Arts & Sciences

Bronwen Konecky, assistant professor of earth and planetary sciences in Arts & Sciences, is among 22 early-career scientists and engineers across the United States honored Oct. 15 as a 2019 Packard Fellow.

A memorial service is planned Nov. 18 at Washington University in St. Louis for Harold L. Levin, professor emeritus of earth and planetary sciences in Arts & Sciences, who died July 16, 2019, in St. Louis. He was 90.

Himadri B. Pakrasi, professor of biology in Arts & Sciences and director of InCEES, was recently awarded a $1.2-million grant for a collaborative study of cyanobacteria with the ultimate purpose of producing nitrogen-fixing crop plants.

Stan Braude, professor of practice in biology, is a talented teacher who instills in his students the skills they need to prepare for life outside of Washington University. Take it from his students, though — because if you ask him, he will give all the credit to Joe (his St. Bernard).

New research from Washington University in St. Louis confirms that the brain tunes itself to a point where it is as excitable as it can be without tipping into disorder, similar to a phase transition. The new research from Keith Hengen, assistant professor of biology in Arts & Sciences, is published Oct. 7 in the journal Neuron.

New research from Washington University in St. Louis realizes one of the first parity time-symmetric quantum systems, allowing scientists to observe how that symmetry — and the breaking of it — leads to previously unexplored phenomena. These and future PT symmetry experiments have potential applications to quantum computing. The work from the laboratory of Kater Murch, associate professor of physics in Arts & Sciences, is published Oct. 7 in the journal Nature Physics.

Joseph Jez, Howard Hughes Medical Institute Professor and chair of biology in Arts & Sciences, along with two former researchers in his laboratory, P.A. Rea and R.E. Cahoon, was awarded a U.S. patent for engineered plants that could help detoxify, or remediate, soils contaminated with heavy metals.

The university’s Center for the Humanities in Arts & Sciences, along with other academic partners, received funding from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation for an Africa fellowship program, aimed at enhancing research capacity for early-career humanities scholars. The application deadline is Nov. 11.

Faced with extreme weather events and unprecedented environmental change, animals and plants are scrambling to catch up — with mixed results. A new model developed by Carlos Botero, assistant professor of biology in Arts & Sciences, helps to predict the types of changes that could drive a given species to extinction.

Learn about how poet Paul Tran and more than a dozen artists, illustrators and designers are preparing for the inauguration of Andrew D. Martin as 15th chancellor of Washington University in St. Louis.