Science & Technology

A seven-year experiment shows that pond communities bear the imprint of random events in their past, such as the order in which species were introduced into the ponds. This finding locates one of the wellsprings of biodiversity but also suggests that it may not be possible to restore ecosystems whose history we cannot recreate.

The Howard Hughes Medical Institute has awarded Washington University  a 2010 Research University Grant to support the devleopment of creative, research-based courses and curricula. The university will receive $1.6 million over a period of four years/ HHMI also awarded Sarah C. R. Elgin, PhD, the Viktor Hamburger Professor of Arts and Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, a long-time HHMI professor, $80,000 over four years to support her work on important problems facing science education. 

An archeologist at Washington University in St. Louis is helping to reveal for the first time a snapshot of rural life in China during the Han Dynasty. The rural farming village of Sanyangzhuang was flooded by silt-heavy water from the Yellow River around 2,000 year ago. Working with Chinese colleagues, T.R. Kidder, PhD, professor and chair of anthropology in Arts & Sciences, is working to excavate the site, which offers a exceptionally well-preserved view of daily life in Western China more than 2,000 years ago.

As part of the Human Microbiome Project (HMP), scientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and their colleagues have decoded the genomes of 178 microbes from the human body, they report in the journal Science.

At last count there were three physics PhDs in Congress, five science PhDs total, and 228 senators and congressmen with law degrees. WUSTL postdoctoral fellow in physics Chris Spitzer, who has just been named a Congressional Science Fellow for 2010-2011, is off to Washington to learn and observe but also to do what he can to make sure national policy in areas such as energy and the environment reflects current scientific understanding.

The International Center for Advanced Renewable Energy and Sustainability (I-CARES) has awarded 11 faculty members — university professors undertaking innovative and collaborative research in the broad areas of bioenergy and sustainability — grants totaling nearly $300,000.

Sally Elgin wins award for her commitment to finding new, more powerful ways to teach science and to support teachers in the biological sciences.

The decoding  of the Neandertal genome, which suggested modern humans interbred with Neandertals, followed hard on the heals of a WUSTL professor’s critique on mathematical and logical grounds of a gene analysis that suggested no interbreeding.

A groundbreaking ceremony for Preston M. Green Hall was held Friday, April 30, in Uncas A. Whitaker Hall. The building, which will house the School of Engineering & Applied Science, is being named in honor of the late Green, a WUSTL alumnus and benefactor. It will turn the corner at Skinker Boulevard and Forest Park Parkway, connecting on its western edge to the recently completed Brauer Hall.

WUSTL students from the Department of Mathematics in Arts & Sciences recently distinguished themselves in two competitions: A trophy from the 15th annual Missouri MAA Collegiate Mathematics Competition and more than respectable scores at the William Lowell Putnam Mathematics Competition, a difficult and prestigious national contest.