School of Medicine

Three WUSTL doctoral candidates were inducted into the Edward A. Bouchet Graduate Honor Society at the annual Bouchet Conference on Diversity in Graduate Education April 19-20 at Yale University. The Bouchet Society, named for the first African American to earn a doctorate in the United States, recognizes outstanding scholarly achievement and promotes diversity and excellence in doctoral education and the professoriate.

WUSTL neurologist John C. Morris, MD, has received the Alzheimer’s Association’s Medical and Scientific Award for 2013.

The 15th Annual Komen St. Louis Race for the Cure in downtown St. Louis is June 15. Since 1998, when Komen St. Louis Race for the Cure began, Komen has awarded about $28 million for outreach, education, screening and research programs at Washington University Medical Center.

The International Center for Advanced Renewable Energy and Sustainability (I-CARES) has announced the award winners for its 2013 Call for Proposals. This year, special emphasis was placed on projects related to climate change.

School of Medicine researchers have shown that several markers for presymptomatic Alzheimer’s disease identified in recent years are accurate predictors of Alzheimer’s years before symptoms develop. Catherine Roe, PhD, says researchers found no differences in the accuracy of the biomarkers.

Erin Sanborn, a doctoral student in the School of Medicine’s Program in Occupational Therapy, is the recipient of the 2013 Women in Science Rosalind Kornfeld Leadership Award given by the Academic Women’s Network at the university.

William H. Daughaday, MD, a leading diabetes researcher, world authority on growth hormone, and the former director of the metabolism division at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, died after a long illness Friday, May 3, 2013, in Milwaukee. He was 95.

Burton E. Sobel, MD, internationally known leader in cardiovascular medicine, prolific scientist and former longtime director of the Cardiovascular Division at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, died Friday, May 3, 2013, at his home in Vermont, after a long illness. He was 75.

Many medical conditions destroy nerve axons, the long wires that transmit signals to other parts of the body. Now, researchers have found a way the body can remove injured axons, identifying a potential target for new drugs that could prevent the inappropriate loss of axons and maintain nerve function.

Washington University alumnus Mark Wronkiewicz (BS ’12) developed BrainCopter, one of the first brain-controlled applications for the iPad, while studying biomedical engineering at the university. His mentor, the School of Medicine’s Eric Leuthardt, MD, tries the application, which challenges players to use their thoughts to manipulate a flying brain icon past obstacles.