Any multicellular animal poses a special difficulty for the theory of evolution. Most of its cells will die without reproducing, and only a privileged few will pass their genes. Given the incentive for cheating, how is cooperation among the cells enforced? In the Dec. 16 issue of the journal Science, Washington University in St. Louis biologists Joan Strassmann and David Queller suggest the answer is frequent population bottlenecks that restart populations from a single cell.
Rita A. Stanley arrived at the School of Law in 1995. Since then, the scenery and her duties changed, but a constant was excellent co-workers. “People were the reason I loved it here,” Stanley says. Stanley, along with the other 102 staff members who retired from the university this past year, contributed a total of 2,023 years of service to the university — more than two millennia.
Jordan Teisher, a doctoral student in evolution, ecology and population biology, and Jeremy King, a doctoral student in plant biology, have been named the first Monsanto graduate fellows at Washington University.
After the issue of Friday, Dec. 15, the Record daily email takes a break for the holidays. It will resume publication on Wednesday, Jan. 4, 2012, followed by another weekly check-in on Wednesday, Jan. 11. The Record resumes regular daily emails Tuesday, Jan. 17, when classes begin for the spring semester.
There is an undeniable romanticism to the sculpture of Patrick Dougherty. Working with the simplest of materials — sticks, branches and saplings — the North Carolina-based artist creates playful architectural forms that variously suggest nests, primitive shelters and fairy-tale castles. This fall, Dougherty enlisted dozens of students to help construct Double or Nothing, a new commission for the Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts.
Constitutional courts worldwide are increasingly turning to legal arguments and ideas from other countries for guidance and inspiration. But scholarly interest in the growing judicial use of foreign law paints a very misleading picture of the globalization of constitutional law, says David Law, JD, PhD, professor of law at Washington University in St. Louis. He says that for those who want to see the U.S. Supreme Court make greater and more sophisticated use of foreign law, encouraging its members or inviting them to additional conferences and gatherings is likely to have little impact. “At this point in time, the greatest obstacle to judicial comparativism in the United States is not the unwillingness of individual judges to consider foreign legal materials, it is the current political economy of the American legal education.”
Seethu Seetharaman, PhD, was recently installed as the W. Patrick McGinnis Professor of Marketing in the Olin Business School at Washington University in St. Louis. The ceremony, held Oct. 26 in the Charles F. Knight Executive Education Center, included welcoming remarks by Chancellor Mark S. Wrighton and an address by Seetharaman.
Faculty Fellows in the South 40 recently hosted holiday parties for their student neighbors. Freshman Matt Burkhardt (left) visits with Ian MacMullen, PhD, assistant professor of political science in Arts & Sciences. MacMullen and his wife, Lola Fayanju, MD, research fellow in the WUSTL Department of Surgery, co-hosted the party in their Gregg House residence. Faculty Fellows help integrate academic and residential life by living in the residential colleges with students for three-year stints.
Nominations are due Jan. 19 for the fourth annual James M. Holobaugh Honors. Campus Life and the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender) Advisory Board will be hosting the Holobaugh Honors Ceremony at 7 p.m. Wednesday, Feb. 8, in Holmes Lounge, Ridgley Hall.
With the holidays right around the corner, many parents are scanning the latest “recommended toy” lists as they make their final purchases. An education expert at Washington University in St. Louis says that, while educational toys are a fine idea, children receive the most benefit when their parents play with them and engage them in their new gifts. R. Keith Sawyer, PhD, associate professor of education in Arts & Sciences, offers advice to parents worried about making the right toy choices for their children.