Newsroom Stories

City versus forest. Apollonian rationality versus Dionysian subconscious. Wayward lovers and working-class thespians versus the regal, glittering world of the fairies. William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream is a study in contrasts, joining elegant verse and bawdy humor with cruel punishments and magical enchantments “past the wit of man.” This month, the Performing Arts Department will present the Bard’s most popular comedy — arguably the most popular ever written — as its spring Mainstage production.  

Young women who have experienced traumatic events are more likely to become alcohol dependent than those who have not, according to researchers at the School of Medicine and the Midwest Alcoholism Research Center. 

Focusing light into a scattering medicum such as tissue has been a dream since the beginning of biomedical optics, according to Lihong Wang, PhD, WUSTL biomedical imaging expert. Previous techniques allowed light to be focused only within a millimeter of the skin. Now Wang has invented a technique called “TRUE”  that uses an ultrasound guide star to allow scattered optical light to be focused deep within tissue.    

Eleven faculty members from Washington University School of Medicine were honored Feb. 9 at the 2011 Distinguished Faculty Awards ceremony at the Eric P. Newman Education Center.

WUSTL’s top 11 percent finish in last year’s RecycleMania competition was impressive, but the Office of Sustainability is challenging WUSTL to finish even higher in the 2011 RecycleMania contest, which lasts eight weeks and ends Saturday, April 2. RecycleMania 2011 pits WUSTL against other colleges and universities to see which campus can keep the greatest amount of waste materials from landfills.

D. Craig Allred, MD, professor of pathology and immunology, has received a one-year, $24,000 grant from the Longer Life Foundation for research titled “Predicting Prognosis in Invasive Breast Cancer by Genetic Instability.” … Tamara Burlis, DPT, assistant professor of physical therapy and associate director for clinical education in physical therapy, has been appointed by Missouri […]

Chronicle of Higher Education Dumped on by data: Scientists say a deluge Is drowning research 02/10/2011 The Human Connectome Project will allow researchers to navigate freely available data to come up with new ideas about the brain. “The insights emerge from comparing across a whole collection of studies looking at similar, but not identical, questions,” […]

David Peters, PhD, the McDonnell Douglas Professor of Engineering in the School of Engineering & Applied Science at Washington University in St. Louis, has received the Reed Aeronautics Award for 2011 from the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics. The Reed Award is the highest award an individual can receive for achievements in the field of aeronautical science and engineering.

A parasite and a virus may be teaming up in a way that increases the parasite’s ability to harm humans, scientists at the University of Lausanne in Switzerland and Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis report this week in Science.

How have race relations in America evolved since the civil rights movement of the 1960s? Was the election of President Barack Obama a milestone in this regard? Did it truly serve as a turning point in America’s history of racial inequality? Later this month, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and Washington University in St. Louis will explore these questions and more with a symposium titled “Race in the Age of Obama.”