News + Events

The Research Institute for Fragrance Materials (RIFM) will take center stage at the American Chemical Society’s Fall 2025 “Innovations in Chemistry” meeting with a series of presentations designed to engage attendees in the science of fragrance safety.

On Monday, August 18, from 12:30 to 1:20 p.m., RIFM scientists will present at the ACS Expo Theater, located in the center of the conference’s Expo Hall. This interactive session will introduce attendees to RIFM and its role in ensuring the safety of fragrance ingredients, outlining the safety assessment process and what it entails. The presentation will also offer a preview of the cutting-edge research to be discussed at Tuesday’s symposium, encouraging attendees to join for a deeper dive into the science. Complimentary food and drinks will be provided.

On Tuesday, August 19, RIFM will host a half-day symposium titled Chemical Toxicology in Fragrance Safety: Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow at the Westin DC Downtown. Organized and presided over by RIFM Senior Scientist Holger Moustakas, PhD, the session will showcase cutting-edge approaches to assessing the safety of fragrance materials, both synthetic and naturally derived, without the use of animal testing. Reflecting global regulatory shifts, the session will highlight New Approach Methodologies (NAMs), including in vitro assays, read-across strategies, and exposure-based modeling, all designed to ensure safety while aligning with ethical and legal expectations.

After a Welcome Address by RIFM President Anne Marie Api, PhD, Fellow ATS, the session will open with a keynote presentation by Prashiela Manga, PhD, Deputy Director of the Office of Cosmetics and Colors in the Office of the Chief Scientist at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and Voluntary Research Associate Professor at NYU Langone Medical Center. Dr. Manga will provide an update on the FDA’s implementation of the Modernization of Cosmetics Regulation Act of 2022 (MoCRA), the most significant expansion of the agency’s authority to regulate cosmetics and ensure that products used daily by millions of consumers meet modern safety expectations since the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act was passed in 1938.

Building on the regulatory perspective introduced in the keynote, Dr. Moustakas will present new research on the use of Structural Activity Groups (SAGs) to improve chemical clustering and support read-across in non-animal safety assessments. Developed in collaboration with academic and regulatory scientists, this work demonstrates how SAGs enhance reproducibility and efficiency in evaluating structurally similar fragrance ingredients.

Continuing the theme of data-driven innovation in fragrance safety, RIFM Principal Scientist Aurelia Lapczynski will discuss how RIFM’s high-throughput environmental risk assessments, applied to more than 3,000 fragrance materials, are driving data-informed decisions that protect ecosystems without compromising innovation.

Shifting focus from environmental to human health endpoints, skin sensitization, a key concern for consumer safety, will be addressed by RIFM Principal Scientist Isabelle Lee, PhD. This presentation will highlight the shift toward fully integrated New Approach Methodologies (NAMs), which are replacing traditional animal-based models. In a related talk, Amanda Ulrey, MS, of the Institute for In Vitro Sciences, will explore how cross-sector collaboration and validation are helping to build global confidence in animal-free toxicology.

The session will also feature two closely linked presentations on the Creme RIFM Aggregate Exposure Model, a state-of-the-art probabilistic tool developed by RIFM and Creme Global. RIFM Principal Scientist Gretchen Ritacco, MS, will present on how RIFM uses the Model in its fragrance ingredient safety assessments and will touch on RIFM’s 2024 “low exposure paper” and its relevance to real-world fragrance exposure scenarios. Creme Global Data Scientist Cesar Scrochi, MSc, will follow with an overview of the Model, explaining what it is designed to do, how it works, and the collaborative process behind its development and validation.

To close the session, researcher Marine Canton, PhD, of Laboratoires Pierre Fabre Dermo-Cosmétique and Université de Reims Champagne Ardenne, will present new research on the chemical composition of volatile and non-volatile fractions of Ferula galbaniflua (galbanum) resinoid, a natural complex substance used in perfumery, broadening the scientific lens of the symposium.

Later that evening, Dr. Moustakas and Senior Associate Scientist Jake Muldoon, PhD, will also present a poster at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center on how chemical clustering and read-across can streamline the safety evaluation of natural complex substances, another step in RIFM’s ongoing effort to modernize safety science for a diverse and evolving ingredient landscape.

By hosting and contributing to this session, RIFM will further cement its role as the global benchmark in fragrance safety science, bringing together the tools, partnerships, and scientific rigor needed to meet the challenges of today and tomorrow.