Submitted by the University of Washington Friday Harbor Marine Labs

How can studying marine invertebrates advance understanding of human health?

On Aug. 5, at 7 p.m. at the San Juan Community Theatre, Dr. Amro Hamdoun, Professor and Associate Director of the Center for Marine Biotechnology and Biomedicine at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, will give the 2024 Illg Distinguished Lecture on his research to address this question. Dr. Hamdoun’s work merges developmental biology and environmental toxicology to understand how chemicals are accumulated and eliminated from cells. He and his team are pioneering fascinating new methods for using sea urchins as model organisms in cell and developmental biology.

His free public lecture will address his lab’s research on how intracellular protein localization during embryonic development affects embryo physiology. Friday Harbor Laboratories has established the Illg Distinguished Lectureship to bring a distinguished scientist to present their research on marine invertebrate zoology to Friday Harbor

Labs and the surrounding community. The lecture series is a tribute to the late Professor Paul L. Illg and his contributions as a scientist, teacher, mentor and friend.