Biography - Dr. Paul A. Lachance, Ph.D

Rev. Dr. Paul A. Lachance was born in St. Johnsbury, Vt. on June 5, 1933. He graduated from St. Michael’s College (Vt.) in 1955 (B.Sc. with honors) and was a distinguished military graduate (2nd Lt. USAF). He married his high school sweetheart, Thérèse Coté, in August of that same year in St. Mary Star of the Sea Church in Newport, Vt.  They raised four children: Michael Paul (Cooperstown, NY), Peter André (Yardley, PA), Marc-André (Essex Junction, VT), and Susan Ann (Cranford, NJ). He earned his Ph.D. in nutritional physiology (biology) with first class honors from the University of Ottawa (Canada) in 1960.

After completing his military service at Wright Patterson (Ohio) Air Force Base as an Aerospace Food and Nutrition Scientist, Lachance left the USAF as a First Lieutenant and became the first Flight Food and Nutrition Coordinator for the Manned Spacecraft Center at NASA in Houston, TX. He was responsible for establishing the Gemini/Apollo flight food systems, first working in the Crew Systems Division (1963-65) and in the Biomedical Research Office (1965-67). He co-authored the first studies of bone mass loss and negative nitrogen balance in astronauts, publishing the first evidence of bone and muscle loss due to weightlessness. He conceived of the first “clamshell” suit which was later adopted by the USSR space program as its “penguin suit” and later called the Adeli suit. In 1965, he imposed the most stringent food safety requirements ever imposed on the food industry. The Manned Spacecraft Center awarded him its Superior Achievement Award in 1967 for his work, including initiating what became known as the HACCP system for food safety which has potentially saved millions of people from becoming ill by a food-borne illness. Of all the NASA spin-offs, HACCP has had one of the largest impacts on the world and its citizens. He was recruited to join the faculty of the Food Science Department of the New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station and Rutgers - the State University of New Jersey.

Professor Lachance completed groundbreaking and memorable work for over 40 years, becoming a nationally and internationally recognized scholar. He was a gifted teacher and an outstanding researcher. He is known as the originator of the “nutrification” concept which underlies many of the nutrition programs backed by the Department of Agriculture and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). It is the basis used by the FDA to establish nutrition guidelines and labeling on the basis of Recommended Daily Allowances. He was also known for his work in defining the role of protein in human nutrition and wrote extensively on amino acid profiles and absorption. His research in the metabolism of vitamin A and related compounds has continued for three generations. Lachance was the Founding and Emeritus Director of the Nutraceuticals and Functional Foods Institute of the Center for Advanced Food Technology. He was Professor Emeritus of Food Science at Rutgers University since 2005.  He served as Chair of the Department of Food Science for six years; Director of the Graduate Program in Food Science (the largest in the USA and the world); Faculty Representative to the Board of Trustees; Chairman of the University Senate; and served as Faculty Representative to the Board of Governors of the University. As Chair, the Food Science Department at Cook College gained premier status in the Western World, and the Department the highest possible rating (and the first sole 1a rating at Cook College) from the University Committee on Standards and Priorities in Academic Development (CSPAD). He served as a consultant to some of the major companies in the food industry. He was most proud of serving as the major advisor for over 60 Ph.D. and M.Sc. students and being recognized as an award-winning teacher.

Lachance inaugurated the first known course in the U.S. on the Nutritional Aspects of Food Processing. He developed the first freshman level course in Nutrition at Rutgers University. He introduced the first introductory course in food science/nutrition for non-majors and conceptualized a series of courses for non Food Science majors; he served on the thesis committees of students in Food Science, Animal Science, Home Economics, and Nutrition. He was a recognized public speaker and communicator in the fields of Nutrition and Food Science, speaking before local, state, national, and international groups. He appeared on local and national radio and television programs including “Good Morning America,” “The Merv Griffin Show,” and “Not for Women Only.”

He earned the William V. Cruess Award for Excellence in Teaching (IFT, 1991); Professor Endel Karmas Award for Excellence in Teaching Food Science, Rutgers Dept. of Food Science (1987-88); the John C. Hartnett Award for Distinction in Science, St. Michael’s College (Vt.) 1982; Meritorious Achievement in Cereal Chemistry Award – New York Section – American Assoc. of Cereal Chemists (1972); the NASA Sustained Superior Performance Award (NASA, 1967); the Gemini Support Team Group Achievement Award (1966); Certificate of Appreciation, American Institute of Baking (1978-91); Certificate of Appreciation, Dairy Research, Inc. (1973); the Phi Tau Sigma Award (Food Science Honor Society); and the Delta Epsilon Sigma (National Catholic Scholastic Honor Society), 1969.  He has been recognized in Who’s Who in the World, Who’s Who in America, Who’s Who in the East, American Men and Women in Science, and Who’s Who in Technology Today. For his lifetime of work, Dr. Lachance was honored with the 2008 NSF Food Safety Lifetime Leadership Award in Education and Technology, primarily for the creation of the “Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) system which has become the food safety standard for the food industry in the United States and throughout the world.” He had a reputation, according to a colleague, as a serious and careful scientist “–the kind of guy who has the technical expertise, but also a sense of what the consumer is looking for and wants to make the information available to them.” He was known to say that “a university exists to teach the search for truth,” stressing the need to serve Rutgers’ students.  In 1982, his alma mater (St. Michael’s College, Vt.) recognized “his meritorious achievements in human nutrition, your Christian example as husband and father, and your recent ordination as a Permanent Deacon” with an honorary Doctor of Science, Honoris Causa. He was later in the first class of inductees into St. Michael’s College’s Academic Hall-of-Fame (2002).

He was invited to speak and work internationally, and his Washington activities included participation in the White House Conference on Food, Nutrition, and Health (1969); expert testimony in the FTC hearings on protein supplements, nutrition advertising, and children’s advertising; presentation of the Nutrition Consortium’s “National Nutrition Objective”; consultant with the U.S.D.A. on its child nutrition and other nutrition-related programs; and seven years as liason for USAF and later for NASA to the NAS/NRC’s Food and Nutrition Board. He also served for a two-year period on the National Science Foundation Oversight Committee and on an NIH site visit for an Obesity Center at the Mayo Clinic. He has appeared before and/or provided written testimony for Hearings of Congressional Committees, the Federal Trade Commission, the Food and Drug Administration, and the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture.

Dr. Lachance has authored or co-authored more than 200 technical papers and scholarly chapters, and authored (or was cited in) hundreds of other letters and articles, some containing suggestions to the food industry which have been adopted and put into practice. He was invited to speak in many parts of the world and completed lifesaving work in Guatemala whereby tortillas were fortified with soy, three B vitamins and vitamin A. Follow-up studies indicated that in those villages that adopted the program, infant mortality dropped by nearly 45 percent. He also directed an extensive research project aimed at improving school feeding programs.

Lachance was ordained a Permanent Deacon in the Roman Catholic Church in 1987 and was appointed to work at St. Paul’s in Princeton, where he was a marriage counselor and assisted in innumerable masses, baptisms, funerals, and weddings until his retirement in 2010. He coordinated a program with over 50 hospital ministers serving three healthcare facilities, nursing homes, rest homes, and the housebound of the parish. He performed the wedding ceremonies of each of his four children and baptized all nine grandchildren. He was certified as a Chaplain, General Health Care.  He leaves his sweetheart of over 60 years, Thérèse C. Lachance, his four children, and their spouses/partners (Carole Lachance, Patti Malinowski Jensen, Amy LaChance, and Phillip Shih (Susan Lachance). He leaves nine grandchildren: Marcel, Elijah, AnnaGrace, Beau, Joelle, Aline, Michaela, Zoey Maleekah, and Paul Thomas (Shih). He was predeceased by his father, Raymond, and mother, Lucienne, and his brothers Raymond, Herbert, and Maurice. He leaves sister Gloria (Nashua, NH) and brother Richard (Cocoa, FL) as well as many other relatives and friends. Ordained Deacon Rev. Dr. Paul A. Lachance was a Vermonter who called it the way it was…In lieu of flowers, please send donations to the John C. Hartnett Endowment which was established in 2000 by Paul and Thérèse to honor Professor Emeritus John C. Hartnett (’43) for his dedication to excellence in teaching and his outstanding influence on biology and other students at Saint Michael’s College for 44 years: Office of Institutional Advancement, Att: Kathie Berard, St. Michael’s College, One Winooski Park, Colchester, VT 05439.