Imrat KhanWorld-renowned sitar player Imrat Khan, a distinguished artist-in-residence in the Department of Music in Arts & Sciences, will be joined by virtuoso tabla player Samir Chatterjee for a concert of Indian classical music at 8 p.m. Sunday, March 25. Khan, the senior-most member of the famous Etawa Gharana (musical dynasty), is widely recognized as one of the giants of Indian classical music, celebrated for his virtuosity, musicality and inventive wit.
A compound that halts nerve cell activity when exposed to light glows in this image of two nerve cells.Brain activity has been compared to a light bulb turning on in the head. Scientists at the School of Medicine have reversed this notion, creating a drug that stops brain activity when a light shines on it. The new compound activates the same receptor used by many anesthetics and tranquilizers, making it harder for a brain cell to respond to stimulation. The drug may some day be used to treat epilepsy.
Scientists have known for years that the energy cost of walking and running is related primarily to the work done by muscles to lift and move the limbs. But how much energy does it actually take to get around? Does having longer legs really make a difference? Herman Pontzer, Ph.D., assistant professor of physical anthropology in Arts & Sciences, has developed a mathematical model for calculating energy costs for two and four-legged animals. His research was published in a recent issue of The Journal of Experimental Biology.
Robert Osburn (yellow helmet, recording and sketching) and WUSTL graduate student Jenny Lippmann (measuring and doing compass readings) conducting the cave survey in a small passage of 23 degree cave in Crawford County, Missouri.The Caves of St. Louis County and the Bridges of Madison County share a common theme: loss. The former, a scholarly paper that appears as the sole entry of the current issue of Missouri Speleology, is a description of some of St. Louis County’s 127 known caves and a warning that development over the past two centuries has eliminated or destroyed many caves in a state that could quite rightly call itself the Cave State. The latter is a tear-jerking novel, made into a movie by Clint Eastwood about a doomed, unlikely love affair, a hallmark of the ’90s with all the permanence of the Backstreet Boys. Caves, though, are in trouble, in St. Louis County, Missouri, and elsewhere, says co-author Robert Criss, Ph.D., professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis.
The figure shows the dynamics of a slab-tear earthquake (top), compared with a shallow thrust earthquake (bottom). The slab-tearing event typically doesn’t feature an accompanying tsunami.Seismologists at Washington University in St. Louis and their colleagues in Australia, Japan and Tonga have determined why a large earthquake in Tonga did not cause a large tsunami. A tsunami warning was issued around the Pacific Rim following the magnitude 8.0 earthquake on May 3, 2006, but the resulting tsunami was very minor and caused no damage.
In dating — as in business — you don’t want to be looking for a date when you’re desperate; you want to find one before you become desperate. Business professors at Washington University in St. Louis have found that how firms manage their research and development (R&D) pipelines could mean the difference between always having products in the works and searching desperately for new goods. More…
When the Conrad Black trial gets under way in March, the argument will be similar to the case against Tyco’s Dennis Kozlowski rather than the cases against Ken Lay or Bernard Ebbers, says Samuel W. Buell, J.D., associate professor of law at Washington University in St. Louis. “This is a case about whether an executive looted his own company, not whether he committed accounting fraud,” says Buell, a former Enron prosecutor. “In a looting case, the battle is often over the testimony and credibility of the members of the board of directors.” More…
Companies maintain a delicate balance when it comes to selling product lines that contain varying degrees of quality. Premium products need to be positioned beyond the claim of “higher quality” alone. A high-end product needs to compare favorably with its direct competitors, but it can’t appear too similar to other items in the firm’s product line. Part of the solution, according to a marketing professor at the Olin School of Business at Washington University in St. Louis is for firms to use an advertising strategy that contains image-oriented appeals to differentiate its premium products from the rest. More…
Corporate governance has been in the forefront of public debate lately, thanks to such high-profile events as options backdating, the awarding of inflated CEO compensation packages and efforts to augment shareholder empowerment. These larger scandals have implications that reach beyond the boardroom into every aspect of an enterprise. Ultimately, the transgressions take their toll on all of society, according to Stuart Greenbaum, former dean of the business school at Washington University in St. Louis.