Newsroom Stories

“Teaching Jazz as American Culture”Jazz is “America’s Music.” Established in the early 1900s, the music has remained popular for nearly a century, going through many variations. In the 1920s, jazz was “pop” music, but today it is often shunned by younger people in favor of today’s popular tunes — rap, rock and country. Can jazz, with its broad history and reputation for being “art” music, be relevant to youth today? The director of a summer jazz institute at Washington University in St. Louis hopes to show that jazz is not only relevant, but also essential. More…

Studying Child Protective Services’ effectivenessEfforts to improve Child Protective Services (CPS) would be more effective if they were based on evaluations of available data instead of assertions that are not supported by evidence, say two child welfare services experts. “While there is no doubt that the current child welfare system has flaws, we can find little empirical data supporting the scathing critiques of mandated reporting laws and CPS. We now have enough empirical evidence to scientifically evaluate many longstanding criticisms of CPS, and many of those criticisms appear to be without basis in reality,” write Brett Drake, Ph.D., and Melissa Jonson-Reid, Ph.D., in an article titled “A Response to Melton Based on the Best Available Data,” published in the current issue of the international journal Child Abuse & Neglect. More…

Women who get most of their daily calcium from food have healthier bones than women whose calcium comes mainly from supplemental tablets, say researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. Surprisingly, this is true even though the supplement takers have higher average calcium intake. More…

A probe of the upper echelons of the human brain’s chain-of-command has found strong evidence that there are not one but two complementary commanders in charge of the brain, according to neuroscientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. It’s as if Captains James T. Kirk and Jean-Luc Picard were both on the bridge and in command of the same starship Enterprise.

Samuel Isaac Weissman, Ph.D., professor emeritus of chemistry who had worked on the Manhattan Project, died Tuesday (June 12, 2007) at 2 McKnight Place at the age of 94. He was a longtime resident of St. Louis.

St. Louis researchers have identified common DNA variations that underlie susceptibility to fever after smallpox vaccination. Their finding is the first to link individual differences written into the genetic code with a vaccine-related complication – albeit a mild one. Most of the eight genetic alterations the scientists identified increased the likelihood of fever after smallpox vaccination. A few, however, reduced fever risk.

Bernard Harris, first African American to walk in space, visits science camp for middle school students at Washington University in St. Louis on Wednesday, June 20, 2007.

Is she safe to hire?Companies with 500 employees or more can expect to be sued for discrimination at least once a year, and the cost to defend the accusation can cost as much as $15,000, even if the allegation is found to be without merit. The Civil Rights Act of 1991 (CRA-91) held great promise for protecting workers from discrimination in the workplace, but the potential cost of litigation makes some firms wary of hiring minorities. A business professor at Washington University in St. Louis has come up with a plan to circumvent potential lawsuits in a way that benefits both employers and employees.

Hong KongIn the days leading up to China’s taking over Hong Kong on July 1, 1997, the media and political pundits were spouting cautionary tales of how China would ruin Hong Kong’s success as Southeast Asia’s financial center. Were the foretellers of doom correct in their outlook? Not at all, says David Meyer, visiting professor of business at Washington University in St. Louis. In fact, ten years later, both Hong Kong and China have reaped the benefits.

Plants on extrasolar planets resembling Earth could be as black as these eggplants.Washington University biology and chemistry professor Robert Blankenship and his colleagues are seeking clues to life on extrasolar planets by studying various biosignatures found in the light spectrum leaking out to Earth. They are speculating on what kind of photosynthesis might occur on such planets and what the extrasolar plants might look like.