FDA Grand Rounds
The FDA Grand Rounds is an educational presentation that is webcast monthly to highlight cutting-edge research underway across the Agency and its impact on protecting and advancing public health. Each session features an FDA scientist presenting on a key public health challenge and how FDA is applying science to its regulatory activities. The 45-minute educational presentation is followed by questions from the audience. You can also view the presentation under Past Grand Rounds following the live webcast. #FDAGrandRounds.
Closer to Zero
Thursday, December 9, 2021
12:00 p.m. - 1:00 p.m. EST
Webcast
About the Speaker
Conrad Choiniere, PhD
Director
Office of Analytics and Outreach(OAO)
Center for Food Safety and Nutrition (CFSAN)
Conrad Choiniere, PhD, is the Director of the Office of Analytics and Outreach at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition (CFSAN). Dr. Choiniere provides executive leadership for a broad portfolio of scientific and regulatory functions including risk and decision analysis, social and behavioral sciences, epidemiology, biostatistics and informatics, education and outreach, and food defense. Dr. Choiniere currently co-leads a core element of FDA’s New Era of Smarter Food Safety focused on fostering and supporting Food Safety Culture across the food system. He also chairs the FDA’s Toxic Elements Working Group which prioritizes the agency’s efforts to reduce exposures to lead, arsenic, and other heavy metals from foods to the greatest extent feasible. Dr. Choiniere has a PhD in Agricultural and Resource Economics from the University of Maryland and a Bachelor of Science in Chemical Engineering from Johns Hopkins University.
About the Presentation
The FDA’s Closer to Zero initiative is the agency’s action plan for reducing exposure to toxic elements, including lead, arsenic, cadmium, and mercury, in foods for babies and young children. Closer to Zero utilizes a multi-phase, science-based, iterative approach for achieving continual improvements over time, laying out plans to further reduce the levels of toxic elements in foods. The plan includes advancing research, the evaluation of changes in dietary exposures to toxic elements, setting action levels, encouraging adoption of best practices by industry, increasing targeted compliance and enforcement activities, and monitoring progress of levels over time.
Past Grand Rounds
2021
- Closer to Zero
- The Development of Cellular-Level Structural and Functional Biomarkers of Eye Disease Enabled by Adaptive Optics
- Laboratory and Clinical Studies to Investigate Whether Ranitidine Converts to a Probable Carcinogen in Humans
- Immune System Responses to Therapeutic Proteins: Getting up close and personal
- SARS-CoV-2: Host-pathogen interaction, vaccines & variants of concern
- FDA's work with African Swine Fever from a policy and regulatory perspective
- Project Orbis: Global Collaborative Oncology Review Program
- Electrical Safety in CTP Regulated Products
- Studies of SARS-CoV-2 NSP1 and Envelope Protein
- Research and Development of Radioanalytical Capabilities for Detection of Radionuclides in Food
- FDA Grand Rounds: The CORE Network (or How I Learned to Love Lettuce…)
2020
- Assessment of Safety and Efficacy of Fecal Microbiota for Transplantation Products
- Facial Coverings During the COVID-19 Pandemic: How well do they flatten the curve?
- Bioequivalence of Complex Topical Generics: In Vitro and In Vivo
- Advancing the Science of Real-World Data to Address the COVID-19 Pandemic
- Nanotechnology: Over a Decade of Progress and Innovation at FDA
- A Pandemic and a Call to Action for One Health: The FDA One Health Initiative
- Artificial Intelligence for Regulatory Science Research
- Analysis of Per and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances (PFAS) in foods- Analytical method development, challenges and successes
- Modernization of Pharmaceutical Manufacturing through the Adoption of Advanced Technology
- Detection of Transmissible Spongiform Encephalopathy Agents in Biological Products Using Protein Aggregation Assays
- Quality Control: Stopping infections before they happen through safer endoscope reprocessing
2019
- Vet-LIRN – How FDA’s Network of Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratories advance animal food safety and public health by conducting outbreak investigations and monitoring resistance in animal pathogens
- Technical and Logistical Considerations for Examining FDA-Regulated Products at International Mail Facilities using Handheld and Field-Portable Analytical Devices
-
Cyclospora Cayetanensis: The Crossroads Between Scientific Advances and Knowledge Gaps
-
Uncertainty is the only certainty there is: Potential approaches for making public health decisions
2018
- Jerky Pet Treats and illness in dogs: a collaborative approach to investigating a mysterious outbreak
- Decomposition of Seafood Products by Mass Spectrometry with Sensory-Driven Predictive Modeling
- The Science to Inform a Tobacco Product Standard for the Level of Nicotine in Combusted Cigarettes
- Bisphenol A: Toxicology and Pharmacokenetic Data to Inform Ongoing Safety Assessments
- How Simulation Can Transform Regulatory Pathways
- FDA's Predictive Toxicology Roadmap: Implications and Opportunities for Stakeholders
- Are Stem Cells Ready for Prime Time? A Look at FDA Research Advances in Regenerative Medicine
- Ethnicity- and Gender-Related Differences in Alzheimer's Disease
2017
- Assessing the Safety and Effectiveness of New and Emerging Therapeutic Ultrasound Technologies
- Developing a Mechanistic Model-Based Approach to Assess Cardiac Safety of New Drugs
- Genome Trakr: How a Large Network of Sequencing Laboratories is Transforming Food Safety and Public Health
- Serious and Actionable Risks, Plus Disclosure: investigating an Alternative Approach for Presenting Risk Information in Prescription Drug TV Ads
- Vaccine adjuvants: New ways to evaluate their safety and effectiveness
- Developing Regulatory Methods for Characterizing Nanomaterials in FDA-Regulated Products
2016
- The Host Response to Whooping Cough Infection and Vaccination [Archived]
- Antibiotic resistance surveillance in the age of genomics: New answers to old questions [Archived]
- FDA Research into 3D Printing of its Regulated Products [Archived]
- Rapid Screening of Dietary Supplements for Undeclared Ingredients [Archived]
- Metabolomics and Proteomics Biomarkers: Discovery and Validation in Toxicity Studies [Archived]