Richard Merrill (IOM), A.B., Columbia University; B.A., Oxford University; M.A., Oxford University; LL.B., Columbia University School of Law, was founding Co-Chair of the Committee on Science, Technology and Law (CSTL).  He is Daniel Caplin Professor of Law, University of Virginia Law School.  He is Of Senior Counsel, Covington & Burling.  An expert in administrative, environmental, and food and drug law, Professor Merrill joined the law faculty in 1969 after four years of practice with the law firm of Covington & Burling.  In 1975 he took a leave from the Law School to serve for two years as chief counsel to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, where he received the FDA Commissioner’s Special Citation and the agency’s Award of Merit.  He was Dean of the Law School from 1980 to 1988.  During the fall of 1988 he was scholar-in-residence at the National Wildlife Federation and in the spring of 1989 he was a visiting fellow at the Centre for Socio-Legal Studies at Oxford University.  He was a member of the faculty of the American law session of the Salzburg Seminar in 1981 and 1986.  A former Rhodes Scholar, Merrill was editor-in-chief of the Columbia Law Review. After graduation, he served as law clerk to Judge Carl McGowan of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.  He has been a consultant to the U.S. Congressional Office of Technology Assessment, the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.  He is a member of the American Law Institute and a fellow of the American Bar Foundation and the Virginia Law Foundation.  Professor Merrill is a member of the Institute of Medicine.  Professor Merrill has served on numerous National Academies boards and committees, including (1) Board on Health Sciences Policy; (2) Policy Division Advisory Committee; (3) Food Forum; (4) Committee to Ensure Safe Food from Production to Consumption; (5) Report Review of IOM Reports; (6) Committee to Study the Use of Advisory Committees by the Food and Drug Administration; (7) Committee on Nutrition Components of Food Labeling (chair); (8) Council of the Institute of Medicine (executive committee); (9) Committee on Scientific and Regulatory Issues Underlying Pesticide use patterns and Agricultural Innovation; (10) Board on Toxicology and Environmental Health; (11) Committee on Urgent Research Opportunities on Health Effects of Hazardous Exposures; and (12) Committee on Institutional Means for Assessment of Risks to Public Health.  Professor Merrill was a member of the National Academies planning committee that initiated the 1997 Academy Symposium on Science, Technology, and Law and a member of CSTL's Subcommittee on Ensuring the Quality of Information Disseminated by the Federal Government.