Behind a Veil of Smoke: The Rise of the Department of Research and Development at Philip Morris, 1945-1955

As part of the DAHSM Culpeper Seminar Series, Brianna Rego, Postdoctoral Fellow at the UCSF Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education, will present a paper titled: "Behind a Veil of Smoke: The Rise of the Department of Research and Development at Philip Morris, 1945-1955". Rego holds a PhD in History from Stanford University (2012). Rego's research focuses on late-twentieth century and contemporary history of science and science policy, with a dissertation in history of the tobacco industry in which Rego examined the internal scientific research labs built by the tobacco industry in the late 1950s and early 1960s in response to mounting concerns about the health effects of smoking. These labs were shut down in the 1980s amid concerns over litigation. Culpeper Seminar Series Wednesday, October 24th, 2012 Laurel Heights Conference Room 474 3:30 – 5:00 pm The works by Rego on polonium-210 in tobacco were published in 2009 in Isis and in 2011 in Scientific American: The Polonium Brief: A Hidden History of Cancer, Radiation, and the Tobacco Industry (Isis, 2009 100:453-484 PDF) Radioactive Smoke: A Dangerous Isotope Lurks in Cigarettes (Scientific American, 2011)