Chicago meeting. As a result of the attendee's comments, the 2011 meeting scheduled for Chicago is being moved to Denver. An unhappy Chicago section Councilor described this action as unprecedented and wanted to know why the Chicago section was not consulted about it. Most of the people seemed to support the decision, which apparently will stand.

Candidates in the Elections

The election this year will fill the following offices.

The division is grateful for the hard work of the current Nominations Committee, Lisa Peterson, Nick Geacintov and Judy Bolton in identifying this slate of exceptional candidates. The strength of our Division depends upon the willingness of its members to offer their time to serve as officers. The Division is indebted to the members who have agreed to stand for office this year.

Proposed by-law changes

A committee headed by Pete Dedon, acting Chair-Elect, proposed the following By-Law changes to the Executive Committee at their meeting in Boston. After a discussion, and a few changes, the Executive Committee voted to bring the changes below to a vote of the membership. In summary the changes, if approved will:

1. Allow electronic balloting.
2. Abolish mandatory quorums for the business meeting. Business meeting attendance rarely meets the current quorum rule
3. Start all new terms of office on January 1

[ View the proposed changes in our by-laws ]

Election

The election ballot and an envelope addressed to the Division's secretary were sent to our members by regular mail. Please return this ballot, using the enclosed envelope, by October 22, 2007.