The New York Times best-selling historian Douglas Brinkley and New Yorker cartoonist Roz Chast will present keynote addresses for “Celebrating Our Books, Recognizing Our Authors”, Washington University’s 10th annual faculty book colloquium. Organized by the Center for the Humanities in Arts & Sciences and the Washington University Libraries, the colloquium also will feature new book presentations by four faculty authors, as well as a display of all faculty books published during the past three years.
These days, there’s a lot of buzz about high school students needing to prepare for a global environment. An Nov. 29 panel discussion seeks to offer students some concrete guidelines as they make the transition to college. The event primarily targets all area high school students, but it also is geared toward parents and teachers.
Researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, including Stuart A. Kornfeld, MD, have obtained new evidence that at least some persistent stuttering is caused by mutations in a gene governing not speech, but a metabolic pathway involved in recycling old cell parts. Beyond a simple association, the study provides the first evidence that mutations affecting cellular recycling centers called lysosomes actually play a role in causing some people to stutter.
The Campus Store will give WUSTL faculty and staff members an opportunity to do some early holiday shopping. The store will hold its 14th annual Faculty/Staff Appreciation Event Wednesday, Nov. 30, and will offer a 30 percent discount to Washington University faculty and staff members from 3-8 p.m.
Chancellor Mark S. Wrighton (center) speaks during the question-and-answer session of the “Report to the Neighbors” meeting Nov. 16 at the Knight Center. The annual event is held to help keep those living in neighborhoods surrounding WUSTL informed on university happenings and also to give neighbors a forum to voice comments and concerns to a panel of university administrators.
The women’s cross country team raced to the program’s first-ever national title at the 2011 NCAA Division III Cross Country Championship held Nov. 19 at Lake Breeze Golf Club in Winneconne, Wis. Updates also included on women’s soccer, men’s and women’s basketball and swimming and diving.
WUSTL Dining Services is providing a traditional Thanksgiving meal for students who will be staying in St. Louis for the holiday. The buffet with turkey and all the trimmings will be offered from 11:45 a.m.-2 p.m. Thanksgiving Day, Nov. 24, at College Hall in the South 40 House.
The Record daily email takes a break for the Thanksgiving holidays after Nov. 22 and resumes publication Tuesday, Nov. 29. Check out record.wustl.edu or news.wustl.edu for all the latest university news and information.
Genomics and Pathology Services at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis (GPS@WUSTL), directed by Karen Seibert, PhD, is now offering a test for mutations in 28 genes associated with cancer. The genes in the test affect a variety of different types of tumors, including blood, lymph, lung, brain, bladder, kidney, skin, stomach, prostate and breast cancers.
Traditionally, fossil-hunters often could only make educated guesses as to where fossils lie. The rest lay with chance. But thanks to a software model used by WUSTL professor Glenn Conroy, PhD, and researchers at Western Michigan University, fossil-hunters’ reliance on luck when finding fossils may be diminishing. Using artificial neural networks, Conroy and colleagues developed a computer model that can pinpoint productive fossil sites.
