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A team of scientists reports a major advance in seqencing large genomes.A team of scientists that includes a Washington University in St. Louis biologist, has evaluated and validated a gene-enrichment strategy for genome sequencing and has reported a major advance in sequencing large genomes. The team showed a six-fold reduction of the effective size of the Zea mays (maize or corn) genome while creating a four-fold increase in the gene identification rate when compared to standard whole-genome sequencing methods.

Photo courtesy U.S. ArmyA U.S. Army brigadier general congratulates the graduates of the new police academy in Sin’Jar.Americans anxious to handover power to a sovereign Iraqi government by June 30 should remember it took 10 years for Allied Forces to return similar powers to Germany following World War II, says WUSTL political expert Victor Le Vine. Iraq, like post-war Germany, is now considered debellatio — its government no longer exists under international law. And, like it or not, the United States is stuck in Iraq until a new government is formed, a process that hinges on some very contentious constitution making. As part of an international conference on post-conflict constitutional reconstruction, Le Vine spent two years examining some 20 cases of constitution making in countries torn by war, revolution, rebellion and internal collapse. His analysis suggests that Iraqi nation-building will be both “painful and agonizingly difficult.”

“The Tenth Circuit’s decision upholding the constitutionality of the ‘Do Not Call’ registry is a straightforward application of the Supreme Court’s commercial speech jurisprudence, but this may not be the end of the ‘Do Not Call’ list cases,” says Neil M. Richards, an expert in the fields of privacy law and constitutional law and an associate professor of law at Washington University in St. Louis. “It’s likely that the telemarketers will petition the Supreme Court to take the case, and I think there’s at least some chance that the Supreme Court might hear it,” he says. “Supreme Court commercial speech doctrine is confusing, and this would be an opportunity to clear up some of the confusion.”

As the spotlight focusing on same-sex marriage in the United States continues to brighten, the issue is affecting more than the gay and lesbian couples desiring to obtain marriage licenses. “The rapid progress we are seeing on this issue is changing how some gay and lesbian youth are envisioning their own futures,” says Diane Elze, Ph.D., an assistant professor of social work at the George Warren Brown School of Social Work at Washington University in St. Louis. “They are beginning to see marriage as an option for themselves — not just traveling to Vermont for a civil union, or having a commitment ceremony, or acquiring domestic partnership benefits from their employer, but some of them can now imagine themselves as future married persons.”

David Hadas, Ph.D., professor of English in Arts & Sciences, died March 3, 2004 at his home in St. Louis of complications from cancer. He was 73. Hadas, who had taught at the University since 1964, will be most remembered for his “The Bible as Literature” class, which was very popular with students.

BroadPhilanthropist Eli Broad, named one of the top art collectors in the world by ArtNews and Art and Antiques magazines, will speak on Thirty Years of Collecting at 5 p.m. Monday, March 8, at the Washington University Gallery of Art.

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