Science & Technology

Below is a link to the Washington University news release about the U.S. News & World Report undergraduate rankings for 2004-05: http://news-info.wustl.edu/news/page/normal/3627.html To view a full listing of U.S. News magazine, book and Web-only rankings for 2004-05, please visit the U.S. News & World Report site: http://www.usnews.com/usnews/edu/college/rankings/rankindex_brief.php

Below is a link to the Washington University news release about the U.S. News & World Report undergraduate rankings for 2004-05: http://news-info.wustl.edu/news/page/normal/3627.html To view a full listing of U.S. News magazine, book and Web-only rankings for 2004-05, please visit the U.S. News & World Report site: http://www.usnews.com/usnews/edu/college/rankings/rankindex_brief.php

Bill Nye will explore how the latest scientific advancements relate to social policy at 11 a.m. September 13 in Graham Chapel as part of the Assembly Series.

Photo courtesy USDASchaal rice one.Biologists from Washington University in St. Louis and their collaborators from Taiwan have examined the DNA sequence family tree of rice varieties and have determined that the crop was domesticated independently at least twice in various Asian locales. Jason Londo, Washington University in Arts & Sciences biology doctoral candidate, and his adviser, Barbara A. Schaal, Ph.D., Washington University Spencer T. Olin Professor of Biology in Arts & Sciences, ran genetic tests of more than 300 types of rice, including both wild and domesticated, and found genetic markers that reveal the two major rice types grown today were first grown by humans in India and Myanmar and Thailand (Oryza sativa indica) and in areas in southern China (Oryza sativa japonica). More…

Photo courtesy NASAAmid a bevy of international space exploration missions to the Moon, the Washington University Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences in Arts & Sciences and ShanDong University at WeiHai (SDU at WH) in Mainland China have agreed to cooperate on scientific research and joint training of students in the two institutions. The agreement comes less than a year away from the planned launch of Chang’E-1, the Chinese lunar probe project, in April, 2007. The goals of China’s Chang’E-1 project are first to place a satellite into orbit around the Moon in 2007; then to land an unmanned vehicle on the Moon by 2010; and to collect samples of lunar soil with an unmanned vehicle by 2020. The spacecraft carries five instruments to image and measure different features of the Moon. Within two years, three additional missions from the United States, India and Japan will generate a furious flurry of data that will keep space scientists enthralled for the better part of the next decade. The Japanese Selene mission is scheduled to launch in the summer of 2007, the Indian Chandrayaan-1 in late 2007 or early 2008, and the United States’ Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter for October 2008. More…

Olga Pontes is Going FISHin’.Biologists at Washington University in St. Louis have made an important breakthrough in understanding a pathway plant cells take to silence unwanted or extra genes using short bits of RNA. Basically, they have made it possible to see where, and how, the events in the pathway unfold within the cell, and seeing is believing, as the old saying goes. Craig Pikaard, Ph.D., Washington University professor of biology in Arts & Sciences and his collaborators have described the roles that eight proteins in Arabidopsis plants play in a pathway that brings about DNA methylation, an epigenetic function that involves a chemical modification of cytosine, one of the four chemical subunits of DNA. More…

Bill Nye will share his infectious enthusiasm for science and explore how the latest scientific advancements relate to social policy at 11 a.m., September 13, in Graham Chapel as part of the Assembly Series.

Constant blood flow shields the brain from cold, limiting the effects of any attempt to cool the brain.Attempts to cool the brain to reduce injury from stroke and other head trauma may face a significant obstacle: current cooling devices can’t penetrate very deeply into the brain. Scientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have shown that blood flow in the brain creates a “cold shielding” effect and have developed a method for calculating brain temperature that may be used to improve brain cooling techniques.

David Kilper / WUSTL PhotoLars Angenent with an earlier model of his microbial fuel cell. An advance in the design has increased the power output by a factor of 10. Hopes are that the fuel cell can be scaled up even more and function as a viable energy form.In the midst of the worldwide energy crisis, researchers at Washington University in St. Louis have been continuing their work on a microbial fuel cell that generates electricity from wastewater. Advances in the design of this fuel cell in the last year have increased the power output by a factor of 10 and future designs, already in the minds of the researchers, hope to multiply that power output by 10 times again. If that goal can be achieved, the fuel cell could be scaled up for use in food and agricultural industries to generate electrical power – all with the wastewater that today goes right down the drain.

Richards has observed the inheritance of epigenetic factors in plants.Eric Richards, Ph.D., professor of biology at Washington University in St. Louis, writing in the May issue of Nature Reviews Genetics, analyzes recent and past research in epigenetics and the history of evolution and proposes that epigenetics should be considered a form of soft inheritance, citing examples in both the plant and mammalian kingdoms.