Author: Talia Ogliore

Jeffrey Catalano, professor of earth and planetary sciences in Arts & Sciences, received a three-year Department of Energy grant to support research on elements and minerals essential for the production of electric vehicles, cellphones and computers.

Using computer simulations and a simple theoretical model, physicist Mikhail Tikhonov in Arts & Sciences showed how bacteria could adapt to a fluctuating environment by learning its statistical regularities — for example, which nutrients tend to be correlated — and do so faster than evolutionary trial-and-error would normally allow.

St. Louis shows the strongest correlation between biodiversity and income of the 20 major U.S. cities included in a recent study. Solny Adalsteinsson, staff scientist at Tyson Research Center and a lecturer in the environmental studies program in Arts & Sciences, is a co-author of the new research published in Global Change Biology.

New research from physicists in Arts & Sciences reveals that neurons in the visual cortex — the part of the brain that processes visual stimuli — respond differently to the same kind of stimulus over time.

White clover is a weed that grows the world over. Biologist Kenneth M. Olsen in Arts & Sciences discovered how white clover developed its anti-herbivory superpower with input from both of its seemingly innocuous parents.

Jonathan Myers, associate professor of biology in Arts & Sciences, and William Farfan-Rios, a postdoctoral research fellow of the Living Earth Collaborative at Washington University, are co-authors of a study that found that trees’ fecundity — or physical potential to reproduce — peaked or plateaued as they reached an intermediate size.

Understanding how a cell commits resources to building new parts — and eventually divides into two cells — is the focus of a new grant for Shankar Mukherji, assistant professor of physics in Arts & Sciences. The research is funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

Biologists in Arts & Sciences used statistical methods to trace the path of Pieridae family butterflies as they diversified and their plant hosts fought back, over and over again. The study also finds that butterflies often regain hosts they haven’t used for millions of years.

Biologists at Washington University in St. Louis examined data from 2,600 lizard species worldwide and discovered that while hundreds of different types of lizards have independently evolved arboreal lifestyles, species that possessed sticky toepads prevailed.

New research led by archaeologists at Washington University in St. Louis shows that meat and dairy played a more significant role in human diets in Bronze Age China than previously thought. The analysis also suggests that farmers and herders tended to sheep and goats differently than they did their cows.