Three WUSTL biologists earn national honors

DBBS Faculty Members Tuan-hua David Ho & Ralph Quatrano, along with DBBS graduate student Ashley Galant recognized by American Society of Plant Biologists

Three Washington University in St. Louis scientists were honored this year by the American Society of Plant Biologists (ASPB), two for sustained achievement in their careers, and the third for a promising beginning.

Tuan-hua David Ho, PhD, professor of biology in Arts & Sciences, was elected president of the American Society of Plant Biologists (ASPB) for 2009-10. The ASPB, with 5,000 members, is one of the largest and most influential plant biology societies in the world.

Founded in 1924, its mission is to encourage and publish research in plant biology and to promote the interests of plant scientists. The ASPB publishes the highly cited and respected journals Plant Physiology and The Plant Cell.

Ralph S. Quatrano, PhD, the Spencer T. Olin Professor of Biology in Arts & Sciences and dean designate of the School of Engineering & Applied Science, won the Adolph E. Gude, Jr. Award, given every third year for outstanding service to the science of plant biology.

Ashley Galant, a graduate student in the lab of Joseph M. Jez, PhD, assistant professor of biology in Arts & Sciences, was awarded the Pioneer Hi-Bred graduate student fellowship. The fellowship recognizes innovative graduate research in areas of plant biology that relate to important commodity crops.....

Three WUSTL biologists earn national honors | Newsroom | Washington University in St. Louis

Stuart Kornfeld receives prestigious Kober Medal

Stuart A. Kornfeld, MD, the David C. and Betty Farrell Professor of Medicine, has received one of the highest awards in academic medicine, the 2010 George M. Kober Medal, from the Association of American Physicians.

Kornfeld was presented the award on April 23 during the association's annual meeting in Chicago.

"The Kober Medal has always had a special meaning to me because of the extraordinary achievements of its previous recipients," Kornfeld says. "I am deeply honored to have been selected."...

Kornfeld receives prestigious Kober Medal | Newsroom | Washington University in St. Louis

Alzheimer’s-like changes affect brains of elderly long before symptoms appear

Older adults with evidence of amyloid in the brain but no clinical symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease have structures in the brain that don’t communicate readily with each other, according to researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.

The findings, published in Biological Psychiatry, may be yet another indicator that Alzheimer’s damage to the brain begins to occur long before there are clinical symptoms of the disease.

Using brain-mapping techniques, first author Yvette I. Sheline, MD, and colleagues found that key brain structures don’t connect as efficiently in brains where positron emission tomography (PET) scans revealed the abnormal presence of the amyloid protein...

Alzheimer’s-like changes affect brains of elderly long before symptoms appear | Newsroom | Washington University in St. Louis

Alison Goate appointed Director of Hope Center for Neurological Disorders

Goate appointed director of Hope Center for Neurological Disorders | Newsroom | Washington University in St. Louis

Drs. Alan Schwartz and Randall Bateman, members of DBBS, to be honored by Academy of Science of St. Louis

Three medical school faculty to be honored by Academy of Science of St. Louis | Newsroom | Washington University in St. Louis

Daniel Link, DBBS faculty member recognized as Outstanding Mentor

Outstanding mentoring recognized Newsroom Washington University in St. Louis

Following his instincts: Sleckman's intuition pays off in teaching, research

Barry Sleckman, MD, PhD, was a busy young entrepreneur and disaffected commuter college student when his life began taking a sudden series of unexpected turns in the late 1970s. One weekend, a close friend seeking a job with the state police urged Sleckman, now the Conan Professor and director of Laboratory and Genomic Medicine at Washington University School of Medicine, to come to the civil service exam with him to boost his morale and ease his worries. Sleckman agreed to do it, but when they arrived at the exam, Sleckman found out the only way he could go in was if he took the exam, too.

"I passed the test, the medical and physical fitness exams, the psychiatric and background checks, and, three months later, they called me back and said, ‘Congratulations, you're a member of the 95th New Jersey State Police Academy,’" he says.

Sleckman took a look at the golf-club repair business he founded at age 12 and ran from his parents' basement (with three employees) and at the busy work in college that kept cluttering up his schedule and decided that perhaps destiny was calling.

He knew he was mistaken before a year had passed. But his eight-month stint in the state police left him fascinated by the medical work he'd seen paramedics perform and wondering if he could become a doctor....

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