Newsroom Stories

Two new interdisciplinary exective education courses bring together experts from across the Danforth Campus to explore emerging concepts that will impact the future of industries, economies and the environment. The two-day and three-day seminars will take place near the end of October.

A nationwide consortium of scientists has reported the first comprehensive genetic analysis of squamous cell carcinoma of the lung, a common type of lung cancer responsible for about 400,000 deaths each year. According to Ramaswamy Govindan, MD, of Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, about 75 percent of the tumors studied have mutations that can be targeted with existing drugs.

Guitarist Vincent Varvel and soprano Stella Markou will launch the fall Danforth University Center Chamber Music Series at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 12. The performance will feature songs spanning four centuries, including works by Henry Purcell, George F. Handel, Enrique Granados, Heitor Villa-Lobos and George Gershwin. In addition, the program will highlight My Beloved Is Mine, a 2007 composition by WUSTL’s own Martin Kennedy, assistant professor of music.

A new study suggests an estimated 46.3 percent of adolescents with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) were the victims of bullying. The study originated at the Brown School and is part of a pioneering program of research on adolescents and adults with autism led by Paul T. Shattuck, PhD, assistant professor. Lead author Paul Sterzing, PhD, assistant professor at the School of Social Welfare of the University of California, Berkeley, completed this study when he was a student at the Brown School.

The “No More ‘Too Big to Fail’” rallying cry is unrealistic, says Cheryl Block, JD, federal taxation, budget and bailout expert and professor of law at Washington University in St. Louis. “When the next really big economic crisis arises, Congress is unlikely to stick to its ‘no bailout’ pledge,” she says.

On September 7 the Partnership for Undergraduate Life Sciences Education (PULSE) announced that Kathryn Miller, PhD, professor and chair of biology at Washington University in St. Louis has been selected as one of 40 Vision and Change Leadership Fellows. Over the next year the Vision and Change Leadership Fellows will consider and then recommend models for improving undergraduate life-sciences education.

Scientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have identified a protein essential to repairing the intestine’s inner lining.

Faculty and graduate students from St. Louis-area universities with an interest in labor, households, health care, law and social welfare are invited to take part in a series of Monday brown-bag luncheon seminars to be held biweekly on the Danforth Campus at Washington University in St. Louis beginning Monday, Sept. 10, through Monday, Dec. 3.

Edward S. Macias, PhD, who has served as Washington University’s chief academic officer for the past 25 years, has announced that he will step down from his position as provost and executive vice chancellor June 30, 2013.

Before classes began at the Brown School, students, faculty and staff went out into the St. Louis area Aug. 25 for the annual Brown School Community Service Day. A video captures the program at Gateway Greening, one of 21 area agencies for which students, faculty and staff provided service. “It’s nice to start off the year ‘walking the walk,’” says Melissa Jonson-Reid, PhD, professor at the Brown School.