School of Medicine

A biomarker in newborns may signal autism spectrum disorder months or even years before troubling symptoms develop and such diagnoses typically are made. Researchers at Washington University School of Medicine and Stanford University found that some newborns had very low levels of a neuropeptide years before their diagnoses with autism spectrum disorder.

Washington University in St. Louis has stepped up to help doctors and nurses who need somewhere to stay amid their intense work caring for the sick during the COVID-19 pandemic, providing rooms and meals at the Knight Center and the Lofts apartments.

The COVID-19 WashU/BJC Maker Task Force has emerged as a central hub for St. Louis-area makers to help people in health-care settings stay safe as they care for patients during the COVID-19 pandemic. The multidisciplinary group is working to develop everything from isolation gowns to ventilator replacement parts.

Aerosol research at the McKelvey School of Engineering at Washington University in St. Louis is working at breakneck speed to understand the novel coronavirus and its effects at scales ranging from ecosystems to virus particles suspended in droplets.

Researchers at Washington University School of Medicine have transformed stem cells into insulin-producing cells. They used the CRISPR gene-editing tool to correct a defect that caused a form of diabetes, and implanted the cells into mice to reverse diabetes in the animals.

Ann M. Gronowski, in the Department of Pathology and Immunology at Washington University School of Medicine, has received an award from the American Association for Clinical Chemistry.

COVID-19 has touched seemingly every aspect of life, and that includes laboratory work on the Medical and Danforth campuses. Most labs have responded by taking steps to temporarily shut down bench work and take that work online, while others have shifted their focus to the coronavirus.

COVID-19 survivors are needed to donate blood plasma. Infectious diseases physicians at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have developed an expanded access program to give blood plasma from COVID-19 survivors to critically ill patients.

Washington University School of Medicine is launching a clinical trial for patients hospitalized with COVID-19 at Barnes-Jewish Hospital. The study will investigate whether two different antimalarial drugs, including hydroxychloroquine, alone or in combination with a common antibiotic is effective in treating COVID-19 patients.

Elizabeth M. Brunt, MD, professor emerita of pathology and immunology at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, has received a Lifetime Achievement Award for Contributions to Liver Pathology from the Hans Popper Hepatopathology Society.