Jeanne Guillemin

Trained in sociology and anthropology, Jeanne Guillemin has long been involved in issues regarding medicine, infectious diseases, and biological weapons. She is the author of Anthrax: The Investigation of a Deadly Outbreak (University of California Press, 1999) which documents the US-Russian inquiry into the contested cause of the 1979 Sverdlvosk anthrax outbreak. Prior to this research, she investigated the "yellow rain" controversy of the 1980s. Both projects involved US allegations against the Soviet Union for treaty violations involving biological weapons. Her latest book is Biological Weapons: The History of State-sponsored Programs and the Problem of Bioterrorism (Columbia University Press, 2004). She has been a delegate to the annual Pugwash Working Group on the Chemical and Biological Weapons Conventions, a participant in the Belfer Center (Harvard University) Executive Session on Domestic Preparedness, and has taught for three years in the SSP course, "Confronting Bioterrorism." Professor Guillemin was also on the World Health Organization editorial board for its 2004 guide to public health responses to biological and chemical weapons attacks. She has also done research on the 2001 anthrax postal attacks and their consequences for US biodefense initiatives. Following a September 2005 trip to China, she has renewed her interest in the 1934-1945 Japanese biological warfare program based in Manchuria and responsible for the world's most aggressive use of biological weapons, during World War II.

Jeanne has a web site for the education of the public on the issue of high-containment laboratories for research on select agents.

Jeanne Guillemin's book "Biological Weapons" is featured on the PBS American Experience web site for the film "The Living Weapon" which chronicles the history of the US program from its beginning in 1942 to its renunciation by President Richard Nixon in 1969.