Megan collecting Galanthus specimens

Gloriosa were grown in the greenhouse

The Girl Scouts of Eastern Missouri  honored Toni Kutchan during their 2011 Girls and Women of Distinction award ceremony.

“The achievements of these Girls and Women of Distinction reflect the mission of Girl Scouting,” said Donna K. Martin, chief executive officer of Girl Scouts of Eastern Missouri. “Each one is a role model, and each is making a positive difference in her community.”

2011 Women of Distinction
Seated: Mary Ann Lazarus, Risa Zwerling-Wrighton, Maxine Clark, Frankie M. Freeman
Standing: Michele Liebman, Shimmy Gray-Miller, Toni Kutchan, Mary Kay January, Antoinette Filla, Sally Brayley Bliss

Read more at the Girl Scouts website and the St. Louis Suburban Journals.

Former Kutchan Lab intern, Xu Han, has been accepted to a National Institutes of Health summer internship for 2011. He will be working in the lab of Dr. Kenneth Yamada, Chief of the Laboratory of Cell and Developmental Biology, National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research in Bethesda, MD. Congratulations Xu!

Xu is currently attending the University of Minnesota School of Dentistry. His undergraduate institute, Macalester College, recently posted an article about Xu. Read the article here.

“For most adults of a certain age, childhood bedtime stories were simple fables that ended with ‘and they lived happily ever after.’ Not for Toni Kutchan and her big brother, Mike. ‘We didn’t have bedtime stories, we had math problems,’ laughed Kutchan, who is Oliver M. Langenberg Distinguished Investigator for the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center….”

Read the rest of this article here.

The December issue of the Phytochemical Society of North America (PSNA) newsletter features an article about Dr. Zenk, written by Dick Mansell, a former coworker, in celebration of the Pioneer Award Dr. Zenk received this past summer.

The article begins: “Professor Meinhart Zenk has been one of the most productive and influential scientists in the field of Phytochemistry over the past 40+ years. His prolific publication list and diversity of research topics is likely without equal. One needs only to peruse his Vitae to be amazed at his mastery and accomplishments within the field.”

Read the rest of the article by clicking here.

 Dr. Zenk addresses PSNA meeting attendees after receiving the Pioneer Award

The German Academy of Science, traditionally known as The Leopoldina, is an association of scientists founded in 1652 and is the oldest continusously existing academy of natural sciences and medicine in the world. As an academy, it selects outstanding scientists to become members. Since its founding, it has appointed more that 7,000 individuals, including Marie Curie, Charles Darwin, Albert Einstein, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Alexander von Humboldt, Justus von Liebig and Max Planck. Dr. Meinhart Zenk was elected to Leopoldina in 1983. Today, more than a quarter of its members come from outside Germany. New members are proposed by the academy members and are elected to the academy by the presidium in a multi-stage selection process. 

Dr. William Danforth and Dr. Phil Needleman congratulate Dr. Kutchan 

Danforth Center celebrates Dr. Kutchan’s Leopoldina election and induction

The Kutchan Lab hosted three summer interns in 2010. Daphne Benzaquen and Ashley Muehler are undergraduate students who participated in the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center summer intern program. They worked on opium poppy enzymes. Calvin Irwin is a high school student who participated in the STARS (Students and Teachers as Research Scientists) program. His project also explored opium poppy enzymes. All three completed successful projects and presented their research at a seminar. Good luck to each of them in the future!

Left Photo: Dr. Yasuhiro Higashi (interns’ mentor), Daphne Benzaquen, Ashley Muehler, Dr. Toni Kutchan

Right Photo: Ashley Muehler, Calvin Irwin, Daphne Benzaquen in front of “Team Kutchan” headquarters!

Dr. Taiji Nomura (former Kutchan Lab member) has received the Arthur C. Neish Award, which is given each year to a few outstanding early career scientists by the Phytochemical Society of North America. He accepted the award and presented his research at this year’s joint ASP/PSNA meeting in Florida in July.

Dr. Nomura at the 2010 ASP/PSNA Conference

Dr. Meinhart H. Zenk has received the Phytochemical Pioneer Award given by the Phytochemical Society of North America in recognition of a lifetime of outstanding contributions to the field of phytochemistry . He accepted the award at this year’s joint ASP/PSNA meeting in Florida in July.

Drs. Zenk & Nomura receive awards

Recently Dr. Meinhart Zenk’s research was in the news. His work on morphine in mammals was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science [Grobe, N., Lamshöft, M., Orth, R.G., Dräger, B., Kutchan, T.M., Zenk, M.H. and Spiteller, M.: Urinary excretion of morphine and biosynthetic precursors in mice. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 107, 8147-8152 (2010)]. Several news agencies reported these results, including Nature News, Science News and National Geographic and The St. Louis Beacon (links to reports below). 

http://www.stlbeacon.org/content/view/104594/107

http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100426/full/news.2010.202.html

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2010/04/mice-make-morphine/

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/04/100426-natural-morphine-drugs-humans-mice/