PHOTO HIGHLIGHTS OF THE WASHINGTON MEETING
For the millennial year, photobiology will focus its attention on the 13th International Congress of Photobiology, July 1-6, 2000. The setting will be the Hyatt Regency Hotel at the Embarcadero Center in San Francisco, a short walk or cable-car ride to many of the glorious sites of the city. Especially close (a 10-minute walk) is Fisherman’s Wharf, the epicenter of the Fourth of July celebrations and the city’s grand fireworks display over the Bay. ASP will not hold a separate meeting that year but is hosting the international meeting for the Association Internationale de Photobiologie.
As Program Chair for the 13th ICP (also known as Photobiology 2000 or ICP-2K), I have been working with an excellent international program committee that has contributed its ideas and energy to developing an exciting scientific program. The most recent findings will be featured in areas such as photosensory biology; photosynthesis; plant and marine ecosystems; circadian rhythms; photoimmunology; photoaging; melanin and psoralen photobiology; UV damage, repair, and carcinogenesis; vision; photodynamic therapy; in vivo spec-troscopy and many other hot areas of photobiology. The format includes symposia, special lectures, and poster and platform sessions. Awards of the both the AIP (Finsen and Edna Roe Medals) and the ASP (Research, Young Investigator, Photon, and Lifetime Achievement Awards) will be presented.
The program is rapidly nearing completion, and a tentative one is provided in the second announcement, which is being mailed to all ASP members and members of the other participating societies. Since the program will continue to evolve for some time yet, particularly once abstracts are received, the most recent information will be available on the POL Website (www.POL-US.net or www.photobiology.org). For the first time in the history of the ASP or the International Congresses, abstract submission, session assignment, and meeting registration will all be conducted online. The meeting organizers hope this will be convenient for partici-pants as well as for the program committee and session organizers.
The 13th ICP will be the only photobiology meeting next year, so you won’t want to miss it! We are looking forward to a superb meeting, because of both the science and the setting.
ASP News is published quarterly by
The American Society for Photobiology
BioTech Park-Suite 9
1021 Fifteenth Street
Augusta, Georgia 30901
Editor: John S. Connolly, Ph.D.
SCIENTIFIC EDITING SERVICES
P.O. Box 16222
Golden, Colorado
(303) 278-3622
(303) 278-0086 (fax)
Connolly@SciEdServ.com
Frank Gasparro (President), Fred Urbach (Finance Chair) and John Hearst (Local Arrangements) welcome your suggestions.
Nancy Oleinick
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Luncheon (below) at the 27th Annual Meeting of ASP, Washington, D.C.
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It is an honor and a privilege to serve as President of the American Society for Photobiology. I plan to address different society issues in each newsletter during my term. I find myself in an enviable position. Our members are international leaders in photobiological and photochemical research. Our journal, Photochemistry and Photobiology, remains the premier specialty periodical in the area of photobiology. Our annual meetings highlight innovative and relevant research while continuing to attract outstanding senior and junior scientists. And, our society remains financially sound. As a relatively small society, ASP is in an excellent position to address the challenges of a rapidly changing scientific environment We should acknowledge the vision and efforts of numerous past officers and members who built ASP into the effective and prosperous scientific society we enjoy today.
I want to take this opportunity especially to thank Nancy Oleinick for her leadership and wisdom this past year. Nancy has also performed double duty, functioning as both ASP President and as Program Chair for the 13th International Congress of Photobiology, which will be held in San Francisco on July 1-6, 2000. This will be an outstanding meeting so mark your calendars now for Photobiology 2000.
I continue the long tradition of my predecessors by encouraging all ASP members to become involved in society activities. There are a variety of ASP committees working year ‘round. Each committee is chaired by an elected Councilor and includes members appointed by either the President or the respective Committee Chair. Finding an activity or project can be as simple as clicking onto our Website (www.POL-US.net) and deciding which committee(s) interest you and then contacting the Committee Chair.
One of the most enjoyable events at our annual meeting involves recognizing the scientific and service contributions of our members. Each year the Awards and Grants Committee selects recipients for the ASP Research Award (which honors well-established scientists who have made major research contributions) and for the ASP New Investigator Award (recognizing exciting new work of someone relatively new to the field of photobiology). Two additional awards are also presented on an adhoc basis following selection by the society officers and council. These include the Lifetime Achievement Award (honoring an individual who has devoted substantial time and effort to ASP over a long period of time) and the Photon Award (honoring a member who has made exceptional contributions and who has served the Society above and beyond the call of duty). Henry Lim chairs of the Grants and Awards Committee, and I strongly encourage members to submit nominations for the Research Award and the New Investigator Award directly to him. I would also invite members to send me nominations for either the Lifetime Achievement Award or the Photon Award.
I had the good fortune to have a Ph.D. advisor (Tom Dougherty) who encouraged me to participate in scientific meetings as a graduate student. (The combined ASP and Radiation Research meeting in 1978, held in San Juan, Puerto Rico, was my first national research conference). What I remember most about these early meetings was the encouragement and support I received from senior scientists. This leads me to the ASP Mentoring Committee, established by Margaret Kripke several years ago, and currently chaired by Kathy Woodburn. A goal of this committee is to maximize the benefits of Society membership for students, fellows and junior faculty. Nancy Oleinick, John Spudich, and Honnavara Ananthaswamy deserve special thanks for their outstanding work in this regard. We all recognize that the future of our society largely depends on the success of our youngest members. We also realize these new photobiologists and photochemists can be overwhelmed when starting their research and/or academic careers. ASP's tradition of hosting a luncheon at the annual meeting for all young investigators and selected senior members of the Society complements institutional-mentoring programs by assisting individuals to acquire a network of professional colleagues. Contact Kathy if you want to be part of ASP's mentoring program.
Finally, our Council has approved production of a new membership directory. All members will have the opportunity to correct or change their current listings when they submit their dues this fall. We anticipate that the new directories will reach all members by the first of the year.
Charles Gomer
“Promises delayed tend to become promises broken.” - Charles Kuralt (1934-1997)
PHOTOBIOLOGY FOUNDATION UPDATE
The Photobiology Foundation is up and running! The inaugural meetings of the Board of Directors were held during the ASP meeting in Washington. Current members are Tom Coohill (Siena College), Tom Fitzpatrick (Harvard), John Hearst (SteriTech), Lanie Hill (UNDMNJ, Secretary-Treasurer) and myself (Thomas Jefferson University, Direc-tor). In an earlier issue of ASP News it was announced that the PF would support novel projects in photobiology. Three proposals were received and considered by the Board.
Two applications have been funded: Dennis Valenzeno (UMKC), Tom Brennan (Dickinson) and Chris Lambert (Connecticut College) are preparing an online photobiology text. The PF award will serve as seed money to get the project demonstration set up as the ambitious trio seeks funding from other agencies
In addition, a research project submitted by Ron Rahn (UAB) for development of a biological UVB dosimeter was funded. Each project received the modest sum of $5,000. In the future, the PF will be seeking funds from the corporate and private sectors; we look forward to expanding the level and magnitude of support.
The guidelines for next year’s deadline for applications will be announced in a future newsletter. The PF welcomes ideas and comments from all interested parties!
Frank Gasparro, Director
REPORT FROM THE PRESIDENT OF THE 13TH ICP
Things are moving along on all fronts. By the time you receive this newsletter (or perhaps with it) you will have received the 2nd announcement. There is a detailed, tentative program as well as instructions for web submissions of abstracts and meeting and hotel registration. The web site should become active sometime in early to mid-October--look for the 13th ICP link at POL. All of the major committee chairs (Program, Nancy Oleinick; Finance, Fred Urbach; Local Events, John Hearst) are busily doing their jobs, and we are anticipating a millennial Photobiology 2000 meeting! Be there!
Frank Gasparro
July 1-6, 2000: Photobiology 2000: Joint International Congress (AIP, ASP and ESP); San Francisco
July 22-27, 2000: XVIIIth IUPAC Symposium on Photochemistry, Dresden, Germany, http://www.chm.tu-dresden.de/photoiupac2000/ (hyphen required)
Sept. 3-8, 2000: SEAWPIT 2000, Bali, Indonesia, http://www.userpage.fu-berlin.de/~xbiokw/seawpit2
tbd 2001: 9th ESP Congress; Lillehammer, Norway (tent)
GRANTS AND AWARDS COMMITTEE SEEKS
NOMINATIONS
Society members are requested to submit nominations for the following awards:
ASP Research Award:
The candidate should have made a major research contribution to the field
of photobiology and should have at least 10 years of research experience.
New Investigator Award:
The candidate should be any investigator who has recently entered the discipline,
but generally is under 36 years of age, who has the potential to continue
and excel in the field.
Please send nominations by December 1, 1999, to:
Henry W. Lim, M.D.
Chair, ASP Grants and Awards Committee
Department of Dermatology
Henry Ford Hospital
2799 West Grand Boulevard
Detroit, Mich. 48202 USA
Phone: (313) 916-4060
Fax: (313) 916-2093
e-mail: hlim1@hfhs.org
WHY ARE THERE TANNING SALONS IN HAWAII?
As part of the 1999 Annual Meeting of the American Society for Photobiology, I presented a paper at the Workshop on Long Term Health and Environmental Effects of Exposure to UVA and Visible Light.1 One of the areas covered in this presentation was the wavelengths involved in and the safety of indoor tanning. In the process of preparing my talk, I chanced upon the fact that eight tanning salons operate in Hawaii despite insolation levels that permit outdoor tanning during all seasons.
Hawaii is not unique, however, as the same internet phone directory lists two tanning establishments in Key West, Florida, nine in Tucson, Arizona, and six in El Paso, Texas--all locales with high insolation during most of the year. Puzzled that some people will pay for a resource freely available from nature, I inquired of acquaintances why people might choose indoor tanning over nature’s alternative and received two answers that I presented at the workshop:
The “UVA” from indoor tanning equipment is safer than the “UVB” from the sun.
Unlike the sun, indoor tanning equipment is regulated by the FDA.
The first possible answer was provided by an acquaintance who explained it represented the “word on the street.” I understand that certain segments of the indoor-tanning industry promoted this idea in the past, but the FDA and FTC presently object to claims that sunlamps and tanning beds are safe or safer than the sun.
The second explanation was purposefully sarcastic and drew the anticipated chuckle from the audience, although Janusz Beer,2 a member of the discussion panel at the workshop, jocularly lamented that he doubted the public would be so attentive to FDA regulations.
Members of the audience offered several other, more plausible rationales. Fred Urbach3 noted two advantages of indoor tanning, even in Hawaii:
The use of timers reduces the risk of sunburn with indoor tanning equipment compared to sunlight.
People who work during the day can acquire and maintain a tan suggestive of a leisurely lifestyle during their lunch breaks or outside normal working hours when the sun is not available.
A woman who had been in the audience offered other advantages of salons:
In a tanning salon you don’t get sandy, and
you can acquire a “lineless” tan in assured privacy.
She also recalled conversations with friends who live in Hawaii who complained that beaches located near Honolulu tend to be crowded and have limited and inconvenient parking.
Another suggestion came from Warwick Morison:4
When you go to a tanning salon, you expect to get a tan.
Warwick describes this as the “Hamburger Shop Analogy” because a person visiting a hamburger shop has a reasonable expectation of acquiring a hamburger. Since tanning salons are in the business of providing tans, people presume that if they use such a facility they will become tanned, even if by virtue of a type 1 or 2 complexion they already know that they have difficulty acquiring a tan by exposure to the sun. While such individuals cannot, in fact, acquire a lasting tan, the hope persists that if they pay for a tan they will acquire one.
At higher latitudes where year-round outdoor tanning is not practical, indoor facilities offer additional obvious attractions to individuals who wish to acquire or maintain a tan.
Thus, I conclude that as long as many people regard a “healthy tan” as a truism rather than an oxymoron, efforts to discourage indoor tanning are unlikely to meet with great success.
Acknowledgment: Supported by the Office of Biological and Environmental Research, Office of Science, U.S. Department of Energy.
John C. Sutherland
Biology Department and the National Synchrotron Light Source, Brookhaven
National Laboratory, Upton, N.Y. 11973
1Sutherland, J.C. and Sutherland, B.M. (1999) Medical and Environmental Effects of UVA and Visible Light, an Overview, Photochem. Photobiol. 70: 14S.
2Beer, Janusz Z., Ph.D., Center for Devices & Radiological Health, U.S. Food and Drug Administration, Rockville, Md.
3Urbach, Frederick, M.D., former Professor and Chairman of Dermatology, Temple University School of Medicine.
4Morison, Warwick L., M.D., Department of Dermatology, Johns Hopkins University.
SUNLIGHT-INDUCED TANNING: GOOD OR
BAD?
To the editor:
Had I attended the 47th Annual Montagna Symposium on the Biology of Skin (reported in ASP News, Winter 1998), there would not have been unanimous agreement on at least one topic of the “several facts (that) are relatively certain.” I refer to, “Tanning is an injury response to the skin,” and the statement to the effect there is no evidence “that developing a ‘tan’ offers more protection than minimizing sunlight in the first place.” Unemotional reflection reveals there is no evidence to refute it either.
Evolutionary pressures on organisms have produced numerous defense mechanisms.
Thus, the adaptive responses of hepatic cytochrome P-450 enzymes to noxious
exogenous agents are of considerable survival value. A defensive response
against UV radiation is the postnatal development of retina-sparing, yellow
UVA screens in the ocular lens. It is likely that hairless ancestors of Homo
sapiens had adapted to the intense solar insolation of Africa by producing
more cutaneous melanin. As we know, deeply pigmented persons are at low risk
for skin cancer. Likewise, when Homo sapiens migrated north to evolve into
white ethnic groups, unexplained loss of melanin may have been compensated
for by acquisi-tion of an adaptive response of the melanocyte to sunlight.
Therefore, tanning may as well be a defensive response as a marker of melanocyte
damage. If the latter is true, topical agents that induce melanogenesis by
a pathway similar to that of UV radiation must be viewed with
caution.
The mind-set that tanning is harmful is not innocuous. It leads to misleading public statements such as the American Academy of Dermatology’s slogan, “A healthy tan is the first sign of skin cancer” [American Health, 17(4): 107, May 1998]. This statement strains the credulity of those of us who tan readily from incidental solar exposure, thereby impairing the credibility of its sponsor. Such misguided thinking compromises the success of programs to convince the public of the dangers of solar exposure. For example, instead of targeting sun-sensitive persons, these campaigns try to make all of us feel guilty about not using sunscreens. This topic was discussed briefly at the NIH Workshop on Ultraviolet Radiation and Tanning (September 16-18, 1998; Bethesda, Md.).
The above considerations raise the question of the ultimate validity of sunscreen use. Unquestionably, sunscreen use by fair-skinned persons reduces their risk for skin cancer. However, the tanning response [has] developed under the selective pressure of the entire solar spectrum. For persons who tan readily, use of high-SPF sunscreens defeats nature’s design by altering the radiation pattern reaching the skin and preventing tanning. These consequences raise concern for long-term damage by long-wavelength UVA and by visible radiation
Off the subject, why is UV radiation is often referred to as light? Dictionaries define light as something that makes vision possible. Except for neonates, who can see partly into the UVA region, our visual threshold is 400 nm or higher. The well-established term sunlight is troubling, but I am comforted by the fact that it originated in the 13th century, long before the term ultraviolet was employed (1840).
John A. Johnson
Department of Internal Medicine/Dermatology
984360 Nebraska Medical Center
Omaha, Nebraska 68198
P&P GOES ONLINE WITH FULL TEXT OF ARTICLES
Forget searching through stacks of papers or scanning multiple indexes to find that Photochemistry and Photobiology article that you need right now. For several years, it has been possible to sit down at your computer and search a data-base of P&P articles. But now, for articles published in volume 70 and beyond, you’ll be able to call up the full text of the article, complete with figures, and if you like, print an exact replica of the printed journal pages.
By the time you read this, the full text of P&P articles will be available in both HTML and PDF formats. Most people feel that the former is easier to view and read. PDF files, on the other hand, recreate each page exactly as published and are better if you want to print a copy of an article. Initial coverage will begin with the October issue and will soon be extended back to the start of volume 70 (July 1999). Of course, the tables of contents have been available online since 1995, abstracts since late 1996, and full texts of rapid communications since early 1997. Now, full text coverage of all articles will be added.
In the new online presentation of P&P, you’ll find many handy features that make it simple to use. For example, readily accessible buttons will allow you to jump easily to abstract, methods, results, discussion, or references. References cited in the text will be linked to the full citation in the reference list so that you can easily check the citation and then quickly go back to the point where you had stopped reading. Figures will be presented, not as tiny thumbnail sketches, but as images that are large enough to see and appreciate. However, they will still be linked to larger, high-resolution versions for detailed examination or printing.
This new online service will be offered free of charge for the remainder of 1999 to give you a chance to try it out. Starting in 2000 it will be available for a nominal add-on fee to your usual membership dues. If you prefer, you can request the online version of the journal as a replacement for your paper copy.
Along with the new functionality, you’ll find a whole new look to P&P online and a new URL dedicated just to the journal, http://www.aspjournal.com/. Of course, you’ll con-tinue to be able to access P & P via Photobiology Online, http://www.POL-US.net from the US and http://www.POL-Europe.net from the UK.
Dennis Valenzeno
Associate Editor for Electronic Publication
The ASP newsletter is a great source for the news in photobiology, but what about the in-between times, the months from one issue to the next? What about the most recently published or soon-to-be-published papers? For that kind of current information, the Photobiology News section of Photobiology Online (POL) is the place to go.
Photobiology News is the leading link on the top level page of the POL site. It is divided into two major sections: The first is a set of buttons across the top of the page that will take you to the latest tables of contents for Photochemistry and Photobiology or for the Journal of Photochemistry and Photobiology. And, if you really need to know the latest and greatest, there are links to listings of papers that have been accepted, but not yet published, in each of these journals. In addition, there are buttons that will take you to the latest newsletters of either ASP or ESP.
Below the button bar is a list of the latest developments related to photobiology. These are in chronological order with the latest at the top and are regularly updated. For instance, this is where you can find out who won an ASP election or the latest round of ASP awards. There is also news about photobiology in the popular press or related to industry. For example, you can follow a link that leads you to an account of this year’s awarding of a Public Welfare Medal of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences to Arnold Beckman for his development of the DU spectrophotometer.
Photobiology Online, a joint presentation of both the American and European Societies for Photobiology, has recently updated its URLs to make them easier to remember. The old ones that you may have book-marked will still work, but the more convenient forms are:
http://www.POL-US.net
and
http://www.POL-Europe.net
which will take you to the POL server in the United States and in Europe, respectively.
Dennis Valenzeno
dvalenz@kumc.edu
"When you take stuff from one writer it's plagiarism; but when you take
it from many writers, it's research."
- Wilson Mizner
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