Science & Technology

Copyright Pieter JohnsonEutrophication is caused by higher phosphorous and nitrogen that create a profound impact on the food web, threatening the frogs’ existence.A collaboration involving ecologists at WUSTL and the University of Wisconsin strongly points to farming practices and development, two factors that create a condition called eutrophication in ponds and wetlands, as factors behind the high incidence of deformed frogs. Eutrophication is caused by higher phosphorus and nitrogen (prime components of agricultural fertilizer) levels in wet ecosystems. Higher levels of these nutrients cause a profound impact on the food web that imperils the frogs’ existence.

Ramanath Cowsik, Ph.D., professor of physics in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, recently became the 25th member of the Washington University faculty to be elected to the National Academy of Sciences. He joined 71 other new members and 18 foreign associates from 13 countries in recognition of their distinguished and continuing achievements in original research.

New evidence has linked deformities to the presence of a parasite that has been noted in scientific literature for a century and a half.

Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis is a long-time leader in medical research and clinical practice. The school employs a number of experts in many areas of expertise, including health care policy issues. Under the direction of former dean William Peck, the university has established the Center for Health Policy to: Identify key […]

A colony of 28 day-old *Physcomitrella patens* grown in laboratory culture showing the green, leafy shoots in the center, with fine, radiating protonemal filaments growing outward.Washington University in St. Louis will be involved directly with sequencing the entire genome of the moss, Physcomitrella patens, at the Joint Genome Institute (JGI) in Walnut Creek, Calif. The Community Sequencing Program at the United States Department of Energy chose a proposal submitted by Ralph S. Quatrano, Ph.D., Spencer T. Olin Professor and Washington University biology department chair, and Brent Mishler, Ph.D., professor of integrative biology and director of the Jepson Herbaria at the University of California, Berkeley, to sequence the plant’s DNA.

A page entitled, “Rankings of WUSTL by News Media.”

WUSTL researchers are investigating how to infuse grains with folate typically found in green vegetables such as broccoli.A team of researchers led by Karel Schubert, Ph.D., affiliate research biology professor in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, recently achieved a breakthrough to enhance levels of folate, a vitamin essential to human and animal health, in the model plant Arabidopsis.

David Kilper / WUSTL PhotoBottled water or tap? A WUSTL environmental engineer specializing in aquatic chemistry sees no difference between the two in terms of health.Paying extra for bottled water? You may be wasting your money, says an expert in aquatic chemistry. Daniel Giammar, Ph.D., a faculty member in the Environmental Engineering Science Program at Washington University in St. Louis, says that tap water is just as safe to drink as bottled water. He also says that the pricey bottled water you value so highly might well be nothing more than repackaged tap water. “The tap water we drink meets very strict standards that are designed to protect our health,” Giammar says. “These are developed over many years of study and they all include fairly large factors of safety. Any differences between tap and bottled water, in terms of health, are negligible.”

Joe Angeles / WUSTL PhotoA new book co-authored by a memory researcher at Washington University in St. Louis is one-stop shopping for all the questions we have about memory and how serious our lapses might be as we grow older. Mark A. McDaniel, Ph.D., professor of psychology in Arts & Sciences at WUSTL, says his book, Memory Fitness: A Guide for Successful Aging, relies on many rigorous academic studies but is written for the lay person. “Our mission is to give the general public a good idea of what they can reasonably expect from their memory capabilities as they age,” says McDaniel about the book he co-authored with Gilles O. Einstein, Ph.D., professor and chair of the psychology department at Furman University. “It also outlines some reasonable expectations about things people can do to perhaps increase their memory performances.”

Washington University has a number of internationally recognized experts and researchers on terrorism and homeland security who can address issues including intelligence, critical infrastructure, cybersecurity, target identification, and many other areas of concern related to the latest news on threats to the U.S. Faculty associated with the University’s Center for Security Technologies may be of […]