Tyrone Hayes has been in an almost 20 year battle with Swiss chemical manufacturer Syngenta.
Hayes is now a integrative biology professor at UC-Berkeley but in 1997 he began his research on atrazine, a Syngenta chemical used on corn.
His research showed that atrazine had toxic effects including that is was causing frog tadpoles to develop both ovaries and testes.
What followed was a smear campaign where Syngenta worked to discredit Hayes and his research.
Hayes will be speaking at Knox College on April 20th at 7 p.m. in Kresge Recital Hall at the school’s bi-annual EquiKnox Lecture.
EquiKnox speakers are organized by Knox Advocates for Recycling and Environmental Studies.
The Co-President of KARES, Sophia Spooner tells WGIL she became aware of Hayes after her friend heard him speak at Tufts University.
“After doing a little more research about him it became very clear he covers really every discipline, political science, environmental science, biology, chemistry, physics,” Spooner says.
Spooner says she also wants attendees to understand the extent to which Hayes was threatened by a company covering up the harm of their product.
“A lot of what we want to be to get out this is just seeing what these companies will do to silence people that have found things that have gone against them as a company,” Spooner says.
This event is free and open to the public, as well as KARES’ Earth Month Festival on April 23.
