In response to the Ferguson Commission’s call to improve college access, the university has launched the College Readiness and Pipeline Initiative. Leah Merrifield, in her new role as associate vice chancellor for community engagement and St. Louis college readiness initiatives, will lead the university’s efforts.

During a five-year period ending in 2013, nearly 400 children ages 16 or under were taken to one of two hospital emergency rooms in St. Louis for gun-related injuries, according to a study led by Martin S. Keller, MD, at the School of Medicine. Of those children, 20 later died. Analyzing such cases can help identify risk factors and stem gun-related injuries, researchers believe.

The moon was never a fully homogenized body like Earth, analysis of moon rocks made by the Chinese rover, Yutu, suggests. Arts & Sciences’ Bradley L. Jolliff, PhD, helped analyze the mission data. The basalts the rover examined are a new type, chemically different from those retrieved by the Apollo and Luna missions 40 years ago.

Daniel J. Leopold, PhD, research associate professor of physics in Arts & Sciences, died Dec. 10, 2015, after a battle with pancreatic cancer. He was 61.