School of Medicine

The School of Medicine’s Samuel Achilefu and colleagues are working to develop a novel cancer therapy that uses light against tumors that have spread.

Will Ross, MD, knows he should be dead. Instead, he achieved success despite the odds. He has designed a program to expose first-year students at the School of Medicine to blighted St. Louis neighborhoods — similar to those in which he grew up. His experiences shaped the nephrologist’s work as a physician and professor.

Using cells from children diagnosed with primary ciliary dyskinesia, a genetic lung disease, School of Medicine researchers have figured out how mutations disrupt the clearing of the airways.

The Institute for Public Health at Washington University in St. Louis will launch the regional St. Louis Area Hospital-Based Violence Intervention Program, which will aim to promote positive alternatives to violence, thanks to a $1.6 million grant from Missouri Foundation for Health.

Leonard Jarett, MD, the first director of the Division of Laboratory Medicine in the departments of medicine and pathology at the School of Medicine, died Jan. 13 in Pennsylvania, where he lived. He was 81.

John E. Majors, professor emeritus of biochemistry and molecular biophysics at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, died Jan. 10, 2018, of a heart attack. He was 69.

A long-term study of adult children of Alzheimer’s patients — led by the School of Medicine — aims to define who is likely to develop the disease and when, and to establish a timeline for how quickly the disease will progress.

People who survive brain infection with West Nile virus can have neurological problems long after the virus is gone. A new study in mice suggests unresolved inflammation may be the reason.

Misty Good, MD, assistant professor of pediatrics at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, has been named to the Scientific Advisory Council of the Necrotizing Enterocolitis (NEC) Society. The nonprofit aims to reduce cases of NEC, a potentially fatal intestinal disease in premature newborns.

David C. Van Essen, the Alumni Endowed Professor of Neuroscience at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, has received the 2017 Glass Brain Award from the Organization of Human Brain Mapping. The award recognizes lifetime achievement in using neuroimaging to advance understanding of the brain.