Newsroom Stories

Sports updates for the week of April 19

“The retirement announcement of Justice John Paul Stevens does not come as a big surprise, but it is still a sad day,” says Gregory P. Magarian, JD, former Stevens clerk and professor of law at Washington University in St. Louis. “The Supreme Court is losing a great jurist and a great man.” Magarian calls Stevens a “pragmatic populist” because of the way he approached his decisions with the court. “Stevens always has been very focused on what a Supreme Court decision is going to do to an ordinary person,” he says. “He’s never written an opinion just to make a point or put on a show.” 

Barry Sleckman, MD, PhD, was a busy young entrepreneur and disaffected commuter college student when his life began taking a sudden series of unexpected turns in the late 1970s.

The WUSTL Energy Awareness Committee is offering faculty, staff and students the opportunity to celebrate Earth Day with a volunteer event at Tyson Research Center from 9-11 a.m. Saturday, April 24. Volunteers will be asked to assist with the restoration of a glade, a native habitat in Missouri, at Tyson.

Ryan Anderson, a second-year medical student and president of the class, was one of 30 medical students nationwide to receive the American Medical Association Foundation’s 2010 Leadership Award. The award provides medical students, residents, fellows and early-career physicians with special training to develop their skills as future leaders in organized medicine and community affairs. … […]

What do ballroom dancing, fresh farm produce and paper beads from Africa have in common? They are central to the business plans of award-winning ventures in the 2010 YouthBridge Social Entrepreneurship and Innovation Competition. Five start-up businesses dedicated to helping others shared a total of $155,000 in cash grants presented at a ceremony April 13 at Washington University.

Junior Brianna Davis (right), member of the WUSTL Visions Gospel Choir, presents a surprise birthday gift to Chancellor Emeritus William H. Danforth, MD, during the Woman’s Club Centennial Gala April 10. The gala commemorated 100 years of the Woman’s Club and coincidentally was held the night of Danforth’s 84th birthday.

Emergency Assembly Points — areas where those inside a particular building should assemble when an evacuation is needed — have been designated on all campuses. Signs like this one are being erected on the Danforth, North and West campuses and will go up on the Medical Campus in the next few months.

Organisms from yeast to rodents to humans all benefit from cutting calories. In less complex organisms, restricting calories can double or even triple lifespan. But researchers at Washington University School of Medicine and two other centers report in the journal Science that they are less interested in calorie restriction for longer life than for its ability to promote good health throughout life.  

Using powerful DNA sequencing technology to decode the genomes of cancer patients, scientists at the School of Medicine are getting an unprecedented look at the genetic basis of a highly lethal breast cancer that disproportionately affects younger women and those who are African-American, they report in the journal Nature.