Prof. Mary Gulumian

Professor Mary Gulumian was Head of the Toxicology and Biochemistry Section at the National Institute for Occupational Health (NIOH) and thereafter Head of Toxicology Research Projects, at the NIOH.  Presently, she holds an honorary Professorial post in the Haematology and Molecular Medicine Department, the University of the Witwatersrand where she has presented courses on Health Risk Assessment and supervised postgraduate students.  She has also been appointed as an Extraordinary Professor at the North West University where she organized workshops on Health Risk assessment. She is the founder member and the past President of the Society for Free Radical Society of South Africa (SFRR-SA), the founder member and President of the Toxicology Society of South Africa (TOXSA), and the founder member and President of the Society of Risk Analysis (SRA)-Africa. 

She served as the vice-President of the Executive Committee of the International Union of Toxicology (IUTOX).  She was a member of the final review board of WHO Concise International Chemical Assessment Documents (CICAD) publications on number of toxic compounds.  She currently represents South Africa in the OECD Working Party on Manufactured Nanomaterials as well as serves on Expert Technical Committee for WG3 of ISO/TC 229 on nanotechnologies. Nationally, in her capacity as the President of TOXSA, Professor Gulumian was involved in the registration of Toxicologists in South Africa and in setting up curricula necessary for this registration She served as the Council member of the South African Council for Natural Scientific Professions (SACNASP) for the duration of 10 years and presently is a member of the Registration Committee of SACNASP.

Her research interests include hazard identification and communication as well as elucidation of mechanisms of toxicity of micro and nano particles. She received funding from local (DSI and MHSC) and from international agencies (EU projects) to conduct research on the topic. She has authored and co-authored numerous scientific publications on this topic and made great number of keynote and invited presentations at local and overseas conferences. She has also provided expert consultation to industry and government departments on the toxicity of chemicals in the working and ambient environments.  Professor Gulumian is also a member of the Editorial Board of the journal of Human and Experimental Toxicology (HET), Toxicology, and the journal Particle and Fibre Toxicology (PFT), and also the Associate Editor of the journal Inhalation Toxicology.