Charles Hawker's bio:

Dr. Charles Hawker is Scientific Director for Automation and Special Projects at ARUP Laboratories, where he has been since 1992. Dr. Hawker is also Professor of Pathology (Adjunct) in the University of Utah, School of Medicine. At ARUP he has developed several major automation and robotic systems that have made ARUP one of the country’s most automated laboratories. He is a past President of both the National Academy of Clinical Biochemistry (NACB) and the Clinical Ligand Assay Society (CLAS) and is the current Vice President (President Elect) of the Association of Clinical Scientists. He has received the Professor Alvin Dubin Award from the NACB for contributions to the profession and to the Academy, the Becton Dickinson Award from the Association for Laboratory Automation for “significant contributions to medical systems engineering,” and two AACC Outstanding Speaker Awards (2000, 2007).

He has chaired automation committees in both CLSI (formerly NCCLS) and Health Level 7. He has also served on the CLSI Strategic Planning Committee and Area Committee for Automation and Informatics. Currently he chairs a CLSI Subcommittee on Specimen Labels: Content and Location, Fonts, and Label Orientation. He is a co-author of chapters on clinical laboratory automation in the 4th Edition of the Tietz Textbook of Clinical Chemistry and Molecular Diagnostics (2006), the 6th Edition of the Tietz Fundamentals of Clinical Chemistry (2008), as well as author of a chapter on automation in the December, 2007 issue of Clinics in Laboratory Medicine. He has published 40 peer reviewed papers, 13 chapters or invited reviews, and 42 abstracts, and has one issued patent. He is a frequent lecturer on laboratory automation at national and international conferences.

Prior to joining ARUP Laboratories, Dr. Hawker served as Technical Director and other positions in ten years with SmithKline Beecham Clinical Laboratories in St. Louis, MO, and as Laboratory Director of the Laboratory Procedures Esoteric Center, Manager of Research and Development, and other positions over ten years with the Laboratory Procedures Division of The Upjohn Company in Kalamazoo, MI. Dr. Hawker earned a BA in chemistry at Illinois Wesleyan University, an MS in biochemistry from the University of Wisconsin (Madison), a PhD in biochemistry from the University of Pennsylvania, and an MBA from Washington University in St. Louis. Prior to embarking on his automation journey, Dr. Hawker was well known for having the first widely used radioimmunoassay for parathyroid hormone in the US in the 1970s. His laboratory also performed the initial research (1980) that led to the discovery of procalcitonin and its use as a marker for septic shock. His current automation research projects are focused on machine vision systems that can identify mislabeled specimens or can measure specimen volumes and interfering substances through the sides of specimen tubes covered with labels.

Dr. Hawker has no relevant financial relationships to disclose.