Research Wire

Most bird families have adapted to changes in ambient temperature by changing both their bodies and their bills simultaneously, according to biologist Justin Baldwin in Arts & Sciences, first author of a new study in Nature Communications.

Researchers led by physicist Henric Krawczynski in Arts & Sciences received $1.5 million from NASA to fund a new flight of XL-Calibur, a balloon-borne telescope built to examine the most extreme objects in the universe. XL-Calibur will be launched from Esrange Space Center in Sweden, north of the Arctic Circle, in May 2024.

Neuroscience researchers Tom Franken, MD, PhD, and Alessandro Livi, PhD, at the School of Medicine, are among the recipients of this year’s McDonnell Center for Systems Neuroscience Small Grants.

In a paper published in IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Circuits and Systems, researchers at Washington University describe a portable uterine-contraction tracker: a cheap-to-make, flexible electrode patch.

Political scientists Taylor Carlson and Carly Wayne, in Arts & Sciences, won a National Science Foundation grant to study factors that drive political radicalization.

For the first time, a study by researchers including biologist Susanne Renner in Arts & Sciences helps solve the mystery of the timing of falling leaves in autumn by revealing the pivotal role of the summer solstice.

Researchers at Washington University in St. Louis found the first abiotic pathway for RNA hydrolysis in iron-rich soils and sediments. Understanding how RNA breaks down under given conditions is critical to harnessing the molecule for use in emerging technologies.

Kristen Prufrock, in the Department of Neuroscience at the School of Medicine, is teaming up with anatomists from several other institutions to identify the cellular principles governing how facial bones take shape.

Biologist Matthew Austin in Arts & Sciences published a study in the American Journal of Botany that describes changes to the flowering time and other important life cycle events in Leavenworthia species, a group of small flowering plants found in glades in Missouri.

In a study published in Medical Physics, researchers in the lab of Abhinav Jha at the McKelvey School of Engineering evaluated artificial intelligence techniques for cleaning up medical images based on performance in clinical tasks.