Will stock in Facebook, which recently filed for
initial public offering (IPO), drop significantly following the end of
its IPO lock-up period later this year? It might if the company follows
recent trends, finds a new study by graduate students at Washington
University in St. Louis.
Randall Bateman, MD, had no intention of becoming a doctor when he enrolled as an undergraduate at Washington University in St. Louis. As a faculty member at the School of Medicine since 2006, Bateman now focuses his research on Alzheimer’s disease.
Researchers have found significant differences in brain development in infants as young as six months old who later develop autism, compared to babies who don’t develop the disorder. The new research, which relied on brain scans acquired at night while infants were naturally sleeping, suggests that autism doesn’t appear abruptly, but instead develops over time during infancy.
Many children with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) can benefit from medication for related disorders such as attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). “Unfortunately, there is very poor understanding of overall medication use for kids with autism,” says Paul T. Shattuck, PhD, assistant professor at the Brown School at Washington University in St. Louis. As a step toward improving the situation, Shattuck and colleagues studied psychotropic medication use compared across individuals with an ASD, ADHD and both an ASD with ADHD. “Observations from the present study reinforce the complexity of pharmacologic treatment of challenging behavior in kids with ASDs and ADHD. There needs to be a clearer guide for treating kids with both an ASD and ADHD,” he says.
The annual George Washington Week, sponsored by the sophomore honorary Lock & Chain, kicks off on President’s Day, Monday, Feb. 20. This year’s theme is “Who is WU?” Carriage rides, keynote speakers, community service and silent auctions all are being organized with a focus on diversity and heritage on the WUSTL campus and in the greater St. Louis area community.
Deanne Bell, an alumna of Washington University in St. Louis and host of popular science and technology-themed television shows, will share her love for a profession that she finds fun, creative, and critical to innovation, in an Assembly Series presentation at 7 p.m. Friday, Feb. 24.
Last year, the National Collegiate Athletic
Association required all aluminum bats used in college play to meet a
new performance standard designed to limit the exit speed of the ball
off the bat. This year, the National Federation of State High School
Associations also has implemented the new standard. With spring training beginning at all levels this month, a WUSTL professor and WUSTL baseball coaches comment on the new bats and how they have affected play.
The American public exhibits deep partisan divisions
about the direction that federal fiscal policy should take, finds a new
national survey from the Weidenbaum Center at Washington University in St. Louis. The American Panel Survey will take place monthly, and will measure shifts in attitudes over time.
Peter Gizzi’s poetry practically vibrates with tensions — between the lyrical and the abstract, joy and grief, interior and exterior. In Threshold Songs, his fifth and most recent collection, the writer is at once elegiac and experimental, building poems and shaping meanings from the rhythms and collisions of words and language even as he mourns a string of personal losses. On Thursday, Feb. 23, Gizzi, the Visiting Hurst Professor of Poetry, will read from his work as part of The Writing Program’s spring Reading Series.
Naoko Akimoto has been named a McDonnell International Scholar at Washington University in St. Louis. Akimoto earned a bachelor’s degree in law from the University of Tokyo, which is one of 27 premier universities from around the world partnered with Washington University in the McDonnell International Scholars Academy.