Plenary Speakers

THE MAKING OF A SCIENTIST:  AN UNLIKELY JOURNEY

Mario R. Capecchi is a Nobel laureate and Distinguished Professor of Human Genetics and Biology at the University of Utah. He is best known for his pioneering work on the development of gene targeting in mouse embryo-derived stem cells. This technology allows scientists to create animal models for many human diseases, including cancer.

THE SPIRIT CATCHES YOU AND YOU FALL DOWN:  A LECTURE BY ANNE FADIMAN

Anne Fadiman is an award winning author, essayist and editor. As the inaugural Francis Writer in Residence at Yale University, she served as a professor in the English department and as a mentor to students interested in careers in writing or editing.

Her first book, The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down, won a National Book Critics’ Circle Award. It chronicles the trials of an epileptic Hmong child and her family as they attempt to navigate the gulf between Hmong and American medical systems. The book is taught as an example of both literary journalism and as a casebook for cross cultural sensitivity.

Anne Fadiman edited The American Scholar for seven years and edited several books. She has also published a best-selling collection of essays: Ex Libris: Confessions of a Common Reader, a witty ode to everything book.

SEARCHING FOR THE CURE FOR ALS

Paul Alan Cox is a native of Utah and Wyoming whom Time named one of 11 Heroes of Medicine in 1997 for his work in ethnobotanical drug discoveries. He has won numerous awards, including the Goldman Environmental Prize for his efforts in preserving Samoan rain forests, which he wrote about in his book Nafanua: Saving the Samoan Rainforest.