Arts & Sciences

Photo by David KilperAcclaimed conductor Leonard Slatkin — music director of the National Symphony Orchestra in Washington, D.C., and conductor laureate of the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra — will return to St. Louis as guest conductor for WUSTL’s “Piano Extravaganza” at 7 p.m. Oct. 28. Presented by the Department of Music in Arts & Sciences, “Piano Extravaganza” will mark the formal opening of the University’s newly renovated 560 Music Center, located at 560 Trinity Ave. in University City.

Poet and author Susan Wheeler, the visiting Fannie Hurst Professor of Creative Literature in Washington University’s Writing Program in Arts & Sciences, will read from her work Thursday, Oct. 25, and speak on the craft of poetry Tuesday, Oct. 30. Wheeler is the author of four poetry collections – Bag ‘o’ Diamonds (1993), Smokes (1998), Source Codes (2001) and Ledger (2005) – as well as a novel, Record Palace (2005).

Acclaimed conductor Leonard Slatkin — music director of the National Symphony Orchestra in Washington, D.C., and conductor laureate of the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra — will return to St. Louis as guest conductor for Washington University’s “Piano Extravaganza” at 7 p.m. Oct. 28. Presented by the Department of Music in Arts & Sciences, “Piano Extravaganza” will mark the formal opening of the University’s newly renovated 560 Music Center, located at 560 Trinity Ave. in University City. The concert will feature performances by more than a dozen student, faculty and alumni pianists, including Seth Carlin, professor of music in Arts & Sciences, and Hugh Macdonald, Ph.D., the Avis H. Blewett Professor of Music in Arts & Sciences.

WUSTL senior Ruth Poland and Jonathan Chase, Ph.D., associate professor of biology and director of WUSTL’s Tyson Research Center, check species out in one of Tyson’s ponds.An ecologist at Washington University in St. Louis has discovered that after ponds dry up through drought in a region, when they revive, the community of species in each pond tends to be very similar to one another in species composition.

Photo by David KilperThat clover necklace you make for your child could be a ring of poison. That’s because some clovers have evolved genes that help the plant produce cyanide — to protect itself against herbivores such as snails, slugs and voles. Kenneth Olsen, Ph.D., assistant professor of biology in Arts & Sciences, is looking at the genetics of a wide variety of white clover plants to determine why some plants do and some plants don’t make cyanide. Ecology and geography play important roles.

Is that clover necklace you make for your child poison? It could be. Kenneth Olsen, Ph.D., Washington University assistant professor of biology in Arts & Sciences, is looking at the genetics of a wide variety of white clover plants to determine why some plants do and some plants don’t make cyanide. Ecology and geography play important roles.

Soprano Jennifer Jakob will perform an intimate Liederabend for the Department of Music in Arts & Sciences. Literally translated as “evening of song,” Liederabend is a German term referring to a recital given by a singer and pianist, particularly of works by 19th-century Austrian or German composers. The program will include songs by Hugo Wolf, Johannes Brahms, Franz Schubert, Robert Schumann and Richard Strauss.

On Wednesday, Oct. 17, the documentary “Thin” will be shown at 7 p.m. in McDonnell Hall, Room 162, followed by a panel discussion with health professionals. The film is a comprehensive and honest profile of four women struggling with their affliction at an eating disorders treatment center.

Marxism in China, taboo images in Tibet and war, sex work and memory in 20th-century Japan will be among topics discussed as WUSTL welcomes the 56th annual Midwest Conference on Asian Affairs to the Danforth Campus Oct. 19-21. The conference is sponsored by the East Asian Studies Program in Arts & Sciences.

Photo by David KilperLarry A.Taber, Ph.D., (left) the Dennis and Barbara Kessler Professor of Biomedical Engineering, and Philip Bayly, Ph.D., the Hughes Professor of Mechanical Engineering, employ a microindentation device to measure the mechanical properties of embryonic hearts and brains. The researchers are examining mechanical and developmental processes that occur in the folding of the brain’s surface, or cortex, which gives the higher mammalian brain more surface area (and more intellectual capacity) than a brain of comparable volume with a smooth surface.