Arts & Sciences

Raymond Arvidson, the James S. McDonnell Distinguished University Professor Emeritus in Arts & Sciences, has been awarded an Outstanding Public Leadership Medal from NASA. The honor — his fourth service medal from the space agency — marks the culmination of a storied career in planetary exploration that goes back to the first Viking Mars landers in the 1970s.

For the first time, a study by researchers including biologist Susanne Renner in Arts & Sciences helps solve the mystery of the timing of falling leaves in autumn by revealing the pivotal role of the summer solstice.

A sense of purpose in life — whether it’s a high-minded quest to make a difference or a simple hobby with personal meaning — can offer potent protection against loneliness, according to research from Patrick Hill in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis.

Washington University in St. Louis undergraduate student Keona Dordor and St. Louis novelist Lyndsey Ellis are the inaugural recipients of the Heartland Journalism Fellowships.

Researchers at Washington University in St. Louis found the first abiotic pathway for RNA hydrolysis in iron-rich soils and sediments. Understanding how RNA breaks down under given conditions is critical to harnessing the molecule for use in emerging technologies.

Roger Michaelides, an assistant professor of earth and planetary sciences in Arts & Sciences, is co-investigator of a new NOAA-funded project that aims to improve the warning systems for flash floods that often threaten areas recently denuded by fire.

Barbara A. Schaal, the Mary-Dell Chilton Distinguished Professor in the Department of Biology in Arts & Sciences, was elected a member of the American Philosophical Society in May. Schaal was among the first scientists to use molecular biology-based approaches to understand evolutionary processes in plants.

Biologist Matthew Austin in Arts & Sciences published a study in the American Journal of Botany that describes changes to the flowering time and other important life cycle events in Leavenworthia species, a group of small flowering plants found in glades in Missouri.

Jewish books stolen by Nazis during World War II are returned to Prague — by way of Washington University Libraries.

As a biology faculty member, Professor Emerita Ursula Goodenough invited non-science majors to understand and reflect on the history of life on Earth. The second edition of her book, The Sacred Depths of Nature: How Life Has Emerged and Evolved, brings the wondrous saga to a new audience.