Washington People

Susan Bayliss, MD, is director of pediatric dermatology at the School of Medicine. She uses humor and kindness in connecting with her patients. Most of them are in the St. Louis region, but she also treats children she meets while on medical missions overseas. Wherever she is, her passion for her work is evident.

One in three American adults has high blood pressure. Jessica Wagenseil, DSc, associate professor of mechanical engineering, is investigating how mechanical properties of the cardiovascular system contribute to this widespread disease.

Brian Nussenbaum, MD, the Christy J. and Richard S. Hawes III Professor of Otolaryngology, is a surgeon dedicated to caring for patients with life-threatening head and neck cancers. Passions for teaching, research and patient safety have steered his career.

For Marion Crain, JD, vice provost and the Wiley B. Rutledge Professor of Law at Washington University in St. Louis, the power of collaboration is at the center of everything she does, from her teaching and scholarship to showing dogs and raising sheep.

Andrew J. White, MD, the Philip R. Dodge, MD, Scholar in Pediatrics, took an unorthodox, even explosive, route to medicine. As director of the Pediatric Residency Program, his breadth of knowledge, exuberance and quick wit help him recruit, train and inspire future pediatricians.

Bill McKinnon, PhD, professor of earth and planetary sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, lists as his top research interests the icy satellites of the outer solar system and the physics of impact cratering. But he isn’t picky. If anything unusual and exciting is going on anywhere in the solar system, he wants to know about it.

Gammon Earhart, PhD, a professor in the Program in Physical Therapy at the School of Medicine, works to restore movement to patients with Parkinson’s disease. Arguably her most significant contributions as a researcher have been her studies demonstrating the benefits of tango dancing on patients with Parkinson’s. Freedom of movement, it turns out, has become a theme of sorts for Earhart — professionally and personally.

Arny Nader creates large sculptural installations that feel fantastic and whimsical yet grounded in utilitarian purpose. Last fall, Nadler won a $20,000 artist fellowship from the Regional Arts Commission of Greater St. Louis. We sat down to discuss growing up in Chicago, restructuring the undergraduate majors and the malleability of steel.

Karen Seibert, PhD, research professor of pathology and immunology and of genetics, helps scientists connect and collaborate. Seibert, who does so with a mixture of warmth, optimism, enthusiasm and humor, is the director of Genomic Pathology Services at Washington University, a groundbreaking service that simultaneously analyzes many different genes to help patients and their doctors identify the best treatment options.

Marie Griffith, PhD, is the director of the John C. Danforth Center on Religion and Politics at Washington University in St. Louis. Griffith, the John C. Danforth Distinguished Professor in the Humanities, came to WUSTL in 2011 from Harvard Divinity School. Her husband, Leigh E. Schmidt, PhD, Edward Mallinckrodt Distinguished University Professor, is also a faculty member at the Danforth Center.