Leo Sher, M.D.

February 13, 2010.  Amy Bishop, Ph.D., an Assistant Professor of Biological Sciences, opened fire during a biology faculty meeting at the University of Alabama’s Huntsville campus yesterday, killing three biology faculty members, including the Chairman of the Department of Biological Sciences, and injuring three other employees at the school (1-7). Dr. Amy Bishop is a Harvard-educated neurobiologist who joined the faculty of the University of Alabama at Huntsville in 2003 (1,2).

She received her Ph.D. in Genetics from Harvard University, and was an Instructor in Medicine at Harvard Medical School before moving to Alabama. Dr. Bishop has published numerous articles in scientific journals.

Dr. Bishop and her husband Jim Anderson are award-winning inventors who designed a new cell growth incubation system as a replacement for the old-fashioned petri dish (3-7). Before the shooting, the University of Alabama at Huntsville President’s blog contained the following statement: “IntelCell recently introduced InQ, a precision instrument designed to increase the precision and consistency of cell growth in laboratory experimentation. This remarkable technology, which will change the way biological and medical research is conducted, was developed by Dr. Amy Bishop, an assistant professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at The University of Alabama in Huntsville. Then, the collective support of Biztech and the Huntsville Angel Network helped InQ get to market” (5). The San Fransisco Chronicle website states that Bishop was denied tenure as a faculty member (6,7). They hypothesize that they were letting her go but keeping her projects – thus making money off of them.

Dr. Bishop also worked on the “Neuristor” project: “My laboratory’s goal will be to continue in our effort to develop a neural computer, the Neuristor, using living neurons. This computer will exploit all of the advantages of neurons. Specifically, neurons rich with the nitric oxide NO dependent learning receptor, N Methyl D Aspartate receptor NMDAR, will be utilized” (6). Her recently published paper, “Mitigation of peroxynitrite-mediated nitric oxide (NO) toxicity as a mechanism of induced adaptive NO resistance in the CNS” (8) was related to this project.

References

1. Hall KM. 3 dead, 3 hurt in Alabama campus shooting. Associated Press. http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100213/ap_on_re_us/us_ala_university_shooting Accessed: February 12, 2010.
2. http://web.archive.org/web/20070820140857/www.uah.edu/colleges/science/biology/amy/amy.htm Accessed: February 13, 2010
3. Grace G. Profile: Dr. Amy Bishop, alleged University of Alabama-Huntsville shooter. http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/posted/archive/2010/02/12/profile-dr-amy-bishop-alleged-university-of-alabama-huntsville-shooter.aspx Accessed: February 12, 2010.
4. UAH shooting: DR. Amy Bishop in custody! http://www.gather.com/viewArticle.action?articleId=281474978044941&grpId=3659174697244816&nav=Groupspace Accessed: February 13, 2010
5. Google’s cache of http://www.uah.edu/president/blog/ninthfull.php. It is a snapshot of the page as it appeared on Jan 15, 2010 17:31:49 GMT. http://74.125.47.132/search?q=cache:wrnEGgBOXswJ:www.uah.edu/president/blog/ninthfull.php+amy+bishop+site:uah.edu&cd=2&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=safari Accessed: February 12, 2010
6. Danz JJr. Alleged U. of Alabama Shooter Revealed – With Possible Motive? http://newsblaze.com/story/20100213042144j112.nb/topstory.html Accessed: February 13, 2010
7. University shooting at Alabama-Huntsville: Dr. Amy Bishop is suspect. www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/abraham/detail??blogid=95&entry_id=57181 Accessed: February 13, 2010
8. Bishop A, Gooch R, Eguchi A, Jeffrey S, Smallwood L, Anderson J, Estevez AG. Mitigation of peroxynitrite-mediated nitric oxide (NO) toxicity as a mechanism of induced adaptive NO resistance in the CNS. J Neurochem. 2009 Apr;109(1):74-84.