Medicine & Health

Celebrate another successful Tread the Med walking campaign at 11:30 a.m. Sept. 12 in the Barnes-Jewish Institute of Health at Washington University School of Medicine Hope Plaza.

Inflammation and cell stress are major factors in diabetes. Cell stress also plays a role in Wolfram syndrome, a rare, genetic disorder that afflicts children with many symptoms, including juvenile-onset diabetes. Now scientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and elsewhere have identified a molecule that’s key to the cell stress-modulated inflammation that causes insulin-secreting cells to die.

​William S. Coxe, MD, a neurological surgeon known for his dedication to patients and superb surgical skills, died Thursday, Aug. 2, 2012. He was 86.​

Michael J. Mueller works to improve movement and physical performance in people affected by different diseases and injuries.

Giving antibiotics before cesarean section surgery rather than just after the newborn’s umbilical cord is clamped cuts the infection rate at the surgical site in half, according to infection disease specialist David K. Warren, MD, and his colleagues at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and Barnes-Jewish Hospital.

Applications for the K12 Clinical Hematology Research Career Development Program scholars are being accepted through Oct. 22. The K12 Career Development Program is aimed at clinical or research fellows, instructors or recently appointed assistant professors committed to research in non-malignant hematology.

Researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have identified a potential target for treating diabetes and obesity. Studying mice, they found that when the target protein was disabled, the animals became more sensitive to insulin and were less likely to get fat.

Zuum, a free iPad app, estimates a user’s disease risk and offers a customized plan for living a healthier life.

The federal government is in the process of revising the regulations that govern most human subject research in the United States. In a “Policy Forum” piece in the Aug. 3 issue of Science, bioethics expert Rebecca Dresser, JD, the Daniel Noyes Kirby Professor of Law and professor of ethics in medicine, weighs in with recommendations for changes in the oversight process.

New research from Washington University in St. Louis suggests that as much as 10 percent of individual differences in intelligence can be explained by the strength of neural pathways connecting the lateral prefrontal cortex to the rest of the brain. Findings establish “global brain connectivity” as a new method for understanding human intelligence.