Notables

WashU Medicine researchers Randall J. Bateman, MD, and Kanta Horie, PhD, received the 2026 Jeffrey L. Morby Prize from Cure Alzheimer’s Fund for developing a blood test that detects and stages Alzheimer’s by measuring toxic proteins in the brain.

WashU Medicine molecular microbiologist Meng Wu was honored for her research on how early-life gut microbes shape lifelong immunity.

Tammie L.S. Benzinger, MD, PhD, and Thomas H. Schindler, MD, PhD, both of WashU Medicine’s Mallinckrodt Institute of Radiology, have been recognized with prestigious awards from the Society for Nuclear Medicine & Molecular Imaging.

Anthony J. Azama, associate vice chancellor for student success and the John M. Schael Director of Athletics at WashU, has been elected to serve as third vice president of the National Association of Division III Athletics Administrators.

Kelley Van Dyck Murphy, Constance Vale and Chandler Ahrens — all architecture faculty at the WashU Sam Fox School — have won a Most Enhanced Award from the Landmarks Association of St. Louis.

Kathy Gaytan, executive director of compliance and audit at WashU, will retire Dec. 31, according to Chancellor Andrew D. Martin. A search for her replacement is underway.

Yin Cao, ScD, an associate professor in the Division of Public Health Sciences in the WashU Medicine Mary Culver Department of Surgery, has been named a 2026 Fellow of the 101st class of the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation.

Three members of the WashU community have been selected for the 2026-27 cohort of Leadership St. Louis, a Focus St. Louis Program.  

The Steven & Susan Lipstein BJC Institute of Health building at WashU Medicine was recognized for its sustainable design and sustainability features.

The MAK Center for Art and Architecture and the SOM Foundation have named Linda C. Samuels, a professor and chair of urban design at the WashU Sam Fox School, as 2026 researcher-in-residence.