Perspectives

Anthropologist Theresa Gildner, in Arts & Sciences, challenges longstanding misconceptions about multiple sclerosis in a perspective piece published in the journal Nature Reviews Neurology.

Ronné Turner, WashU’s vice provost for undergraduate enrollment and student financial aid, discusses her professional journey; increasing access to a WashU education; and preparing students for success after college.

In this Q&A, author and poet Mary Jo Bang, in Arts & Sciences, explains her process of translating Dante’s “Paradiso,” the last of three volumes that together form “The Divine Comedy.”

The inaugural A&S Innovates Research Pitch Competition this spring featured three-minute lightning pitches from Arts & Sciences faculty members presenting bold ideas on topics ranging from smart textiles to ChatGPT.

The Sam Fox School’s Pablo Moyano Fernández writes about the advantages of concrete for single-family home construction. Though wood still dominates the U.S. market, Moyano and WashU architecture and engineering students have explored concrete housing through models, prototypes and design competition entries.

Cultures differ around the world, meaning each city has its own set of variables that shape the evolutionary processes of wildlife. Understanding how these human cultural practices shape evolutionary patterns will allow people to better design cities that support both humans and the wildlife that call these places home, writes Elizabeth Carlen.

Translating these men’s writing is not just a matter of bringing a text from one language into another. It is also a deep reflection on the complex position of Jews and conversos in those years. Their unique vantage point offers a window into the intertwined histories of Europe, the Americas and the in-betweenness that marked the Jewish experience in the early modern world, writes Flora Cassen.

The spiral of silence becomes inimical to pluralistic debate, discussion and, ultimately, to democracy itself, writes James L. Gibson.

As Jay Bhattacharya comes into his new role, fellow scientist and Christian Dr. S. Joshua Swamidass (MD, PhD, associate professor of pathology & immunology) interviewed the NIH director about his convictions and his plans to lead the medical-research agency while controversy and questions swirl around the current administration’s approach to science and medicine.

A new podcast from WashU’s John C. Danforth Center on Religion and Politics covers topics ranging from evangelical Christians and Donald Trump to social media and lost connections, and even “The Karate Kid.”