Arts & Sciences

Early in September, the X-Calibur mission, preparing for launch at the Columbia Scientific Balloon Facility in Fort Sumner, N.M., put its pointing system through its paces to make sure all of its parts were working in programmed harmony.

“Foundations of Diversity at Washington University and Throughout Academia” will be the focus of a campus conference Sept. 12 in honor of Robert L. Williams II, PhD, professor emeritus of psychology and of African and African-American studies at Washington University in St. Louis.

In the 1970s and ’80s, the St. Louis band Tracer was one of the area’s premiere exponents of fusion-style jazz. On Thursday, Sept. 11, the re-formed Tracer will launch Jazz at Holmes Series. The annual fall series also will include tributes to John Coltrane, Charles Mingus and Gaslight Square.

John G. Baugh, PhD, the Margaret Bush Wilson Professor in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, is one of 10 distinguished scholars to be honored as 2015 fellows of the Linguistic Society of America.   

It can be plain or embroidered, a single hue or richly patterned, a bold statement or a humble custom. In “Unveiled,” Chicago-based playwright Rohina Malik explores the significance of the traditional Muslim hijab through the lives of five contemporary women who choose to wear it for the Edison Ovations Series at Washington University Saturday, Sept. 27.

Ralph S. Quatrano, PhD, dean of the School of Engineering & Applied Science, has announced that he will step down as dean at the end of the academic year, June 30, 2015. After a yearlong sabbatical beginning in July 2015, Quatrano will resume his position as the Spencer T. Olin Professor of Biology in Arts & Sciences.

Jean Sutherland Boggs, the first woman appointed to full professorship in the Department of Art History and Archaeology in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, died Friday, Aug. 22, 2014. She was 92.

Rebecca Treiman, PhD, the Burke & Elizabeth High Baker Professor of Child Developmental Psychology in Arts & Sciences, received the 2014 Society for the Scientific Study of Reading’s Distinguished Scientific Contributions Award, given every two years for outstanding contributions to the field.

Washington University’s Global Health Center selected five ​WUSTL students for its inaugural summer research program, which paired students with faculty mentors to explore issues such as malnutrition, maternal health and access to health care. Pictured is program participant Laura Bliss, a second-year medical student.

In a few days, a balloon-borne telescope sensitive to the polarization of high-energy “hard” X rays will ascend to the edge of the atmosphere above Fort Sumner, N.M., to stare fixedly at black holes and other exotic astronomical objects. It will be carried aloft by a stratospheric balloon that will expand to a sphere large enough to hold a 747 jetliner the float height of 120,000 feet, three times the height at which commercial aircraft fly and on the edge of Earth’s atmosphere. Launching the balloon is not child’s play.