---

Media Relations

IU center to study pollution-illness links

First-of-its-kind initiative in Indiana will focus on cancer and children's health issues

Indianapolis Star
May 1

By Tammy Webber

Indiana anglers are regularly warned about high mercury levels in fish, but is the potent neurotoxin really affecting Hoosiers' health? Air pollution typically is higher in neighborhoods surrounding factories, but can higher rates of cancers be traced to such emissions? In Indiana, such connections are rarely, if ever, found because nobody's routinely looking for them. That will change beginning July 1, when the Indiana University School of Medicine launches a new Center for Environmental Health to explore possible links between pollution and diseases -- as well as how genetics and personal lifestyle choices, such as smoking, can work with pollution to cause illnesses. The center, the first of its kind in Indiana, initially will concentrate on cancer and children's health, said Director James E. Klaunig, an IU toxicology and pharmacology professor. "This is something that's a need in Indiana and certainly a need for the university," said Klaunig. "This is an accepted science that has been missing from IU and university systems throughout Indiana."

Read this story at: http://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060501/NEWS01/605010424&SearchID=73243251755137

Learn more about James E. Klaunig at: http://cancer.iu.edu/research/members/member_bio.php?id=1139

Learn more about the IU School of Medicine at: http://www.medicine.iu.edu/

---

---