Science & Technology

A small molecule called VIP, known to synchronize time-keeping neurons in the brain’s biological clock, has the startling effect of desynchronizing them at higher dosages, says a research team at Washington University in St. Louis. Neurons knocked for a loop by a burst of VIP are better able to re-synchronize to abrupt shifts in the light-dark cycle like those that make jet lag or shift work so miserable.

Christopher Gill, PhD, has received a four-year, $398,000 grant from the National Science Foundation to promote the improved safety of cyber-physical systems such as cars and planes.

Ram Dixit’s lab at Washington University in St. Louis has shown that a protein named after the katana, or samurai sword, plays a crucial role in patterning the “skeleton” inside plant cells. The work provides a clue to the long-standing mystery of how the cytoskeletons within both plant and animal cells become organized in function-specific patterns.

Among the victims who lost their lives in Bosnia during the 1992-1995 genocide were 8,000 Muslim males living in Srebrenica whose bodies were dumped into mass graves. There was little hope for their loved ones of identifying their remains until the advent of DNA technology. For the Holocaust Memorial Lecture, anthropologist Sarah Wagner will tell the story of how science helped close a painful chapter for the millions who lived through the worst atrocity in European history since World War II.

A team of Washington University in St. Louis engineers and physicians is combining areas of expertise to prevent hospitalized patients from deteriorating while in the hospital and from being readmitted soon after discharge.

Alan Templeton, PhD, professor emeritus of biology at Washington University in St. Louis, has an unusual screen saver on his office computer. If you ask him about it, he’ll tell you it is a frost flower, or ice flower. The “flowers” are fleeting natural creations that appear only once or twice in the fall and are seen only by those who rise early and know where to look.

Evolutionary biologist W.D. Hamilton predicted that organisms ought to evolve the ability to discriminate degrees of kinship so as to refine their ability to direct help to individuals with whom they shared the most genes. But two WUSTL biologists point out that there seem to be many cases where “a veil of ignorance” prevents organisms from gaining this kind of information, forcing them to consider a situation from the perspective of all members of their group instead of solely from their own perspective or that of their close kin.

Ramanath Cowsik, internationally recognized for his contributions to neutrino physics and to the understanding of dark matter in the universe, was installed as the James S. McDonnell Professor of Space Sciences in Arts & Sciences in a ceremony Oct. 7 in Holmes Lounge.

Although an irregular heartbeat is a common malady in the United States, affecting an estimated 5 million people, the treatments for it are limited in scope and effectiveness. Now, Igor Efimov, PhD, at Washington University in St. Louis, is studying a new potential treatment that may be much more effective and less painful for patients.

Members of the Washington University in St. Louis community will gather at 4 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 15, in the Ginkgo Room of Olin Library to remember Rita Levi-Montalcini, one of two women from the university who won the Nobel Prize. The event, which is hosted by the Woman’s Club of Washington University, is free and open to the public.