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Agent Orange was a herbicide used in the Vietnam War to kill the plants surrounding the Vietnamese army. Agent Orange was sprayed over 14 million acres of inland tropical forest. It mixture of two different kinds of herbicides or 50-50 mixtures of 2,4-D and 2,4,5-T that was sprayed out of C-123 aircraft. A byproduct of the production of Agent Orange was dioxin, a very harmful chemical. Operation Ranch Hand was the code name used for the C-123s spraying the herbicides in Vietnam.

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Galston traveled to Vietnam to see the effects of the chemical and fought to perform tests on the chemical with rats to gage the toxicity levels. He came to the conclusion that it was harmful for environment, and toxic to humans, which led President to end the use of Agent Orange.

“I thought it was a misuse of science,” he said. “Science is meant to improve the lot of mankind, not diminish it - and its use as a military weapon I thought was ill-advised.”

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Arthur W. Galston, a Yale plant biologist who did early research that helped lead to the herbicide Agent Orange, then helped raise awareness of the military's use of it in Vietnam in the 1960s and its devastating effects on river ecosystems, died on June 15 in Hamden, Conn. He was 88.

The cause was congestive heart failure, his family said.

In letters, academic papers, broadcasts and seminars, Dr. Galston described the environmental damage wrought by Agent Orange and traveled to South Vietnam to monitor its impact. From 1962 to 1970, American troops released an estimated 20 million gallons of the chemical defoliant to destroy crops and expose Viet Cong positions and routes of movement.

Dr. Galston asserted that harm to trees and plant species could continue for an untold period, and perhaps for decades. He pointed out that spraying Agent Orange on riverbank mangroves in Vietnam was eliminating "one of the most important ecological niches for the completion of the life cycle of certain shellfish and migratory fish."

Then, in 1970, with Matthew S. Meselson of Harvard and others, he made a case that Agent Orange presented a potential risk to humans. The scientists lobbied the Department of Defense to conduct toxicological studies, which found that compounds in Agent Orange could be linked to birth defects in laboratory rats. The revelation led President Richard M. Nixon to order an immediate halt of spraying.

In later years, Dr. Galston tied his activism to his own early research. In the 1940s, at the University of Illinois, he had experimented with a plant growth regulator, triiodobenzoic acid, and found that it could induce soybeans to flower and grow more rapidly. But if applied in excess, he noted, the compound would cause the plant to catastrophically shed its leaves.

A colleague, Ian Sussex, a senior research scientist at Yale, said others used Dr. Galston's findings in the development of the more powerful defoliant, Agent Orange, named for the orange stripe painted around steel drums that contained it. The chemical, produced by Dow, Monsanto and other companies, is now known to have contained dioxins, long-lived compounds associated with cancers, birth defects and learning disabilities.

In the 1980s, Dr. Galston helped introduce popular courses in bioethics for undergraduates at Yale and in the 1990s was instrumental in founding the Interdisciplinary Center for Bioethics at the university. He explored the risks and rewards of genetically modified plants and crops, pesticides, stem-cell research, cloning and other issues as co-editor of two textbooks, "New Dimensions in Bioethics" (2000) and "Expanding Horizons in Bioethics" (2005).

In other important work in plant physiology, Dr. Galston experimented with the nutrient riboflavin and its role in enabling plants to absorb blue light, making a connection that he advanced and published in 1950 in the journal Science. He also wrote a book, "The Life of the Green Plant" (1961).

Arthur William Galston was born in Brooklyn. He graduated from Cornell and earned his doctorate in botany from Illinois in 1943.

After teaching at the California Institute of Technology, he moved to Yale in 1955 as a professor of plant physiology. At Yale, he was chairman of the department of botany in the 1960s and chairman of the department of biology in the 1980s. Dr. Galston was also a former director of the division of biological sciences at Yale. He retired in 1990 as a professor of botany emeritus.

Dr. Galston is survived by his wife of 66 years, Dale. He is also survived by a son, William, of Bethesda, Md.; a daughter, Beth, of Carlisle, Mass.; and a grandson.

In 2003, Dr. Galston reconsidered the arc of his research.

"You know," he said, "nothing that you do in science is guaranteed to result in benefits for mankind. Any discovery, I believe, is morally neutral and it can be turned either to constructive ends or destructive ends."

He concluded: "That's not the fault of science."

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Arthur Galston, Agent Orange Researcher, Is Dead at 88 (Published 2008)

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Arthur W. Galston, a Yale plant biologist who did early research that helped lead to the herbicide Agent Orange, then helped raise awareness of the military's use of it in Vietnam in the 1960s and its devastating effects on river ecosystems, died on June 15 in Hamden, Conn. He was 88.

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Arthur knew Agent Orange had caused "an ecological disaster" that might take decades to repair.
its use went against the Geneva protocols against chemical and biological warfare.
"The agent of horror was partly his child."
In the1940s at the University of Illinois, Galston experimented with a plant growth regulator called triiodobenzoic acid and found that it could make soybeans flower and grow faster. He found that if you used too much of it it caused the plants to release ethylene, which digested the cell wall between leaf and stem and defoliated them. A colleague, Ian Sussex, a senior research scientist at Yale, said others used Dr. Galston’s findings in the development of the Agent Orange. Galston regretted his research.

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About Gale In Context: U.S. History Uncover information on hundreds of the most significant people, events, and topics in U.S. history from a variety of sources. Don't know how to login? Depending on this location's preferences, the log-in process could include your library card number, a student or user ID, or another provided password.

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The Settlement Fund was a lawsuit brought about by Vietnam veterans and their families against the major manufacturers of Agent Orange due to the health effects from the chemical. It settled out-of-court in 1984 for $180 million dollars, and was largest settlement of its kind at that time. The Settlement Fund was divided between two different groups:
Payment Plan

Veterans exposed to Agent Orange and experiencing health effects could apply to receive payment

“Fairness hearings” were held around the country

Settlement Fund distributed a total of $197 million in cash payments

Class Assistance Program

Distributed $74 million to 83 social services organizations throughout the United States

Had to submit Requests for Proposal

Donated to agencies that provided counseling, advocacy, medical and case-management services for veteran families

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AO background 1 (background info)

AO background 2 (background and health effects)

AO background 3 (background)

galston background (galston background)

AO health effects book

AO health effect

AO exposure health conditions

AO settlement fund

https://news.yale.edu/2008/07/18/memoriam-arthur-galston-plant-biologist-fought-use-agent-orange

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Arthur Galston, a noted plant physiologist and bioethicist who was also known for helping bring a halt to the use of the herbicide Agent Orange in Vietnam, died on June 15 in Hamden, Connecticut, where he lived with his wife, Dale. He was 88 years old.

Galston's research focused on plant photobiology, hormones, protoplasts and polyamines. His major research contribution, he believed, was to suggest and obtain evidence, in 1950, that riboflavin - rather than carotene as previously believed - was the photoreceptor for phototropism. He also discovered the kind of pigment that causes plants to bend in the light. His work led to more than 320 papers in refereed journals, as well as more than 50 articles on public affairs. He also authored textbooks on plant physiology and edited anthologies of papers in bioethics.

A graduate of Cornell University, Galston earned his doctorate in botany from the University of Illinois in 1943. He was an associate professor at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), where he worked closely with Nobel Prize winner George Beadle on defense-related research until he joined the Navy. Stationed at Okinawa, he served as a natural resources officer. He taught at Yale for a year before returning to Caltech, moving back to Yale in 1955.

In his early research, Galston experimented with a plant growth regulator, triiodobenzoic acid, and found that it could induce soybeans to flower and grow more rapidly. However, he also noted that if applied in excess, the compound would cause the plant to shed its leaves.

Others used Galston's findings in the development of the powerful defoliant Agent Orange, named for the orange stripe painted around steel drums that contained it. The chemical is now known to have contained dioxins, which have proven to be associated with cancers, birth defects and learning disabilities. From 1962 to 1970, American troops released an estimated 20 million gallons of the chemical defoliant to destroy crops and expose Viet Cong positions and routes of movement during the Vietnam War.

In letters, academic papers, broadcasts and seminars, Galston described the environmental damage wrought by Agent Orange, noting that the spraying on riverbank mangroves in Vietnam was eliminating "one of the most important ecological niches for the completion of the life cycle of certain shellfish and migratory fish." Galston traveled to Vietnam to monitor the impact of the chemical. In 1970, with Matthew S. Meselson of Harvard University and other scientists, Galston charged that Agent Orange also presented a potential risk to humans. The scientists lobbied the Department of Defense to conduct toxicological studies, which found that compounds in Agent Orange could be linked to birth defects in laboratory rats. The revelation led President Richard M. Nixon to order a halt to the spraying of Agent Orange.

"It was toxic at levels [in rats], which when scaled up to human level meant that the Vietnamese people who were exposed to the sprays probably were ingesting toxic quantities," Galston was quoted as saying in a 2003 Yale Scientific article.

In the same article, he decried the use of his early research in the development of the toxic herbicide.

"I thought it was a misuse of science," he said. "Science is meant to improve the lot of mankind, not diminish it - and its use as a military weapon I thought was ill-advised."

In 1971, while on a visit to Vietnam to investigate the consequences of Agent Orange, Galston was invited to the People's Republic of China, becoming one of the first two American scientists to receive such an honor. In China, he met three heads of state, including Premier Chou En-lai. Through the leader's intervention, Galston was able to work for a summer on a Chinese agricultural commune, and wrote about the experience in a book.

During his Yale career, Galston served in several administrative positions. He chaired the former Departments of Botany and Biology and was director of the Division of Biological Sciences. He also chaired the University's Course of Study Committee and the Committee on Teaching and Learning. He mentored 24 Ph.D. students and 67 postdoctoral fellows from 16 countries, and in 1994 received the William Clyde DeVane Medal for lifelong teaching and scholarship. At the time of his death, he was the Eaton Professor Emeritus in the Department of Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology and professor emeritus in the School of Forestry & Environmental Studies.

After his retirement, Galston was associated with the Institution for Social & Policy Studies (ISPS), serving on its Executive Committee for the Interdisciplinary Bioethics Project. He helped found Yale's Interdisciplinary Center for Bioethics. He taught a new introductory course in Yale College in 2003-2004 that attracted more than 460 students, making it one of the largest courses in Yale College. For more than a decade, he taught college seminars in bioethics. He also organized a series on bioethics at the Joseph Slifka Center for Jewish Life at Yale that brought to campus experts on a wide variety of ethical issues.

As the editor of two textbooks, "New Dimensions in Bioethics" and "Expanding Horizons in Bioethics," Galston explored such topics as the risks and rewards of genetically modified plants and crops, pesticides, stem-cell research, cloning and other issues.

His Yale colleague, Mary Helen Goldsmith, professor emerita of molecular, cellular and developmental biology, lauded Galston for his "life-long interest in the ethical and social implications of scientific and medical research and technologies."

"He was a leading voice on bioethics on this campus," says Carol Pollard, associate director of bioethics at ISPS. "He was my friend, mentor, teacher. He will be sorely missed."

Galston served as president of both the Botanical Society of America and the American Society of Plant Physiologists. He received numerous academic honors, including Guggenheim, Fulbright and Senior National Science Foundation Fellowships, and honorary degrees from Hebrew University in Jerusalem and Iona College. In 2004 he received the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences Alumni Achievement Award from the University of Illinois.This past spring, ISPS and the Department of Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology established an annual Arthur W. Galston Lecture in the scientist's honor.

In addition to his wife, Galston is survived by his children, William of Bethesda, Maryland, and Beth of Carslisle, Massachusetts; and his grandson Ezra of New York.

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In memoriam: Arthur Galston, plant biologist, fought use of Agent Orange

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Arthur Galston, a noted plant physiologist and bioethicist who was also known for helping bring a halt to the use of the herbicide Agent Orange in Vietnam, died on June 15 in Hamden, Connecticut, where he lived with his wife, Dale. He was 88 years old.

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In the long run, Agent Orange is suspected to have caused long lasting health implications for veterans of the war and many Vietnamese civilians. Exposure to dioxin is known to have side effects such as birth defects, cancer, and nerve damage. It has also been shown to have a negative impact on the environment. The vegetation of the region in Vietnam is still recovering from the effects of Agent Orange. The chemicals used tend to stay in the soil for a long time, leaving long lasting impacts. "Agent Orange applications affected foliage of a diversity of tropical ecosystems of Vietnam, but the most severe damage occurred in the forested coastal areas."

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In the 1970s, returned Vietnam veterans began to report skin rashes, cancer, psychological symptoms, congenital anomalies and handicaps in their children, and other health problems. This started many experiments and scientific tests, as well as a lawsuit against the distributors of Agent Orange, including Dow, Monsanto, Diamond Shamrock, Hercules, Uniroyal, and others. In one study conducted by Admiral Zumwalt, the rate of birth defects in children of veterans was nearly double that of the control group, and veterans shows an increase in skin cancer that was unrelated to sun exposure. Researcher Fred A. Wilcox reported in his book Waiting for an Army to Die: The Tragedy of Agent Orange about his findings in the homes of Vietnamese families. He was able to visit with the children, writing, "some are missing arms and legs and eyes; some have enormous heads or strange burned bark skin."

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list of diseases related to Agent Orange exposure

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list of diseases related to Agent Orange exposure

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AL Amyloidosis

Bladder Cancer

Chronic B-cell Leukemias

Chloracne (or similar acneform disease).

Diabetes Mellitus Type 2

Hodgkin's Disease

Hypothyroidism

Ischemic Heart Disease

Multiple Myeloma

Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma

Parkinsonism

Parkinson's Disease

Peripheral Neuropathy, Early-Onset.

Porphyria Cutanea Tarda

Prostate Cancer

Respiratory Cancers (includes lung cancer)

Soft Tissue Sarcomas (other than osteosarcoma, chondrosarcoma, Kaposi's sarcoma, or mesothelioma)

Also birth defects