John Giesy

Key takeaways

John Giesy belongs to astronomy; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect John Giesy to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of John Giesy from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

John Paul Giesy Jr. (born 1948 in Youngstown, Ohio) is an American–Canadian ecotoxicologist. He is an Emeritus Distinguished Professor and former Canada Research Chair in Environmental Toxicology at the University of Saskatchewan. Currently, Giesy is a Visiting Distinguished Professor of Environmental Science at Baylor University in Waco, Texas, USA. Giesy was credited with being the first scientist to discover toxic per- and poly-fluoroalkyl [PFAS] chemicals in the environment. His discoveries also include the photo-enhanced toxicity.

Early life and education Giesy was born in 1948 in Youngstown, Ohio, US. He grew up in Flint, Michigan, where he attended Flint Central High School. Giesy was a varsity wrestler and played in the marching and concert bands. In 1963, Giesy became an Eagle Boy Scout. He graduated from Alma College, where he was a varsity wrestler and played in the Kiltie Marching Band. In 1970, he enrolled at Michigan State University (MSU) for his master's degree and PhD in Fisheries and Wildlife with a specialization in Limnology. He served on the Board of Directors of Alma College and was President of the Alumni Board, and received Alma College's Distinguished Alumni Award.

Career

MSU Giesy started his career at the University of Georgia, where he was promoted to the rank of associate professor before returning to MSU in 1979. As a professor at MSU, Giesy became a member of the university's pesticide research center and served as president of the Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry (SETAC) from which he received the Founder's Award, which is the highest global award given by SETAC and is now a SETAC Fellow. In 1987, Giesy was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship to lecture and conduct research at Bayreuth University in West Germany. Following this, he received the 1990 CIBA-GEIGY Agricultural Recognition Award for "lifelong contributions to the science of environmental toxicology and continuing excellence in research and teaching". At the turn of the century, Giesy and Kurunthachalam Kannan were the first to report on "the global distribution of perfluorooctanesulfonate (PFOS), a fluorinated organic contaminant." Based on the findings of their 2000 study, Giesy and Kannan said that "PFOS were widely detected in wildlife throughout the world" and that "PFOS is widespread in the environment." They said that "PFOS can bioaccumulate to higher trophic levels of the food chain" and that the "concentrations of PFOS in wildlife are less than those required to cause adverse effects in laboratory animals." Giesy was also credited with being the first scientist to discover toxic per- and poly-fluoroalkyl [PFAS] chemicals in the environment. To date, Giesy has published 87 peer-reviewed papers on Per- and poly-fluorinated compounds. As a result of his research, Giesy was named an Einstein Professor, the highest honor bestowed to non-Chinese by the Chinese Academy of Science, and was appointed the Distinguished Honorary Professor at King Saud University as the top environmental toxicologist in the world. During his tenure at MSU, his discoveries included the cause of deformities and lethality in birds of the Great Lakes, photo-enhanced toxicity, and the presence of perfluorinated chemicals in the environment, an important new class of contaminants widely used in common commercial products. Currently, Giesy is studying the fates, distribution and hazards posed by liquid crystal monomers (LCMs) used in the production of flat-screen devices. The LCMs, which are now ubiquitous in the environment, including in the brains of cetaceans, have structures and properties that make them persistent organic pollutants (POPs). They are also predicted to be toxic, but so far little information is available on their potential to cause toxicity.

University of Saskatchewan Giesy eventually left MSU to become a Canada Research Chair in Environmental Toxicology at the University of Saskatchewan (U of S) and professor in the Western College of Veterinary Medicine's Department of Veterinary Biomedical Sciences. In 2010, Giesy was elected as a Member National Academy of Sciences of Canada in the Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences Division of Academy III and elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada (RSC) for being "among the world's most influential environmental toxicologists whose work in ecological risk assessment, including aquatic, wildlife and avian toxicology, has had global impact." He was also among the three nominees for the 2010 Innovation Place-Industry Liaison Office Award of Innovation for having co-developed an assay test that evaluates the effects of chemicals on hormones. While at U of S, Giesy continued to conduct research on endocrine-disrupting chemicals and was sought by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to develop a way to test for these chemicals. As a result, his research team devised a test for use in worldwide screening programs. In 2012, Giesy was recognized with the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Paris-based Scientific Committee on Problems of the Environment and China's Zhongyu Environmental Technologies Corporation. He was also awarded RSC's Miroslaw Romanowski Medal in recognition of his "critical work addressing environmental contamination". As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, and like many US municipalities, Giesy helped develop an early warning system for COVID-19 by sampling and testing the city's wastewater. By 2021, his laboratory started picking up shedding of the SARS-CoV-2 Alpha variant two weeks prior to an Alberta outbreak by studying the sewage. Giesy's wastewater studies were very similar to prior studies conducted in early 2020 by MIT, Harvard, and Brigham and Women's Hospital. Giesy's team received the Smart 50 Award for the monitoring during COVID. In 2019, Giesy was awarded an honorary doctorate from Masaryk University in the Czech Republic in the field of environmental sciences.

Baylor University In 2016, Giesy was appointed as a Visiting Distinguished Professor of Environmental Studies and to the Graduate Faculty at Baylor University. He continues to teach undergraduate and graduate classes, advise graduate students and conduct research and publish with Baylor Faculty.

… excerpt ends here. Continue reading the full article.

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with John Giesy

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what John Giesy claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In astronomy, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to John Giesy before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about John Giesy ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of John Giesy

In research: John Giesy appears in astronomy research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses John Giesy in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: John Giesy is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1948 births, Academic staff of the University of Saskatchewan, American toxicologists, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for John Giesy outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

How to study John Giesy in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what John Giesy means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain John Giesy out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is John Giesy in simple terms?

John Paul Giesy Jr. (born 1948 in Youngstown, Ohio) is an American–Canadian ecotoxicologist.

Why does John Giesy matter?

Because it connects several astronomy ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study John Giesy?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on John Giesy.