Paul Lecture Kicks Off WALS Season, Oct. 2
The NIH Director’s Wednesday Afternoon Lecture Series (WALS) kicks off its 2019-2020 season by hosting the annual William E. Paul Lecture on Wednesday, Oct. 2, in Masur Auditorium, Bldg. 10.
The talk will be presented by Dr. Max Cooper, a professor of pathology and laboratory medicine at Emory University School of Medicine and a Georgia Research Alliance eminent scholar. His talk is titled “Evolution of Adaptive Immunity in Vertebrates.”
Cooper’s laboratory is studying the evolution of adaptive immunity and exploring the use of lamprey monoclonal antibodies for diagnosis and therapy of infectious diseases and lymphoid malignancies in humans. In the 1960s, he worked with Dr. Robert Good (an American physician who is regarded as the founder of modern immunology) to establish the dual nature of the immune system.
In addition, Cooper also helped discover antibody class-switching by B cells; describe the lymphoid follicle-associated epithelial M cells in the intestine and their transcytotic function; and define the fetal liver and bone marrow origins of B cells and pre-B cells.
Cooper is a former president of the American Association of Immunologists, the Clinical Immunology Society and the Kunkel Society. He is also a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the Academy of Medicine, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and a foreign member of the French Academy of Sciences and the Royal Society of London. He has won many awards, including the 2018 Japan Prize.
This annual WALS lecture was established in 2016 in honor of the late Dr. William E. Paul, who was the leader of the NIH immunology community.
There will be a reception, sponsored by FAES, and an opportunity to talk with Cooper in the NIH Library following the lecture. For more information and reasonable accommodation, contact Jacqueline Roberts, (301) 694-6747 or email WALSoffice@od.nih.gov at least 5 days before the lecture.
The WALS season will continue with most lectures being held on Wednesdays at 3 p.m. Check the WALS website for details, including location information; Masur Auditorium will be under renovation for part of the lecture season.