Research Wire

Biomedical engineer Abhinav Jha, an assistant professor at the McKelvey School of Engineering and of radiology at the School of Medicine, both at Washington University in St. Louis, has published two papers recently related to improving imaging methods for medical applications.

Washington University in St. Louis will receive a $650,000 grant for a collaborative community project focused on improving economic mobility for Black youth in the St. Louis area.

Most organisms on this planet rely on a circadian clock to function properly. New research published by biologists in Arts & Sciences investigates how an internal clock helps nitrogen-fixing cyanobacteria accommodate seemingly conflicting processes within a single cell.

Researchers at Washington University School of Medicine have identified the function of a mitochondrial protein that plays a role in human disease. The research, led by BJC Investigator Dave Pagliarini, could provide new ways to diagnose and develop treatments for some rare mitochondrial diseases.

Carlos Cruchaga, a professor of psychiatry at the School of Medicine, has shown that the protein sTREM2 plays a causal role in the progression of Alzheimer’s disease, meaning that targeting the protein may affect the course of the disease.

Alex Holehouse, an assistant professor of biochemistry and molecular biophysics at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, has received a Faculty Early Career Development Program (CAREER) award from the National Science Foundation.

In a new paper in Physical Review Letters, Kater Murch in Arts & Sciences and his collaborators explore the effects of memory in quantum systems. View an illustrated video about the experiments and findings.

Mark Lawrence and Ismael Seáñez, both assistant professors in the McKelvey School of Engineering at Washington University, have won $25,000 Collaboration Initiation Grants from the school.

In a study published recently in Advanced Materials, researchers from Washington University and the University of Southern California reveal a new pathway for designing optical materials using the degree of atomic disorder. The researchers anticipate developing crystals that enable advanced infrared imaging in low-light conditions or to enhance medical imaging devices.

Researchers at the School of Medicine have devised a method to gauge Alzheimer’s disease severity by analyzing the patterns of tau pathology in brain scans. The findings could lead to a way to determine how far the disease has progressed in individuals.