Pacific Northwest College of Art (PNCA) is proud to present molecular biologist and public domain plant breeder Alan M. Kapuler Ph.D., to deliver the 2010 Edelman Lecture on Tuesday, March 2, 6:30 pm. Kapuler is the President of Peace Seeds and the Co-Founder and retired Research Director of Seeds of Change, one of the world’s leading providers of organic seeds.

Kapuler is widely considered the founding father of the organic seed movement. He has been saving seeds and breeding plants for over 30 years from his farm in Corvallis, Oregon. His philosophy remains at the heart of the current discussion on where our food comes from and how it is produced. Peace Seeds promotes public domain plant breeding in an effort to protect plant diversity. Kapuler describes the Peace Seeds catalog as a “manual for conserving the plant gene-pool of planet Earth.”

In speaking of the goals of the annual lecture in memory of her father, Jeana Edelman says, “Science, nature, craft and design were the overarching principles that my father imbued in his teachings. Ideas, interactions, diverse points of view, all interesting–some provocative, some catalytic–all contribute to an active intellectual life.”

In addition to Kapuler’s accomplishments in the work of “de-hybridizing hybrids” and disseminating a diverse collection of heirloom varieties, he holds a doctorate in molecular biology from Rockefeller University where he worked with nucleic acids authority A.M. Michelson and apprenticed at the lab of future Nobel Prize winner Howard Temin.