This blog is being shared on behalf of the Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry (SETAC) as part of a blog exchange between SETAC and SOT.
SETAC has scheduled two back-to-back meetings between November 1 and 5 at the Montréal Convention Centre and welcomes members of SOT to collaborate. As environmental and human challenges become increasingly complex, collaboration across scientific disciplines under a One Health approach is becoming more important. To support those conversations, SETAC has planned a two-day topical meeting on Species Surrogacy, followed by the SETAC North America 47th Annual Meeting. Together, the two events create opportunities for focused scientific exchange while simultaneously maximizing time away from the office.
Advancing the Science of Species Surrogacy
Toward Mechanistically Informed, Data Integrated Cross Species Extrapolation
The Advanced Approaches for Species Surrogacy in Chemical Risk Assessment Topical Meeting will be held November 1–2, 2026. The meeting will examine how advances in toxicology, comparative biology, computational modelling, and data integration are strengthening the scientific basis for species surrogacy. Participants will explore how scientific tools, curated toxicity databases, and bioinformatics approaches are improving the ability to extrapolate findings across species, helping researchers better predict impacts on humans and wildlife from laboratory data.
The organizers also plan to review recent advances in new approach methods (NAMs) and examine how these approaches can support chemical risk assessment, support regulatory decision-making, and reduce reliance on vertebrate animals in testing.
The topical meeting will be structured around four interlinked scientific pillars:
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Toxicokinetics Across Species: Evaluating how interspecies differences in absorption, distribution, metabolism, and excretion influence chemical sensitivity and how toxicokinetic data and models can inform extrapolation.
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Toxicodynamics and Pathway Conservation: Assessing how conserved molecular targets, genes, proteins, and biological pathways across taxa can inform predictions of chemical susceptibility through bioinformatics and in silico approaches.
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Species Traits and Functional Diversity: Understanding how life‑history, physiological, morphological, and ecological traits shape sensitivity and resilience to chemical stressors.
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Leveraging Existing Toxicity Data: Using curated databases, interspecies correlation models, and statistical approaches to improve predictions for untested species.
Planned as a two-day, in-person event, the program will include plenary sessions introducing each scientific theme, invited and contributed oral presentations, poster sessions highlighting emerging methods and examples, and interactive sessions linking science to regulatory application. The meeting is set to deliver far-reaching impacts by pinpointing best practices and critical knowledge gaps, strengthening the bridge between cutting-edge research and regulatory requirements, and generating influential conference outputs and publications—while also charting the course for future initiatives.
Connecting Research Communities Across Environmental Science
SETAC extends a warm invitation to members from SOT to the SETAC North America 47th Annual Meeting, which will be held November 2–5, 2026. The scientific program will span three full days and includes oral and poster sessions, plenary talks, exhibits, and lots of engaging networking opportunities. The meeting will have a robust scientific program. Lots of exciting sessions have been proposed. As a sample, here are a few that may be of particular interest to toxicologists and human health risk assessors:
Select New Approach Methodologies Sessions