WashU Experts

The Supreme Court’s June 27 decision to kill all federal constitutional complaints about partisan gerrymandering is a tremendous loss for our democratic process, says a constitutional law expert at Washington University in St. Louis.

Joy Harjo, a member of the Muscogee Creek Nation, has been selected as the 23rd U.S. poet laureate, a move that will inspire Native Americans throughout the country, says Kellie Thompson, director of the Kathryn M. Buder Center for American Indian Studies at Washington University in St. Louis.

If the proposed Trump Administration tariffs are imposed and continue into 2020, China’s likely strategy will be to use fireworks as a “political toy” heading into the election season, says a Washington University in St. Louis expert on international trade.

Kate Smith was the “songbird of the south” and “the First Lady of radio,” a 20th-century superstar whose recording of “God Bless America” was still being played during Philadelphia Flyer and New York Yankees home games. But recently, both teams distanced themselves from Smith due to racist lyrics in a pair of her early recordings. Arts & Sciences’ Todd Decker, chair of music, helps unpack the controversy for USA Today.

In the United States, almost 50,000 people die every year from suicide. While participating in a June 13 briefing on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., a Washington University in St. Louis expert testified that — amid the need nationally to stem violence in schools and elsewhere — suicide remains preventable.

This week’s fire at Notre Dame in Paris, which destroyed the Cathedral’s iconic spire and much of the roof, gripped the world and led to outpourings of support. But the damage could have been far worse, said architectural historian Eric Mumford.

Helium is a valuable, non-renewable resource that is critical for many medical and research applications. But helium supply and pricing are unreliable. Sophia Hayes, a professor of chemistry in Arts & Sciences, spoke at a recent American Chemical Society webinar about the need for congressional action to address these challenges.

New legislation designed to reverse a decades-long decline in worker’s rights under the National Labor Relations Act could play a critical role in reducing the growing income gap between rich and poor in America, according to the recent congressional testimony of a sociologist from Washington University in St. Louis.

The idea of a plant-based patty being tested by Burger King makes business sense, if not health sense, to Washington University in St. Louis researchers who have studied the fast-food marketplace.

The Trump administration said this week that the whole Affordable Care Act should be struck down in the courts. Doing so would have profound implications on health care and the economy, says an expert on health economics at Washington University in St. Louis.