Biographic Sketches of Committee Members - Agriculture Forestry and Fishing Research at NIOSH - page 280

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Biographic Sketches of Committee Members
Paul D. Gunderson ( Chair ) is the former director of the National Farm Medicine
Center (1992-1996) and former director of the Marshfield Medical Research and
Education Foundation (1993-2000), both in Marshfield, Wisconsin. In those ca-
pacities, he conducted numerous research initiatives exploring the health effects
of agricultural exposures, convened scientific meetings and seminars, chaired sci-
entific review mechanisms that rated applications for federal funding, and testified
before Congress about the need for a national agenda on agricultural health and
safety. Dr. Gunderson has a deep appreciation of farming and its associated hazards
and is an expert on farmer suicide. His career exploring the health impact of human
activity in agricultural work settings began in 1976 with research on the respira-
tory effect of working in poultry barns and continued until his initial retirement
in 2000. He serves as director of the Dakota Center for Technology-Optimized
Agriculture in Devils Lake, North Dakota. Dr. Gunderson served as an adjunct
professor in public health administration with the University of Minnesota School
of Public Health and an adjunct professor in the Health Services Management and
Administration Program of St. Mary's University, Winona, Minnesota. He received
the 2006 Stueland Scholar Award from the National Farm Medicine Center at
the Marshfield Clinic Research Foundation for his contributions to research in
agricultural worker health. He has published more than 90 papers on agricultural
safety and health in scientific journals and chaired scientific review panels for the
National Cancer Institute and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
He began his career as a high-school teacher of English and industrial arts in the
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