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2009 John Arthur Wilson Memorial Lecturer -- Dr. Eleanor M.
Brown, Research Chemist, Lead Scientist, Fats, Oils and Animal Coproducts
Research Unit, Eastern Regional Research Center, ARS, USDA
The 50th John Arthur Wilson Memorial Lecture will be presented
at the Annual Meeting by Dr. Eleanor M. Brown at 8:25 am on Friday,
June 19, in Banquet Rooms 1-2.
Eleanor (Ellie) Brown is a native of
East Liverpool, Ohio, and currently lives with her husband in
Oreland, PA. She holds a BA in mathematics and chemistry
from Ohio Wesleyan University, and a Ph.D. from Drexel
University in Chemistry with an emphasis on the application of
physical chemistry to biological problems. Her research career
has been with ERRC, ARS, USDA. Since 1971, she has studied
protein structure in a variety of agriculturally important
systems (dairy, poultry, and leather) to achieve knowledge of
the relationships between structure and biological or
technological function. She has studied the effects of
chemical and enzymatic modifications as well as interactions
with environmental variables and other biomolecules on protein
structure-function relationships in basic and applied contexts.
She is author or coauthor of 125 publications and 4 patents and
has presented 45 papers at scientific meetings.
Since 1990, she has been Lead Scientist for
projects designed to reduce the environmental impact of leather
production and develop a basis for understanding the mechanisms
of tanning. Studies of the relationship between protein
(collagen) structure and function, particularly in a processing
system, form the core of her research. Dr. Brown has
established a successful record of defining research problems on
a molecular basis and developing innovative approaches to their
solution. Early in her research career, she identified the
amino acid residues that comprise the metal binding site of the
milk protein, lactoferrin. She has demonstrated
accomplishments in the areas of chemical modification of amino
acid side chains, spectrophotometric estimation of protein
conformation, molecular modeling of noncrystalline proteins.
She pioneered the combined use of algorithms to predict protein
structure with physical chemical data to develop preliminary
three-dimensional structures for agriculturally important
proteins, including caseins, apolipoproteins, and collagen.
The models, after refinement via molecular dynamics and energy
minimization have proved to be consistent with more recently
obtained data and have provided the basis for modeling of these
proteins by other groups around the world. In conjunction
with the molecular models, she has developed a soluble model
tanning system that allows one to observe by a variety of
spectroscopic techniques the effects on collagen structure of
tanning processes. As Lead Scientist, she has developed
collaborations with researchers in the USA and worldwide for the
study of collagen structure and function in tanning and has
participated fully in collaborations for the development of
value added products from tannery waste. Academic
scientists from the USA, UK, China and Spain have obtained their
own funding to support their research in her laboratory on the
biochemical fundamentals of tanning.
She has been a member of the American Leather
Chemists Association since 1991, serving as a member and chair
of the Uses of Collagen and Its Coproducts Committee, a member
of the Editorial Board of JALCA and a member of Council
(2005-2008). She received the prize paper award in 1993 and the
Alsop award in 1996. Her organizational activities in addition
to the ALCA include membership in the Protein Society, the
American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, the
American Chemical Society where she is a member of the Women
Chemists Committee and the Association for Women in Science
where she was a founding member of the Philadelphia chapter.
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