Record

Some plants like ginkgo trees have either male or female flowers, not both. Susanne Renner, honorary professor of biology in Arts & Sciences, reviewed the genetic basis of sex determination in plants for Nature Plants and will guest-edit a special issue of a Royal Society journal on the topic.

Three researchers at Washington University School of Medicine have been elected to the American Academy of Microbiology in recognition of their scientific achievements and original contributions that have advanced the field of microbiology.

Faculty, staff, friends and loved ones are invited to submit messages of support for the Class of 2021. Submit photo and video messages by Saturday, April 24.

Dolores B. Njoku, MD, a noted clinician, researcher and mentor, has been named director of pediatric anesthesiology at the School of Medicine and anesthesiologist-in-chief at St. Louis Children’s Hospital. She also will be the new Rudolph L. and Mary Frances Wise Endowed Chair in Pediatric Anesthesiology.

The Bellwether Foundation Inc. has awarded Olin Business School and the Brookings Institution a $750,000 grant to improve the quality of life for people in St. Louis and across the country.

Five physician-scientists at the School of Medicine have been elected members of the American Society for Clinical Investigation in recognition of original, creative and independent investigations in the clinical or allied sciences of medicine.

Macy Sprunger, a graduate student in Meredith Jackrel’s lab in the Department of Chemistry in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, won a three-year $136,560 National Research Service Award from the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Such fellowships support predoctoral students conducting research in scientific health-related fields.

Larry J. Johnson, a radiation safety specialist for decades in the Office of Environmental Health & Safety at Washington University in St. Louis, died of a heart attack at his home in St. Louis on April 2, 2021. He was 68.

Michael Nowak, research professor of physics in Arts & Sciences, is co-author of a study in The Astrophysical Journal Letters that shares unprecedented observations of the black hole in the galaxy M87.

John E. McCarthy, the Spencer T. Olin Professor of Mathematics and chair of mathematics and statistics in Arts & Sciences, received a five-year $450,000 grant from the National Science Foundation to develop new tools to deal with complexity in the design of systems such as those used in automatic pilots and self-driving cars.