Statement on U.S. Supreme Court’s Denial of Certiorari in case involving ownership of tissues donated for research

The School of Medicine is pleased by the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision released today. The Court let stand a unanimous 2007 ruling by the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that stated prostate tissue and serum samples donated to Washington University can continue to be used by the institution for cancer research. The appellate court had affirmed the lower federal district court ruling that donors who gave tissue or serum samples to the University for research can’t later compel the school to transfer ownership of the samples to another research institution.

Assembly Series wrestles with bioethical questions

Looking back over the recent past, the advances in biomedicine seem astonishing. The birth of the first “test tube baby” 30 years ago, for example, was viewed as exotic and, to some, scary. Now, in vitro fertilization is commonplace. And yet, justifiable ethical concerns surround the human outcomes of these medical breakthroughs. Leon Kass, M.D., […]

Woman is first in region to receive new heart valve without open-heart surgery

John Lasala and Ralph Damiano Jr. work together on the first surgery in the PARTNER trial. A 78-year-old St. Louis woman was the first patient in this region to receive an experimental device to replace her defective aortic valve without opening the chest wall or using a heart-lung machine. This procedure was performed by Washington University heart specialists at Barnes-Jewish Hospital on Jan. 15.

Disrupting common parasites’ ability to “talk” to each other reduces infection

*T. gondii* imaged just after reproduction inside a host cell. (Photo by Wandy Beatty.)One of the most common human parasites, Toxoplasma gondii, uses a hormone lifted from the plant world to decide when to increase its numbers and when to remain dormant, researchers at the School of Medicine have found. The scientists report this week in Nature that they successfully blocked production of the molecule, known as abscisic acid (ABA), with a plant herbicide. Low doses of the herbicide prevented fatal T. gondii infection in mice.
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