Arts & Sciences

Washington University in St. Louis is establishing a scholarly and educational center that will focus on the role of religion in politics in the United States, according to Chancellor Mark S. Wrighton. “The establishment of the John C. Danforth Center on Religion & Politics reflects the legacy of Jack Danforth and his belief in the importance of a civil discourse that treats differences with respect,” Wrighton said. The creation of the center, which includes the recruitment of five new faculty members with endowed professorships, is being made possible by a $30 million endowment gift from the St. Louis-based Danforth Foundation. It is believed to be the largest gift of its kind made to a university to fund such an academic center.

Washington University Chancellor Mark S. Wrighton and former Sen. John C. Danforth, chairman of the Danforth Foundation, will hold a 3 p.m. media briefing Wednesday, Dec. 16, in WUSTL’s Alumni House to discuss a major announcement focused on religion and politics that they are making earlier in the day at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C.

Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais was one of the great self-made men of 18th-century Europe. Trained as a watchmaker, he rose through the ranks of French nobility to become a successful inventor, businessman, publisher and diplomat, even supplying weapons and provisions to American revolutionaries. Yet Beaumarchais probably is best remembered for his semi-autobiographical Figaro plays, two […]

An international group of anthropologists offers a new theory about the diffusion of maize to the Southwestern United States and the impact it had. Published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the study, co-authored by Gayle Fritz, Ph.D., professor of anthropology in Arts & Sciences, and colleagues, suggests that maize was passed from group to group of Southwestern hunter-gatherers. These people took advantage of improved moisture conditions by integrating a storable and potentially high-yielding crop into their broad-spectrum subsistence strategy.

Nearly 100 years after the discovery of cosmic rays, a new type of gamma-ray telescope is finally allowing physicists to make images of cosmic-ray nurseries.

Human guinea pigs do their homework before volunteering for high-paying clinical trials. New research shows that people equate large payments for participation in medical research with increased levels of risk. And when they perceive studies to be risky, potential participants spend more time learning about the risks and nature of the study. Findings published this month in Social Science and Medicine, suggest there is a “mismatch” between current research guidelines for setting compensation levels and the assumptions participants make about the levels of pay and risk.

Richard M. Hazelton, Ph.D., professor emeritus of English in Arts & Sciences, died Friday, Nov. 13, 2009, of pneumonia at Missouri Baptist Hospital in St. Louis. He was 91.

Washington University’s Department of Music in Arts & Sciences will present its annual sing-along of George Frideric Handel’s oratorio Messiah at 3 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 6, in Graham Chapel. John Stewart, director of vocal activities, directs the program.

Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais (1732-99) was one of the great self-made men of 18th century Europe, a watchmaker who rose through the ranks of French nobility. Yet Beaumarchais is probably best remembered for his semi-autobiographical Figaro plays, two of which — The Marriage of Figaro (1778) and The Barber of Seville (1773) — would form the basis for celebrated operas by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-91) and Gioacchino Rossini (1792-1868), respectively.

A group at Washington University recently tackled a simple circuit in the visual processing area of a chicken’s brain that detects motion in its field of view — with surprising results.