Science & Technology

Image courtesy USGSA team of geologists from China and the United States, including two from WUSTL, report evidence of at least three ice ages occurring between 750 and 600 million years ago.Glaciers reached Cape Cod, Massachusetts, in the most recent ice age about 20,000 years ago. But much harsher ice ages hit the Earth in an ancient geological interval known as “the Cryogenian Period” between 750 and 600 million years ago. A team of geologists from China and the United States, including two from Washington University in St. Louis, now report evidence of at least three ice ages during that ancient time.

PakrasiA research team of biologists and engineers led by faculty at Washington University in St. Louis is seeking to find the Fountain of Youth — not in Florida, but in photosynthetic cyanobacteria (ancient little blue-green algae). Looking at the cellular systems in cyanobacteria, and then in a model plant and a moss species, these researchers want to determine how these organisms protect themselves from radicals, which are chemical culprits in the aging process in everything from bacteria to human beings.

Photo by David KilperSt. Louis teachers gather at WUSTL to compare notes.At Washington University in St. Louis, teachers from five school districts are working with science and math education faculty in an effort designed to align curriculum to the NCLB standards and to improve instruction. Their work is supported by $6.5 million from the National Science Foundation, through funding from NCLB.

Philip Stahl, prominent cell biologist and physiologist and Jonathan Turner, internationally recognized for his accomplishments in computer networks and telecommunications, will receive Washington University’s 2004 Faculty Achievement Awards and summarize their scholarly work at an awards ceremony, as part of the Assembly Series on Sept. 23.

Photo courtesy U.S. Geological Survey/SOFIAGenetic studies performed by Washington University biologists shows that the sunshine State is the exporter of brown lizards to other countries.A new study headed by biologists at Washington University in St. Louis shows that Florida is an exporter of more than just fruit and star athletes. Studying genetic variation in the common brown lizard, Anolis sagrei, the researchers found that introduced populations of the lizard in five different countries can be traced back to the Sunshine State as their site of export.

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.