School of Medicine

Soon after a novel coronavirus first appeared, School of Medicine researchers, doctors and staff began preparing for a possible outbreak. Infectious disease physicians started planning how to respond, and researchers got to work finding drugs or vaccines for COVID-19.

A mouse study from Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis suggests a type of immune cell may play a surprising role in the structure and rhythm of the heart.

The School of Medicine’s Healthy Work Center facilitates research to promote the health of working-age people by focusing on topics such as diet and exercise, cancer prevention and injury avoidance. It’s a rebooted version of the Occupational Safety and Health Research Lab.

Members of the School of Medicine lab of Matthew Ciorba, MD, have identified a way to make radiation therapy for colorectal cancer more effective by inhibiting a protein found in cancer cells in the gut.

Andrew J. Bierhals, MD, associate professor of radiology, has been named vice chair for quality and safety for the Mallinckrodt Institute of Radiology (MIR) at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. 

A drug strategy aimed at revving up the immune system and boosting a type of immune cell known as natural killer cells appears, at least in mice, to effectively treat the skin condition eczema. A team led by the School of Medicine’s Brian S. Kim, MD, is behind the strategy.

Kathy Kniepmann, at the School of Medicine, is an inquisitive, compassionate faculty member who inspires prospective and current students in the Program in Occupational Therapy. She discusses her life, her career and her lifelong interest in learning.

Jeffrey R. Millman and his team at the Washington University School of Medicine produced human insulin-secreting beta cells from stem cells using a new efficient technique. The cells were able to rapidly cure diabetes in mice for at least nine months.

Mary Klingensmith, MD, the Mary Culver Distinguished Professor and vice chair for education in the Department of Surgery at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, has been named a vice president of the American Board of Surgery.

Researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have found that the strain of Zika that circulated in Brazil during the microcephaly epidemic that began in 2015 was particularly damaging to the developing brain.