Newsroom Stories

Fiona Marshall, PhD, an archaeologist in the Department of Anthropology in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, was installed Feb. 10 as the inaugural James W. and Jean L. Davis Professor. The professorship is named in tribute to the lifelong contributions of the Davises to the university.

​Washington University in St. Louis students volunteers built homes in Oklahoma, dug fish ponds in Panama and helped establish medical clinics in Honduras, learning as much about themselves as about other cultures. Sophomore Itzel Lopez said she learned three lessons during her trip to help migrant farm workers in Texas: “The significance of being present, the gift of gratitude and hope and the blessing of acknowledgement.” 

The importance of human milk in evolution and modern health; biology and race in Ferguson; and the latest research on Cahokia Mounds will be among the presentation topics as three major human biology and anthropology professional groups converge in St. Louis for their annual scientific meetings March 24-28.

There are five regular polytopes (Platonic solids) in three-dimensional space and six in four-dimensional space. Only their projections can be built in our dimension-deficient world and that requires an act of imagination. Ivan Horozov, PhD, the Chauvenet Lecturer in Mathematics, is building the two most complex figures in this office in his spare time.

Researchers from around the world will gather April 10 to discuss the risk of emerging infectious diseases, and how best to translate research to clinical care, at the third annual conference of the Washington University Center for Global Health and Infectious Disease.

​Ireland lost 1 million souls to hunger and disease during the potato famine and another million to immigration. But that’s not all, says Peter Wyse Jackson, PhD, president of the Missouri Botanical Garden and the George Engelmann Professor of Botany at Washington University in St. Louis. Ireland also lost its connection to the many plant species that sustained its people throughout the centuries. The ethnobotanist says the study of plants is more important than ever.

James M. DuBois, DSc, PhD, has been named the Steven J. Bander Professor of Medical Ethics and Professionalism at the School of Medicine. In his research, DuBois develops measures to assess outcomes of training programs in ethics and professionalism in medicine and conducts social science studies of patient and research participant attitudes.

Appearing March 12 before the U.S. Senate Special Committe on Aging, Michal Grinstein-Weiss, PhD, associate director of the Center for Social Development (CSD) at Washington University in St. Louis, urged U.S. senators to create long-term asset-building policies and to use such “golden moments” as tax time to urge Americans to save.

With the “Right to Work” movement growing in Wisconsin and other states, a majority of states may soon bar employees and unions from negotiating agreements that require non-members to contribute to the costs of representing them. For unions to survive and thrive, at least two significant changes are necessary, argues Marion Crain, JD, vice provost and the Wiley B. Rutledge Professor of Law at Washington University in St. Louis.

Scientists are eager to make use of stem cells’ extraordinary power to transform into nearly any kind of cell, but that ability also is cause for concern in cancer treatment. New research at the School of Medicine has revealed that these stem cells are present even in slow-growing, less aggressive tumors.