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HATTIESBURG
–
A renowned chemist whose groundbreaking work ushered in
a new era in the fight against AIDS will speak at the
University of Southern Mississippi’s 2006 Lecture Series
in the Sciences.
Dr.
M. Katharine Holloway, a graduate of Southern Miss, will
present the lecture "Discovering New Medicines"
on Tuesday, March 7 at 6:30 p.m. in Bennett Auditorium.
The public is invited to the free event.
Working
for Merck along with chemist Chen Zhao of Abbott Labs,
Holloway was on the teams that developed protease inhibitors,
drugs that kill a type of enzyme in the HIV virus and
render harmless new copies of the virus. Taken with other
drugs, the protease inhibitors have cut the death rate
from AIDS in the United States by more than 70 percent.
"In
the almost 20 years since I graduated from Southern Miss,
I have been privileged to work with wonderful scientists
and to be involved in the basic research for several therapeutic
targets, including CRIXIVAN, which has helped to turn
AIDS into a manageable disease instead of a death sentence,”
Holloway said.
Holloway’s
latter work led to several awards, such as a share in
the 1999 ACS award for Creative Invention, as well as
the honor of being included in a recent Chemical Heritage
Foundation exhibit called "Her Lab in Your Life,”
which describes women's contributions to chemistry.
“We
are thrilled that Dr. Holloway, a truly distinguished
alumna who graduated from USM’s Department of Chemistry
and the Honors College, has agreed to give this lecture
and reacquaint herself with Southern Miss. We hope that
this will not be her last visit and that we will be able
to stay in touch in the future,” said Dr. Sabine Heinhorst,
current T.W. Bennett Professor in the College of Science
and Technology at Southern Miss.
After
graduating from Southern Miss, Holloway obtained her doctorate
in theoretical organic chemistry from the University of
Texas at Austin before joining Merck Research Laboratories
in West Point, Pa.
There
will also be a WISE (Women in Science and Engineering)
luncheon on Tuesday, March 7 from noon to 1 p.m. That
event is R.S.V.P. only.
Click to enlarge
Last updated:
02/20/06
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