Science & Technology

James McCarter, MD/PhD ’98, whose entrepreneurial spirit was nurtured while a grad student, has built his career on translational research.

Researchers in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis have figured out how to feed electricity to microbes to grow truly green, biodegradable plastic, as reported in the Journal of Industrial Microbiology and Biotechnology.

Beginning in the fall of 2019, Washington University in St. Louis will welcome its first cohort of students who will graduate with a bachelor’s degree in environmental engineering. Unlike traditional environmental engineering programs with strong ties to civil engineering, this new degree will have a chemical engineering flavor.

New research from Arts & Sciences suggests that many “redundant” enzymes are actually specialists that ensure maximal growth across different environments. They also seem to increase resistance to antibiotics in conditions like those in the GI tract or urinary tract — raising concerns that current antibiotic susceptibility tests are inadequate.

Marie Kondo herself couldn’t do it any better. Now researchers at Washington University in St. Louis have uncovered a previously unknown structural feature of living cells that is critical to tidying up.

Researchers led by Kenneth M. Olsen in Arts & Sciences used a new imaging technique to reveal a takeover strategy that has worked for weedy rice over and over again: roots that minimize below-ground contact with other plants.

Washington University in St. Louis has launched a new $3.5 million solar project. When complete, it will generate 2.5 megawatts of energy across the university, enough to take 480 cars off the road.

Researchers in Arts & Sciences have discovered and characterized a new form of oxygen dubbed “featherweight oxygen” — the lightest-ever version of the familiar chemical element oxygen, with only three neutrons to its eight protons.

An interdisciplinary team of researchers from the McKelvey School of Engineering and the School of Medicine have found the most efficient length for cilia, the tiny hair-like structures designed to sweep out the body’s fluids, cells and microbes to stay healthy.

Pregnant women who use cannabis may slightly increase the risk their unborn child will develop psychosis later in life, suggests new research from Washington University in St. Louis.