Science & Technology

Photo by David KilperProfessor Losos displays lab mascot, Morton, an Australian-bearded dragon.As professor of biology in Arts & Sciences at Washington University, Losos uses lizards to integrate questions of ecology and evolution. He seeks to better understand how organisms survive in their present-day environments, how they’ve changed over time to fit into those environments, and how they’re continuing to change. “We can’t go back in time,” Losos says, “but we can see what happens today.” And, if one sees well enough, one can extrapolate back to understand how similar changes have occurred over millions of years.

Image courtesy of NASAAn artist’s rendition of a sea on MarsWhile NASA engineers and scientists determine how to roll the Spirit robotic rover onto the Martian surface, Raymond Arvidson, Ph.D., McDonnell Distinguished University Professor and chair of Earth and Planetary Sciences in Arts & Sciences and a host of Washington University personnel are doing their part for a successful mission.

A new book by botanists at Washington University in St. Louis enlightens both consumers of natural products and herbs and traditional physicians. Medical Botany, Plants Affecting Human Health, is the second edition of a 1977 book, Medical Botany, published by Walter Lewis, Ph.D., professor emeritus of biology, and Memory Elvin-Lewis, Ph.D., professor of microbiology and ethnobotany in biomedicine in Arts & Sciences at Washington University.

Courtesy photoThe Trans-Iron Galactic Element Recorder (TIGER) at the McMurdo base in Anarctica. Aria-9, a joint Washington University/NASA K-12 research project, is scheduled for mid-December; it involves measuring galactic cosmic rays.An estimated 1,000 students from 28 K-12 schools from Missouri, Illinois, Washington D.C., New Jersey, Montana, and Queensland, Australia are participating in Aria-9, student experiment packages that get tested on NASA space flights. The Aria-9 is the latest Washington University in St. Louis Project Aria’s “fly-and-compare” K-12 experiment packages, according to Keith Bennett, adjunct assistant professor of computer science and engineering at Washington University in St. Louis, and Aria project director.

Image courtesy of Karin Peyer, 2001*Postosuchus*, the “alligator on stilts,’ was quite a mover in its day.How much different do the bones of similar animals have to be for the classification of a new species? That is the question that drove Stephanie Novak, a new doctoral candidate in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, to develop a novel model to determine classification of a new species. Novak presented details of her model at the annual meeting of the Geological Society of America, held Nov.2-5 in Seattle.

Courtesy of Monterey Bay Area Research InstituteA fish on the ocean floor off California gazes at a sight no human has seen first-hand: a modified Raman spectrometer gathering data on a carbon dioxide sample.In collaboration with oceanographers from the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI), a team of geologists at Washington University in St. Louis is using a rare instrument on the ocean floor just west of California. One of their earliest projects was to see if it’s possible to capture carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and store it on the ocean floor. It’s the first deployment of the Raman spectrometer on the ocean floor.

December/January Science & Technology Tip Sheet

Image by Trent L. Schindler, Nat’l Science Foundation, Arlington, VAComputer-based reconstruction of an arsinoithere, an extinct fossil mammal from Ethiopia that lived 27 million years ago.Tab Rasmussen, Ph.D., a professor of anthropology in Arts & Sciences at Washington University, and two of his graduate students, were part of an international team of researchers that discovered new fossils in the highlands of Ethiopia that are filling gaps in scientists’ understanding of the evolution of African mammals. The results are reported in the Dec. 4, 2003, issue of the journal Nature.

Researchers have devised a new hearing test that measures the auditory brainstem response 20 times faster than current methodology.The marvels of mathematics may open the door to a new, improved hearing test for newborns. A mathematician and a recent electrical engineering doctoral graduate from Washington University in St. Louis have devised a hearing test that measures the auditory brainstem response 20 times faster than current methodology. The technique allows for testing on small digital machines that takes just two minutes instead of the hour current methods take, and volunteers instead of medical personnel can administer it. This bodes well for mandatory hearing testing of newborns within three years.

Meriwether Lewis and William ClarkLewis and Clark, meet Robert Criss. Virtual explorer Robert Criss, Ph.D., professor of earth and planetary sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, has teamed up with Lewis and Clark to provide the oldest determinations of the magnetic declination of America’s interior.