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Metabolomics just got smaller

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Not long ago, scientists placed wagers on the number of genes in the human genome. Some bets ranged upward of 100,000 genes being present. Once the human genome sequence was completed, a project led in part by the McDonnell Genome Institute at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, even the lowest guess of 25,947 proved to be above the true number.

Now, nearly 15 years later, scientists at Washington University are seeing a reminiscent trend in the newest type of big data known as metabolomics. They estimate that the number of metabolites present in a data set could be 90 percent smaller than previously estimated.

The study was published online Sept. 15 in Analytical Chemistry.

Like its genomic predecessor, metabolomics seeks to profile all of the metabolites present in a sample. Unlike genes, however, metabolites are not made from common building blocks and are much more chemically diverse. Familiar metabolites include molecules such as glucose and cholesterol, many of which are a product of diet. Thus, trying to pin down the exact number of metabolites in humans has been a tough challenge. Because of its strong nutritional dependence, some scientists have argued that it’s not even the relevant question to be asking.

There has been interest in measuring metabolites for nearly as long as there has been interest in human health. Analysis of glucose in diabetes probably dates back centuries. Handfuls of other metabolites have been used to diagnose diseases broadly referred to as “inborn errors of metabolism” since the 1960s. Metabolomics tries to measure all of these metabolites, and more. The question is: How many more are there?

The scene for metabolomics was set with the advent of sophisticated devices called mass spectrometers. These instruments are like tiny scales that can measure the weights of molecules, such as sugars. By using databases and computational algorithms, scientists can convert measured weights into compound names, like glucose.

A decade ago, when metabolomics started to become mainstream, scientists were surprised to discover that the number of signals in a typical metabolomics experiment greatly exceeds the number of known metabolites in biochemistry textbooks. Said Gary Patti, associate professor of chemistry in Arts & Sciences and senior author of the study: “Of course, the knee-jerk reaction is to assume that most of the signals that do not return matches in databases correspond to unknown metabolites that have never been reported before.”

The implications of such an assumption are major: tens of thousands of metabolites remain to be discovered, an order of magnitude more than what is included on your common wall chart of comprehensive metabolism (see image below).

Metabolism is complicated. The good news is that it might not be as complicated as previously thought. New research from scientists at Washington University supports a picture more like the one on the right. (Image: Gary Patti lab)

“It is routine to detect tens of thousands of signals in metabolomics, but only 1,000 to 2,000 have been identified in any experiment to date,” said Nathaniel Mahieu, a postdoctoral fellow in Patti’s lab, who led the study.

Said Patti: “The million dollar question is: How many metabolites do all of these metabolomic signals actually correspond to?”

Mahieu and Patti, who was announced last week as an awardee of an eight-year, $5.85 million inaugural grant in environmental health from the National Institutes of Health, developed new experimental and computational approaches to interrogate metabolomics data sets. They arrived at a striking conclusion. They found that the actual number of metabolites in a typical metabolomics analysis may be one-tenth as large as previously suggested, with much of the data coming from “noise.” Thousands of signals arise from contamination, artifacts, and something called “degeneracy” — say, when one metabolite shows up as many different signals. The research team found that some metabolites show up as more than 150 signals.

“It turns out that more than 90 percent of the signals we see in E. coli data are essentially noise,” Mahieu said. “This greatly reduces the number of unknown metabolites that we thought we were detecting.”

“I think this is sort of a wake-up call, a reality check if you will, on what metabolomics suggests about the size of the metabolome,” Patti said. “I believe it is a good thing. It means we’re a lot closer to understanding metabolism than we probably thought we were.”

Postdoctoral fellow Nathaniel Mahieu (left) and Gary Patti, a recent recipient of an eight-year NIH grant, developed approaches revealing that only one-tenth of the signals in a metabolomics experiment correspond to unique metabolites. (Photo: James Byard/Washington University)

As for the next step, Patti’s lab intends to extend their techniques to human samples.

“The ultimate goal is to do analogous experiments for humans,” Patti said. “Our work here is an important step forward.”

So what do all of these noise signals mean to other scientists performing metabolomics? The Patti lab has started curating what they term “reference data sets” in a database called creDBle (creDBle.wustl.edu). They hope that it will facilitate experiments for other scientists performing metabolomics.

“The way metabolomics is currently performed is terribly inefficient. We waste a lot of time trying to interpret signals that provide minimal biological insight,” Mahieu said. “We hope that these reference data sets in creDBle will help prevent scientists from having to identify the same noise signals over and over again now that we have annotated them.”


Funding came via the National Institutes of Health grants R01 ES022181 and R21 CA191097, as well as the Pew Scholars Program in the Biomedical Sciences.

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A singer’s opera

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The Vatican echoes with chants. Rodrigo Borgia is pope.

Steps away, and five centuries later, a tour guide regales visitors with tales of the infamous Borgia clan. Rodrigo, the family patriarch, boasts of their strength. Eldest son Cesare, ensconced within the College of Cardinals, longs for an army. Daughter Lucrezia, alleged poisoner of the family’s enemies, steps free from a painting and into a life of murder and betrayal.

In “Borgia Infami,” St. Louis composer Harold Blumenfeld (1923-2014) combines historical fact and dramatic legend to investigate the nature of power and how secrets echo across the generations.

On Saturday and Sunday, Sept. 30 and Oct. 1, Winter Opera Saint Louis and the Department of Music in Arts & Sciences will present the world premiere of Blumenfeld’s two-act opera in Edison Theatre at Washington University in St. Louis.

A singer’s opera

Harold Blumenfeld (Photo: Washington University Archives)

Written for nine lead singers, choruses and orchestra, “Borgia Infami” depicts the lives, loves and crimes of the brilliant yet corrupt Borgias, perhaps the most notorious family of the Italian Renaissance.

The story opens in 1492 with Rodrigo’s coronation as Pope Alexander VI. But the narrative also jumps forward and backward in time. The Vatican tour guide is magically transformed into Narciso, a poor officer of noble birth who falls under Lucrezia’s spell. Rodrigo feuds with the pious monk Savonarola. Cesare flies to the battlefield, his ruthless trajectory immortalized in the writings of Machiavelli.

Blumenfeld, a professor emeritus of music in Arts & Sciences, who taught at Washington University for nearly 40 years, began “Borgia Infami” in 1998, while in residence at the Bogliasco Foundation’s Centro Studi Ligure, near Genoa, Italy. The opera is based primarily on two sources: “The Incredible Borgias” (1928) by German novelist Klabund (aka Alfred Henschke) and Victor Hugo’s “Lucrèce Borgia” (1833). In 2003, the New York City Opera performed excerpts as part of its annual VOX showcase.

“Borgia Infami is a singers’ opera,” Blumenfeld said at the time. “Arias emerge, duets, trios, a sextet. There are scenes of violence and mayhem … scenes of impassioned filial love … street urchins and irreverent comic relief … and moments of transparent, wistful simplicity.

“In the opening score, a vast fresco of the coronation of Rodrigo Borgia as Pope comes alive, and the opera is launched.”

Cast & Crew

Scott Schoonover

“Borgia Infami” was Blumenfeld’s final collaboration with librettist Charles Kondek. The pair also worked together on the farcical ensemble opera “Fourscore: An Opera of Opposites” (1986), the opera-bagatelle “Breakfast Waltzes” (1991), and the full-length “Seasons in Hell” (1996), based on the life of poet Arthur Rimbaud.

“Borgia Infami” is conducted by Scott Schoonover, founder and artistic director of St. Louis’ acclaimed Union Avenue Opera. Gina Galati, founder of Winter Opera Saint Louis, directs.

The cast is led by baritone Jacob Lassetter as Rodrigo, mezzo-soprano Lindsey Anderson as Lucrezia and bass Andrew Potter as Cesare. Tenors John Kaneklides and Anthony Heinemann play Narcisio and Savonarola.

Nacisio’s friends — Andrea, Ascanio, Jeppo, Oloferno — are played by Zachary Devin, Joel Rogier, Jason Mallory and Robert McNichols, Jr., respectively. Rounding out the cast are Karen Kanakis, Leann Schuering and Victoria Menke as a trio of tourists.

Costume designer is JC Krajicek. Sets and lights are by Scott Loebl and Natali Arco. Darwin Aquino is chorus master. Robert Klein is stage manager. Pianist is Gail Hintz. Laura Skroska is property master. Joseph Novak and Sarah Browdy are technical director and orchestra personnel manager.

Tickets

“Borgia Infami” begins at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 30; and at 3 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 1. Performances take place in Edison Theatre, located in Mallinckrodt Center, 6465 Forsyth Blvd. Tickets are $25, or $20 for seniors and Washington University faculty and staff; $10 for students and children; and free for Washington University students.

Tickets are available through the Edison Theatre Box Office. For more information, call 314-935-6543.

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Jazz at Holmes resumes Sept. 21

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Legendary saxophonist Freddie Washington, a leader on the St. Louis jazz scene since the 1960s, will help to kick-start Washington University in St. Louis’ fall Jazz at Holmes Series by performing a free concert of modern jazz from 8-10 p.m.  Thursday, Sept. 21, in Ridgley Hall’s Holmes Lounge.

In all, Jazz at Holmes will present 10 performances this fall by locally and nationally known musicians.

Washington began playing professionally in the mid-1950s, while still a student at Sumner High School. After a stint in the U.S. Navy, he returned home and became a popular mainstay of the Gaslight Square clubs in the 1960s. Over the years, he has performed with noted musicians such as Nat Adderley, Freddie Hubbard and Emily Remler. His recordings include the critically acclaimed “Lilac, Vol. 1” (1997). He is scheduled to appear Sept. 21 with his quartet, Modern Jazz.

Jazz at Holmes will continue Sept. 28 with drummer Montez Coleman and guitarist Eric Slaughter, followed Oct. 5 by singer Kim Fuller and her band.

Cosentino

Other highlights will include: Italian guitarist Filippo Cosentino performing “Music of Italian Film Composers” Oct. 19; singers Scott Bryan and Rick Schuler performing “Voices of Freedom, Songs of Social Justice” Nov. 2; and the Arc of Light Ensemble, an all-star group of St. Louis jazz musicians, Nov. 16.

Jazz at Holmes

Jazz at Holmes presents free campus concerts in a relaxed, coffeehouse setting most Thursday evenings throughout the year.

All performances take place from 8-10 p.m. in Holmes Lounge. For more information, call 314-862-0874; email staylor@wustl.edu; visit ucollege.wustl.edu/jazz; or follow Jazz at Holmes on Facebook.

Jazz at Holmes is sponsored by Student Union, Congress of the South 40, Department of Music in Arts & Sciences, University College and Summer School, Campus Life, Danforth University Center and Event Management, Community Service Office, Office of Student Involvement and Leadership, Greek Life Office, Office of Residential Life, Office of the Vice Chancellor for Students and Office of the Provost.

Fall schedule

Sept. 21
Saxophonist Freddie Washington

Sept. 28
Drummer Montez Coleman and guitarist Eric Slaughter

Oct. 5
Jazz singer Kim Fuller and her band

Oct. 19
Guitarist Filippo Cosentino
With William Lenihan and the Sogni d’Alba string trio
“Music of Italian Film Composers”

Williams

Oct. 26
Guitarist William Lenihan, pianist Ptah Williams, drummer Steve Davis, violist Amy Greenhalgh and cellist Marcia Mann.
“Streams of Extremity II,” featuring improvised jazz works based on the music of Igor Stravinsky, Béla Bartók, Karlheinz Stockhausen and Miles Davis.

Nov. 2
Singers Scott Bryan and Rick Schuler
“Voices of Freedom, Songs of Social Justice”

Nov. 9
Singer Joe Mancuso

Mancuso

Nov. 16
Arc of Light Ensemble
Featuring saxophonist Paul DeMarinis, trumpeter Randy Holmes, and trombonist Wayne Coniglio

Nov. 30
Guitarist Vince Varvel and his quartet

Dec. 7
Holiday concert
Featuring St. Louis musicians and the Washington University Singers

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Inside the Hotchner Festival: Scott Greenberg

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Elliot is the worst best man ever. He tries to fall out of love with the bride but falls out of an airplane instead.

In “Raindropped,” Scott Greenberg, a senior in Arts & Sciences, explores the idea of tumbling from grace, both figuratively and literally. This weekend, “Raindropped” will receive its world premiere staged reading at Washington University in St. Louis as part of the annual A.E. Hotchner New Play Festival.

In this Q&A, Greenberg discusses “Raindropped” and the playwriting process.

Greenberg (Photo: Jerry Naunheim Jr./Washington University)

You’re an acting major and recently landed your first professional role. What drew you to theater?

I’ve always been a writer, but acting captured my heart when I was cast as Rocky in a high school production of “The Rocky Horror Picture Show.” I’d never acted, so starting with a raunchy musical was terrifying. But it also introduced me to a Scott I’d never met. It was otherworldly fun.

Tell us about “Raindropped.” What inspired you to write it?

“Raindropped” started as a question. Imagine you’re on an airplane with God. What do you ask?

I was so curious. I asked everyone I knew and got lots of insightful answers. But ultimately I decided on … nothing! I thought I’d be too afraid of knowing anything so huge and absolute. And so I wrote the scene: a man on an airplane with God.

Around the same time, two of my best friends graduated. They moved away, happily dating, to start a new life. And I was ecstatic for them but also torn up. Sure, we have phones and planes, but what happens when the people at our core accelerate away?

So what’s the play about?

The skinny is this: Elliot’s an exile, and trying to atone for a grave transgression. Now he’s best man at a destination wedding between two old friends, Liz and Beth.

But maybe he and Liz have history. And maybe he has a mysterious attraction to Liz’s sister. And maybe he’s running away from his dying brother, Charlie. And maybe, just maybe, the universe is doing everything in its power to help him stop messing up.

I want people to think about what they’re running from and where they’re running to. Is home your biological family? The family you make? Or is it something more spiritual? And how does where we’ve been haunt what we allow ourselves to believe?

Helen Fox performs. (Photo: Jerry Naunheim Jr./Washington University)

As a playwright, what do you learn from the workshopping process? How does it feel to hear your words aloud?

When I write, I hear the rhythms in my mind. But then other actors start reading it, and the rhythms can be so different. And that’s wonderful. You realize when the score is unclear, and when the actor is onto something better. It’s a living process.

Writing for the stage forces a kind of compression. You don’t have the same room for exposition that, say, a novel or serial television provides. How do you manage that challenge?

You have to straddle the line between artistic subtly and clarity. So many times, I’ve realized that something makes sense in my head — because I have all of the unwritten context — but confounds everyone else in the room!

As writers, we put so much of ourselves into things and then expect people to just understand. But it takes a lot more legwork. You have to make that translation from brain to page.

Nathan Lamp (left), Lucas Marschke, Fox and Hannah Dains rehearse. (Photo: Jerry Naunheim Jr./Washington University)

About the Hotchner Festival

The A.E. Hotchner New Play Festival begins at 7 p.m. Friday, Sept. 22, with junior Chisara Achilefu’s “Super Boy,” directed by Andrea Urice, teaching professor of drama in Arts & Sciences.

The festival continues at 2 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 23, with Danny Marshall’s “Desperate Times,” directed by Henry Schvey, professor of drama and of comparative literature, also in Arts & Sciences. The festival will conclude at 7 p.m. that evening with Greenberg’s “Raindropped,” directed by William Whitaker, professor of the practice in drama.

Sponsored by the Performing Arts Department in Arts & Sciences, the festival is named for alumnus A.E. Hotchner, who famously bested Tennessee Williams in a campus playwriting competition. The festival is coordinated by Carter W. Lewis, playwright-in-residence. Guest dramaturg is Richard J. Roberts, resident dramaturg for the Indiana Repertory Theatre.

All readings are free and open to the public and take place in The A.E. Hotchner Studio Theatre, located in Mallinckrodt Center, 6445 Forsyth Blvd. For more information, call 314-935-5858, visit pad.artsci.wustl.edu or follow on Facebook.

Natalie Thurman and Marschke practice. (Photo: Jerry Naunheim Jr./Washington University)

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McLeod Writing Prize winners announced

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This year’s winners of the Dean James E. McLeod Freshman Writing Prize were recognized at a ceremony Sept. 18.

The prize was created to award students in Arts & Sciences who engage in research that explores some aspect of race, gender or identity.

The winners, who are now sophomores, are Gabriella Ruskay-Kidd and Ella-Marie West, both honored for their work in Sowande Mustakeem’s course, “African-American Women’s History: Sexuality, Violence & the Love of Hip Hop.” Luka Cai Minglu, an international student from Singapore, won an honorable mention for her work in Wolfram Schmidgen’s course, “What is Justice?”

Learn more and read their winning essays on the Arts & Sciences site.

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Which came first: big brains or demanding environments?

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Given how proud we are of our big brains, it’s ironic that we haven’t yet figured out why we have them. One idea, called the cognitive buffer hypothesis, is that the evolution of large brains is driven by the adaptive benefits of being able to mount quick, flexible behavioral responses to frequent or unexpected environmental change.

It is difficult to test this idea on people because there is only one living species in the genus Homo. Birds, according to Carlos Botero, assistant professor of biology in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, are another matter. There are many species, they have a range of brain sizes and they live everywhere. In many ways, they are the ideal group for testing this hypothesis.

As a young scholar, Botero was able to show how mockingbirds that live in variable habitats have more elaborate songs. Since song complexity is a proxy for learning ability, this finding seemed to support the cognitive buffer hypothesis.

But, after a while, he began to think about alternative explanations for his results. The hypothesis requires that big brains improve survival, but Botero’s study didn’t show this. And it didn’t settle a crucial timing issue: Did large brains evolve in variable habitats, or did they evolve elsewhere and then make it easier to colonize harsh environments? However,  the mockingbird study didn’t look back in time.

So together with Trevor Fristoe, postdoctoral associate in biology at Washington University and Canadian biologist Andrew Iwaniuk of the University of Lethbridge, Botero decided to tease out the assumptions behind the cognitive buffer hypothesis and test each of them separately.

Their study, published Sept. 25 in Nature Ecology and Evolution, showed that large brains weren’t more likely to evolve in variable compared to stable habitats, so that part of the hypothesis wasn’t supported. But it also showed that brainier birds were better able to colonize seasonal, unpredictable places. So birds with big brains were able to move into a broader range of environments.

“The findings were pretty surprising,” Fristoe said. “In the first part of the study, we showed that a big brain really does give birds a survival advantage in variable environments. So the mechanism works. But that made it all the more puzzling when the second part of the study showed that big brains often evolved in stable — not in variable — habitats.”

What does size have to do with it?

Botero is the first to acknowledge that brain size is an imperfect measure of cognition, a term that itself has many definitions.

What the scientists looked at was not absolute brain size, but the difference between brain size and the statistically predicted brain size for the bird’s body size. “An ostrich seems to have a huge brain, but relative to its body size, it’s really not that impressive,” Botero said. “A raven is not much larger than a chicken, but its brain is proportionally much more massive.

“The correlation between relative brain size and cognitive ability is better for birds than for mammals,” Botero said. “Although relative brain size is a noisy metric, it’s still one of the better ways we have to measure brain-related differences among species at large taxonomic scales.

“This whole field is fraught with caveats.”

Nailing down the first assumption

Botero and Fristoe first tested the assumption that a bigger brain gave birds a survival advantage by analyzing the data gathered by the Breeding Bird Survey, a huge database of bird sightings that is used to monitor populations of North American birds.  Each year since 1966, volunteer birders have followed pre-established routes during peak breeding season, stopping for three minutes at designated points to count all the birds they can hear or see.

“We went through all the data for North America, all of the species for which we knew brain size, and came up with a metric for population stability, adjusting for other factors that can affect stability such as clutch size and whether or not the bird is migratory,” Botero said.

They characterized environmental conditions over the same period with data from ecoClimate, an open database of climatic simulations, and data from NASA Earth Observations.

“We showed that species with big brains maintain stable populations in environments where the temperature, precipitation or productivity change a lot, and species with smaller brains cope less well,” Botero said.

“So the mechanism people were proposing really does seem to work,” he said. “Big brains do improve survival when environmental conditions change frequently and unexpectedly.”

Nailing down the second assumption

The scientists were now ready to tackle the main issue. “The cognitive buffer hypothesis asserts brains became bigger because species were being exposed to more variable environments,” Botero said. “It makes sense, but is it true?”

For the hypothesis to be true, the variable conditions had to happen first, and that meant the scientists had to devise some way to reconstruct the characteristics of birds and environments which vanished long ago.

To do this, they looked for evolutionary correlations between transitions in brain size and the temperature and precipitation variability of species-specific habitats in a global phylogeny of birds (a diagram that represents the order in which species are thought to have evolved from a common ancestor).

“We found that big brains are equally likely to evolve in places that had variable conditions and places that had stable conditions. We don’t see any difference between the two,” Botero said. (See sidebars for examples.)

“But we found that variable environments are more likely to be colonized by species that already had big brains,” he said. “That explains why, when we go out today, we find an association between big brains and variable environments. And probably why his earlier study found the best singers among mockingbirds lived in variable habitats.

So we now know a big brain helped species like the common raven to expand into the variety of habitats where they live today, but we still don’t know why ravens and even humans evolved big brains in the first place. Botero and Fristoe are thinking about it.


The research was supported by Washington University funding.

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Gross wins national American Chemical Society award

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Michael Gross
Gross

Michael L. Gross, professor of chemistry in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, has been named recipient of the 2018 American Chemical Society (ACS) Award in Analytical Chemistry, sponsored by the Battelle Memorial Institute.

Gross, who is also professor of immunology and pathology and of medicine at the School of Medicine, will receive the award along with a $5,000 prize at the ACS awards ceremony March 20, held in conjunction with the 255th ACS national meeting in New Orleans. The award recognizes outstanding contributions to the science of analytical chemistry, pure or applied, carried out in the United States or Canada.

“Michael Gross is a true pioneer in the fundamental science and methods development for mass spectrometry of biological molecules,” said William E. Buhro, chair of the Department of Chemistry and the George E. Pake Professor in Arts & Sciences.His contributions range from the earliest efforts in peptide sequencing to studies of protein folding and unfolding on the microsecond timescale.

“Mike is one of the most productive and highly cited mass spectrometrists in history,” Buhro added. “The ACS Award in Analytical Chemistry is richly deserved, and we are extremely proud to have Mike as a longtime member of the Department of Chemistry.”

For more on the award, visit the ACS website.

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Fail Better: Thi Nguyen

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Thi Nguyen has a PhD in neuroscience and a rewarding career in academia — but not the one she expected. Nguyen is associate dean for graduate career and professional development at the Graduate School at Washington University in St. Louis. It’s a new position created to help graduate and PhD students prepare early for today’s top jobs. Some of those careers are at universities; most are not.

“Depending on the discipline, between 10 and 30 percent of graduate students will find a tenure-track position. That’s not a lot,” Nguyen said. “The good news is that our students are highly sought-after in industry and other sectors. The key is to develop skills and gain experiences early that will serve you well, whether you work in an academic or nonacademic setting.”

Nguyen, who has a PhD in neuroscience, has developed innovative programs to prepare PhD students for careers both in and outside of academia. (Photo: Jerry Naunheim Jr./Washington University)

As a postdoctoral researcher at the University of California, San Francisco, Nguyen imagined that one day she would study metabolic disease and nerve degeneration at her own university lab. But events both good (the birth of her first child) and bad (rivals scooped her research twice), forced her to re-evaluate her career path.

“It was hard to let go,” Nguyen said. “We all felt that we were trained to be faculty. Some of us were even told that a job in industry was the dark side.”

Not Nguyen. As a peer mentor, she had helped fellow postdocs explore career paths outside of academia through innovative career-development programs. Nguyen realized this work could be more than an avocation; it could be her career.  When a job in the career office opened, she applied.

“One of the questions I was asked was: ‘Why does a PhD neuroscientist want to be a career adviser?’” Nguyen recalled. “To me it was a very easy answer: I wanted to support my fellow peers. I understood their struggles, their challenges and their strengths very well. I wanted to help them tell their stories and make the most of their education.”

She won a grant to develop a course called “Strategy for Scientists,” which teaches scientists core business concepts and how to strategically build plans and partnerships. Stanford University, Harvard University, UT Southwestern Medical Center and Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center are among the institutions that have adopted part or all of the program. She also received a grant to develop brief job-simulation exercises in fields such as business development and public policy. Graduate students can learn more about these programs and other opportunities at GradCareers.

“I credit my PhD education for the success of these programs,” Nguyen said. “I used my grant-writing skills to earn these competitive grants. I used my research skills to ask the right questions and put the right controls in place. I used my critical-thinking skills to develop effective strategies.”

To better understand where graduate students land, the Graduate School has started to collect and publish career outcomes data. Users can view, by discipline, the number of graduate students who earn jobs in government, business, nonprofits and academia, in both tenure-track and nontenure-track positions. For instance, 49 percent of chemistry graduates work in business, while about 36 percent work in academia as postdocs, tenured or tenure-track professors, nontenure-track instructors or academic researchers, with the remainder working in government or the nonprofit sector. In contrast, 47 percent of history graduates are tenured or tenure-track professors, while 23 percent work in business. 

“The staff at the Graduate School is focused on our data being both comprehensive and transparent,” Nguyen said. “Step one is study the breadth of the fields where graduates build careers. Next, we will study their job satisfaction and which skills they need to succeed. We will go where the data take us to build curricula and programs that serve our students’ real needs.”

To that end, Nguyen and her colleagues have started to build relationships with alumni — professors, certainly, but also government researchers, nonprofit executives, science journalists and business owners.

“I’m inspired by the many ways they are putting their graduate educations to work,” Nguyen said. “They prove that there’s more than one way to make a difference.” 

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Bose, biology group net grant to work with high schoolers on STEM

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Arpita Bose, assistant professor of biology in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, was one of 10 women scientists at universities across the United States to receive a $2,500 grant from L’Oreal and the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) for projects focused on engaging girls and women in science. L’Oreal USA for Women in Science calls it a “Changing the Face of STEM” mentoring grant.

Bose, along with two fellow assistant professors of biology, Joshua Blodgett and Hani Zaher, formed a high school partnership with the Gateway Science Academy, allowing local high school students to experience research in a university laboratory over the summer.

High school interns from Gateway Science Academy with their Arts & Sciences biology faculty mentors. (From left) Arpita Bose; students Jose Acosta and Agni Deeljore; Hani Zaher, Joshua Blodgett and student Abigail Nagl. (Credit: Erin Gerrity)

Last summer, three Gateway Science students worked with the three faculty members.  With the L’Oreal grant, Bose aims to expand the program in 2018.

Bose had received the L’Oreal USA for Women in Science Fellowship through the company and AAAS four years ago.

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Obituary: Shayel Patnaik, student in Arts & Sciences, 21

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Shayel Patnaik helped young people through Each One Teach One, the College Prep Program and College Access Mentoring.

Shayel Mohanty Patnaik, a senior majoring in history in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, died Friday, Sept. 22, 2017. He was 21.

Further details aren’t being released out of respect for his family.

Patnaik’s life will be honored at 2 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 30, in the Women’s Building Formal Lounge on the Danforth Campus. Patnaik came to the university from Memphis, Tenn.

Patnaik will be remembered for his kindness and service to young people, said Julie Shimabukuro, director of admissions. Patnaik worked in the Office of Undergraduate Admissions as a campus tour guide and helped interview prospective students.

“He was enthusiastic and generous and an amazing listener,” Shimabukuro said. “You would see him on a bench having a great conversation with a student, getting to know them and letting them know what was special about this community. There are students here today because of the warmth he showed them. They connected with Shayel and could see him as a future classmate and friend.”  

Patnaik also was committed to serving low-income children in the St. Louis region. He tutored elementary school students through the Each One Teach One program and prepared East St. Louis high school students for the college-application process through College Access Mentoring. He also served as a program assistant for the College Prep Program, which prepares talented, first-generation students from the St. Louis region for life on a college campus.

Leah Merrifield, associate vice chancellor for community engagement and St. Louis college readiness initiatives, said College Prep scholars were drawn to Patnaik’s joy and energy. Whenever he arrived for lunch, they would call out a chorus of “Shayels!”

Patnaik’s life will be honored at 2 p.m. Sept. 30 in the Women’s Building.

“It was like that show ‘Cheers,’ when Norm walked in,” Merrifield said. “He authentically cared about young people who may not have had all of the opportunities that he had. We walked the talk, and our scholars felt that in everything he did, whether he was helping them in a lab or joking with them with after class. He had a servant’s spirit.”

Chancellor Mark S. Wrighton announced that the university and the Patnaik family created the Shayel Patnaik/College Prep Endowed Scholarship, which will provide annual support to a College Prep graduate enrolling at Washington University. Those who wish to contribute to the scholarship may send a check payable to Washington University, memo line: The Shayel Patnaik/College Prep Endowed Scholarship, Campus Box 1082, One Brookings Drive, St. Louis, Mo., 63130-4899, or donate online (in the drop-down menu, choose “other funds” and type in the name).

“This will be a lasting tribute to Shayel’s commitment to helping young people learn and grow and achieve their full potential,” Wrighton said.

Wrighton encouraged students who would like supportive counseling to use the online student portal, studenthealth.wustl.edu, or to call 314-935-6695. Faculty and staff may access the Employee Assistance Program.

Roderick Smith, a senior and fellow College Prep Program assistant, said the concern Patnaik showed to College Prep scholars extended to his fellow program assistants and classmates. That’s just how he lived his life, Smith said.

He remembered the first time they went out to eat. Patnaik asked the server how he was — and meant it.

“He wasn’t just being polite,” Smith said. “He genuinely cared about people. He approached every interaction that way, as an opportunity to make a connection.”

Patnaik is survived by his mother, Munalisa Mohanty, his stepfather, Lyle Bohlman, his father, Bidhan Patnaik, his younger sister, Yasmeen Patnaik, and his grandmother, Prativa Mohanty.

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Arts & Sciences recognizes faculty for excellence in teaching, leadership

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Four Arts & Sciences faculty honored
Arts & Sciences faculty (from left) Jean Allman, Geoff Childs, Eric Brown and Amanda Carey were honored during the school’s annual faculty welcome reception. (Photo: Jerry Naunheim Jr./Washington University)

Four Arts & Sciences faculty were honored during the school’s annual faculty welcome reception, held Sept. 11 in Ridgley Hall’s Holmes Lounge.

Barbara A. Schaal, dean of the faculty of Arts & Sciences, presented awards to Jean Allman, Eric Brown, Amanda Carey and Geoff Childs.

Allman, the J.H. Hexter Professor in the Humanities and director of the Center for the Humanities, received the Arts & Sciences Faculty Leadership Award.

Brown, associate professor of philosophy, and Carey, senior lecturer in Spanish, received the Arts & Sciences Distinguished Teaching Award.

Schaal established both the Distinguished Teaching Award and the Faculty Leadership Award in 2014 as a way to recognize exceptional commitment to Arts & Sciences and its students.

Childs, professor of anthropology, received the David Hadas Teaching Award, which recognizes excellence in teaching first-year undergraduates.

For more on the award recipients, visit The Ampersand.

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Criss receives Lewis C. Green Environmental Service Award

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Robert Criss, professor of Earth & Planetary Sciences
Criss

Robert E. Criss, professor of earth and planetary sciences in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, has received this year’s Lewis C. Green Environmental Service Award in recognition of his long-term commitment to raising awareness of increased flooding risks and the dangers of floodplain development and inaccurate flood studies.

Sponsored by the Great Rivers Environmental Law Center, the Lewis C. Green Environmental Service Award is given to those who show long-term commitment to the preservation of the environment. The award is named after Green, the late founder of the law center and a leading environmental litigator in Missouri for decades.

Criss received the honor at a celebration Sept. 24 on the Missouri River.

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Tate discusses ‘promising practices’ in graduate education

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Washington University in St. Louis is known for its exceptional undergraduate experience. Now, William F. Tate, dean of the Graduate School, and Lori White, vice chancellor for student affairs, have united to better serve the whole student in graduate education.

Their collaboration has led to a new symposium, “Promising Practices in Supporting Graduate and Professional Students,” Friday and Saturday, Oct. 13-14, at Washington University in St. Louis. More than 140 academic and student affairs leaders from top peer institutions will gather to share best practices in graduate education, from developing nonacademic career pathways to helping students manage family demands.

“If we are going to better serve the whole student, then we need to bring everyone who has an impact on that student’s campus experience to the table,” said Tate, who has committed to hosting the symposium for two years. “There is a need for better evidence and resource strategies focused on improving the graduate student experience. ‘Promising Practices’ was conceived to model intellectual bridge building across academic and student affairs boundaries with the aim to improve the graduate education experience and related outcomes.”

Here, Tate shares the genesis of the conference, ways to better support students and why St. Louis is the ideal place to earn a graduate degree.

William Tate
Tate

What is the fundamental difference between undergraduate and graduate education?

Graduate education programs and professional schools seek to recruit highly talented individuals with the potential to make original discoveries or to lead in their chosen field. The emphasis on finding individuals with the potential to advance knowledge production, practice law or engage in clinical practice differentiates graduate and professional school from the undergraduate selection process. People often choose where to get their undergraduate degrees based on the university’s rank, majors or the nonacademic experience — the dorms, the traditions. But they choose graduate schools based on the mentor and the quality of the research environment. They come to work with a particular faculty member. Informed applicants select doctoral programs based on faculty mentors, research fit and the relative standing of the research enterprise — specifically, the department or program as opposed to the university’s overall standing. Typically, incoming matriculates pay little attention to the nonacademic experience or resources. The potential for problems unfolds once they arrive. Students select places where they can engage in discovery. However, what about their need for a sense of belonging within a community? There is a growing recognition that truly outstanding graduate education must address a broader range of social, psychological and developmental factors.

What was the genesis of this idea?

When Lori White was on campus interviewing for her role, we walked around campus talking about ways we could work together to have a more holistic approach to the development of our graduate and professional students. Up until that point, I rarely planned joint events or projects with student affairs. But once she arrived, we started the practice of regular meetings and sending our staff to attend each other’s meetings in order to address important interdependencies and to foster the cross-fertilization of ideas. That synergy led to this proposal. James Parker, Ashley Macrander and many others devoted their time and intellect to the details of this endeavor. It is a wonderful team.

The conference focuses on real-world issues — creating community, improving mental health, getting a job. How did you develop the agenda?

Graduate students spend almost all of their time in a single department or school, often in a single lab or hub of research activity. And when they leave, they don’t go to a university residence hall, but to an off-campus living arrangement. So how do you intervene? In many ways, that’s what this conference attempts to answer. One thing we can do is to create community, but it can’t look like a dorm and it can’t be overprogrammed. Graduate students want to collide just like scientists and entrepreneurs do in Cortex. They want to engage with ideas in a way that respects diversity and inclusion but does not impinge on true free speech. Because how can we discover if we are inhibited by what we say? That is the design challenge — to support the discovery process that is led by departments while enhancing opportunities for graduate students to grow as citizen scholars and public communicators of the important scholarship and practices in their fields.

Mental health is a major concern in graduate life, and we want to share across institutions how best to serve graduate and professional students. We know that students sometimes come to us with anxiety or depression and that graduate education can be stressful. This past year, we worked closely with the Division of Student Affairs to build our capacity to serve graduate and professional students. The conference seeks to expand our knowledge base in this area.

We also know that many of our students will not be following their academic mentors into academia. So what can we do to prepare them to be citizen scholars and leaders in business, government and other fields? We’ve made this a priority and are eager to learn where our peer institutions have made strides.

How are you tracking outcomes?

Provost Holden Thorp is leading the charge among AAU (Association of American Universities) provosts to institutionalize the practice of tracking doctoral studies. The Graduate School is among the leaders across the country in data transparency. It is, for us, a social responsibility and a best practice to share evidence related to our investment in graduate education. We are documenting how long it takes to finish degree programs, who’s completing the programs of study, post-graduation career placement, what factors predict success, and what factors predict poor outcomes. It is an evidence-based strategy. We want to make sure that students are successful, and the only way to do that is to collect the evidence and to be transparent. Displayed on our website, these indicators are among the most important in evaluating our progress.

Many members of the general public are questioning the value of higher education. Is a graduate education worth the investment?

Every graduate dean is thinking about ways to communicate the value of a graduate education. We believe doctoral education and professional programs are about discovery and leadership — evaluating and testing new ideas and models, finding ways to protect our built and social environments, health and human development. Some in society may ask why it is important for someone to study English or history. Understanding the past is extremely important, and students in the humanities are able to form collective wisdom so we can avoid repeating our mistakes. That matters. Our colleagues in neuroscience and in psychological and brain sciences are at the cutting edge of helping us understand the activity of the brain and how to protect and heal it. That matters. If you examine the major scientific and medical discoveries, sociological and economic breakthroughs and inventions since the 1940s, most of the leading individuals involved have at least one thing in common — a graduate education. Imagine society without our important investment in this form of human capital development.

You will be welcoming leaders from across the country to a city that is struggling with questions of race, equality and justice. How does a university’s home impact graduate education?

Cities are often viewed negatively, but we need to acknowledge the precious assets that urban communities represent in the learning process. We must learn and discover together in large scale in cities. Only then can we hope for change on matters of race, equality and justice. Yes, we have unique challenges in St. Louis, but this city is also a tremendous incubator for preparing the next generation of citizen scholars and leaders. In my opinion, we offer an outstanding place to grow and to develop as a researcher and professional.

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Anthropology student Cubellis to study in Berlin

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Lauren Cubellis, a PhD candidate in sociocultural anthropology in Arts & Sciences, received a 2017-18 long-term research scholarship and intensive summer language course grant from the the German Academic Exchange Service (Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst, or DAAD). This funding organization supports the international exchange of students and scholars.

Cubellis will conduct dissertation fieldwork in Berlin with dialogically trained clinicians and experience-informed peer specialists caring for individuals experiencing symptoms of psychosis. Her research focuses on the role of socioeconomic structures in shaping possibilities for care, the diversity of perspectives that are captured in dialogic and poly-vocal approaches to experience, and the unique situation of Berlin as a post-socialist city undergoing rapid gentrification and social change. These themes come together to frame critical questions about the lived experiences and cultural understandings of mental illness in Berlin.

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‘The joke works best when you don’t smile’

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Environmental catastrophe upends the social order. Private functions fuel corporate profits. Oppressed masses rebel against privileged politicians.

Don’t laugh. This is “Urinetown.”

“It’s a dark, dystopian drama that touches on serious themes,” deadpanned Jeffery Matthews, professor of practice in the Performing Arts Department in Arts & Sciences, who will direct the Tony Award-winning show in Edison Theatre for two consecutive weekends Oct. 20-29.

“But it’s also incredibly funny,” Matthews said. “The trick is finding the right balance. As an actor, you have to play it honestly, with integrity. You have to commit to the thing, however absurd, that your character is pursuing.

“You can’t just wink at the audience.”

Ethan Evans as Bobby Strong. (Photo: Jerry Naunheim Jr./Washington University)

‘Urine Good Company’

Set 20 years after a devastating drought, “Urinetown” centers on the burgeoning romance between Bobby Strong, assistant custodian at Public Amenity #9, and Hope Caldwell, a recent graduate of “the world’s most expensive university.”

But soon Bobby’s father, Old Man Strong, is arrested for failing to pay his daily restroom admission, while Hope’s father, the CEO of Urine Good Company (UGC), colludes with a senator to raise prices further.

“In response to the drought, government officials removed toilets from private homes and gave UGC all water management responsibilities,” Matthews said. “Now people have to pay to go to the bathroom. And if they can’t, they’re ‘Sent to Urinetown,’ which is just a euphemism for being thrown off a building.”

Pining for a better world, Bobby and Hope resolve to follow their hearts — but their wide-eyed optimism quickly leads to rebellion, kidnapping and a ragtag revolution that may or may not foster meaningful change.

Yet, for all the satiric bite, “Urinetown” is also a love letter to classic musical theater, evoking “Guys and Dolls,” “Threepenny Opera,” “Dreamgirls” and more. “It’s both parody and homage,” Matthews said. “At one point, everything just turns into ‘Fiddler on the Roof.’ Which is funny, but which also creates an ironic distance. You’re always being pulled out of the action to think about what’s really happening on stage.”

For the cast, maintaining that ironic distance means executing one of the most difficult maneuvers in show biz: keeping a straight face.

At a recent rehearsal, “I asked one actor to make a really bold choice,” Matthews said. “It was huge, it was truthful and it was terribly funny. And everyone started cracking up. But I stopped them. That’s not where this play lives.

“The joke works best when you don’t smile.

“Laughing is the audience’s job.”

Cast members (from left:) Camden Sabathne as Tiny Tom; Carly Rosenbaum as Penelope Pennywise; and Mario Davila as Robby the Stockfish. (Photos: Jerry Naunheim Jr./Washington University)

Cast & crew

The cast of 26 stars Ethan Evans as Bobby and Shelby Davis as Hope. Alexa Rodriquez Pagano is the narrator Little Sally. Laura Lee Kyro and Ricki Pettinato are officers Lockstock and Barrell.

Victor Mendez and Sarah James are Bobby’s parents, Old Man Strong and Ma Strong. Brandon Krisko is the CEO, Caldwell B. Caldwell. Carly Rosenbaum is Bobby’s boss, Penelope Pennywise. Jens Damgaard is Senator Fipp. Mark Fernandez is Dr. Billeaux. Annie Butler is Ms. Millenium.

Sarah Beshke and Danny Guttas are the rebels Little Becky Two-Shoes and Hot Blades Harry. Mario Davila is Robby the Stockfish; Jessy Martinez is Soupy Sue. Dennis Murray and Camden Sabathne are Tiny Tom and Billy Boy Bill.

Sam Gaitsch and Alexandria Moore and Cop 1 and Cop 2. Emma Flannery plays UGC staff. Katherine Cai, Jordan Kassab, Zoe Liu and Abigail Wippel are The Poor.

Costumes are by Erika Frank, with assistance from Mona Jahani. Sets are by Sydney Shafer. Lighting and sound are by Eric Elz and Jon Zielke. Dramaturg is Justin Wright. Music director is Todd Decker. Vocal coach is Kelly Daniel-Decker. Choreography is by Christine Knoblauch-O’Neal, with assistance from Sam Gaitsch. Stage manager is Kaia Lyons, with assistance from Caroline Sullivan. Sarah Azizo is props master.

Tickets

“Urinetown” begins at 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, Oct. 20 and 21, and at 2 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 23. Performances continue the following weekend at 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, Oct. 27 and 28, and at 2 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 29.

Performances take place in Edison Theatre, located in Mallinckrodt Center, 6465 Forsyth Blvd. Tickets are $20, or $15 for students, seniors and Washington University faculty and staff, and $10 for students. Tickets are available through the Edison Theatre Box Office.

For more information, call 314-935-6543.

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Himes honored at National Black Theatre Festival

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Himes

Ron Himes, the Henry E. Hampton, Jr. Artist-in-Residence in Arts & Sciences, has received the Black Theatre Network 2017 Larry Leon Hamlin Producer Award for his work as founder and producing director of The Black Rep. Himes was honored during the opening gala of the National Black Theatre Festival, which took place in Winston-Salem, N.C., this summer.

The Larry Leon Hamlin Producer Award recognizes contributions producers have made to American theater and the entertainment industry. It is named after the late Hamlin, founder, executive producer and artistic director of the North Carolina Black Repertory Company.

Himes founded The Black Rep in 1976 while still a student at Washington University, and it remains one of the nation’s largest and most respected African-American theater companies.

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Brantmeier delivers plenary at United Nations/UNESCO literacy conference

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Cindy Brantmeier, professor of applied linguistics and education in Arts & Sciences, gave the  plenary address Oct. 5 for the United Nations/UNESCO international conference on literacy in Chile. Her lecture explored implications of her research on “literacy across languages and cultures in an increasingly interconnected world” and underscored the fact that literacy is a fundamental human right.

“Dr. Cindy Brantmeier’s plenary was lively and deep, with interesting empirical data, and it provoked much critical reflection,” said Giovanni Parodi, the head for UNESCO literacy.

As part of her follow-up work with UNESCO, Brantmeier has agreed to lead several different research projects on Spanish literacy involving refugees and immigrants across Latin America.

 

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The First 40: Three first-year students record a second of video a day

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Meet Rodriguez Scholar Jazmin Garcia, international student Astrella Sjarfi and football player Tim Tague — three members of the Washington University in St. Louis Class of 2021.

Back in August, we asked these first-year students to record one second of video every day for their first 40 or so days on campus. Here, learn more about these students and their first days in college.

Garcia on her video diary: “Going back and looking at the clips has been fun. With so much happening, a lot of time I’ve forgotten that I did something, so it’s nice to have a record of those memories.”

Why did you apply early decision to Washington University?

Actually, I had never heard of WashU, but I had friends tell me they could see me there, probably because I’m kind of a quiet, studious person. So I visited a couple of times and ended up really loving it. I also was really impressed with the Rodriguez Scholars program and that it was a family.

What are you doing when you’re not studying?

I joined the climbing team. I like that there’s a lot of us who are just learning. Walls are called problems. So when you’re bouldering, there’s a correct way to do the route. There are specific ways that you are supposed to solve the problem. Yes, it is a strength thing, but you also need to be able to put your mind to it too.

Has being a Rodriguez impacted your experience as a first-year student?

Yes, in a lot of ways. I am part of Strive for College, which was started by a Rodriguez Scholar and helps local high school students with tutoring and test prep. A lot of students joke that they are only there because their parents make them come, but I think they actually enjoy it. My Rodriguez “mom” helped plan DACA Week, which is an issue that is really important to me. In high school, I started this organization called the Dreamers Club, and we helped raise money for undocumented students to go to college. So I was excited to get involved in that effort here. And I just hang out a lot in the Office for Student Scholars with other people in the program. In Evanston, there is not a huge Latino population. So here, I can speak Spanish with my friends or listen to a lot of Latin music and share our favorite foods. It’s really the first time in my life I’ve been able to be part of a community like that.


Sjarfi on arriving in St. Louis: “Those first days were such a blur. It took 24 hours just to travel to New York. But I’m at the point where I’m starting to think of this place of home.”    

Why did you decide to study in America? 

I went to an IB (International Baccalaureate) school, so I always knew I would go to college in either the United States or the United Kingdom. My family is more familiar with America, and my dad actually went to Washington University. Still, I was concerned about coming here because of the travel ban and because Missouri is a red state. Those fears went away when I got here for international student orientation. We played this game called “Step In, Step Out.” We all stood in a big circle, and someone shouted out a statement like “Step in if you identify as Asian.” So you step in, acknowledge each other and step back out again. We did that a few rounds and then they got to “Step in if you are Muslim.” I realized I wasn’t the only one. That made me feel better. It was nice to be able to acknowledge each other without exclaiming our identities.

What have you learned since you arrived here? 

I’m in the “Designing Creativity” class, and every week a different person comes to talk about the ways designers can improve people’s everyday experience. I could see bringing those ideas back home, where there is a lot of poverty and communication is not conveyed well. I’ve also met so many people with backgrounds so different than mine. One of my roommates is a first-generation student from the College Prep Program, so she’s introduced me to places around St. Louis, and I’ve  told her what instant noodles are best. We’re learning from each other.

Have you joined any clubs? 

I’ve joined Ultimate Frisbee. This girl just came up to me at the Activities Fair and asked me to join. I didn’t know what to say. I wasn’t against the idea, but all I knew about the sport was that involved throwing a Frisbee. It turned out I actually like it and I’m not terrible.


Tague on his First 40: “I’ve enjoyed the simple moments and the random moments. Sometimes I’ll pause, look around and take a video. It’s made me realize how lucky I am to be in this place. So much has happened in these past 40 days. I can only imagine what will happen in the next four years.”

Why did you pick Washington University?

If you were to ask me my favorite sport, I would answer football in the fall and baseball in the spring. I couldn’t imagine giving either one up, and WashU gave me the opportunity to play both. And, of course, it’s a really good school. That combination of academic and athletic excellence drew me here.

What’s dorm life like?

I live in a six-person suite. We all play either football or baseball, and one guy plays both like me. We play a lot of “Rocket League,” and we eat together. Whenever someone gets hungry, they shout out “BD” and we all go together. Some of my friends from home talk about all of the free time they have in college, but it seems like I always have work to do or practice to go to. However, I am really enjoying all the time I spend doing this work and the hours spent at practice, so the days go by very quickly. It would be nice to sit on the bed for one day and take a nap, but I guess that’s what break is for.

Have you joined any clubs?

I’ve joined the Bear Cubs Running Team, which is a running club for kids on the autism spectrum. Annie Marggraff (AB 2017), who started the program, lives one town over from me and started a chapter back home that my sister, Nicole, joined. My sister has a rare genetic condition and faces so many challenges, but when she runs — something a lot of us complain about — she always has the biggest smile on her face. She is so positive and happy. I wanted to meet kids in similar situations and learn from them the way I’ve learned from Nicole.

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Nasdaq president to speak for Calhoun Lectureship series

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Adena T. Friedman, president and chief executive officer of Nasdaq, will be on the Washington University in St. Louis campus at 4 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 19, in Knight Hall’s Emerson Auditorium as part of the David R. Calhoun Lectureship. Co-sponsored by Olin Business School and Arts & Sciences, the lecture series aims to bring to campus well-known national leaders discussing how their value system and global experience creates an impact in the business environment.

Friedman

Friedman assumed the role of Nasdaq president and CEO in January 2017 and proceeded to steer the company through the implementation of new architecture — called Nasdaq Financial Framework — that earned her Institutional Investor’s No. 1 spot in its 2017 Tech 40 list of financial technology leaders.

While serving as Nasdaq’s president and COO through 2016, Friedman oversaw the company’s business while focusing on driving efficiency, product-development growth and expansion.

Wrote Friedman in an Oct. 6 LinkedIn blog post: “To Nasdaq, tomorrow isn’t an expression of time but a story to rewrite about a connected ecosystem that constitutes a market of possibilities. We possess what is needed to unleash those possibilities: the leading-edge technology, the forward thinking, and the power of data and analytics. We have the ingenuity to power economies, the insights to empower people, and the integrity that is the cornerstone of all markets.

“With those resources, we are going to rewrite ways to expand wealth, create jobs and enrich people’s lives. We aim to set the pace for all that — for re-thinking capital markets and economies anywhere and everywhere.”

Friedman earned a bachelor’s degree in political science from Williams College and a master of business administration from the Owen Graduate School of Management at Vanderbilt University.

The lecture is free and open to the public but registration is encouraged as seating is limited in Emerson Auditorium. A reception will follow.

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Barnes named Packard Fellow

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Jonathan Barnes, assistant professor of chemistry in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, was among 18 leading young researchers across the United States honored Oct. 16 as a 2017 Packard Fellow.

He is the 10th faculty member at Washington University to receive this prestigious fellowship in the program’s 29-year history — and remains dazed by it all.

“There are about three or four chemists nationally each year to get named,” Barnes said. “It’s a huge honor. If you look down the list of the previous fellows, it’s actually humbling to be part of that list. There are people who have been Nobel Laureates. People who will be Nobel Laureates.”

Barnes

“This is a well deserved recognition of an outstanding young scientist, and I could not be more impressed and delighted,” said Barbara Schaal, dean of the faculty of Arts & Sciences and the Mary-Dell Chilton Distinguished Professor. “It’s particularly gratifying to see this award go to a chemist as we are in the midst of an exciting investment in, and transformation of, that department.”

Schaal noted the university’s “strong track record now with this career-changing-fellowship,” with three consecutive Packard Fellows: Barnes; Gregory Bowman (2016), assistant professor of biochemistry and molecular biophysics at the School of Medicine; and Arpita Bose (2015), assistant professor of biology in Arts & Sciences.

There have been four in the past seven years, dating to David Fike (2010), director of environmental studies in Arts & Sciences and associate director of the International Center for Energy, Environment and Sustainability (InCEES). Another previous winner, Jonathan Losos (1994), currently at Harvard University, was named last month to head Washington University’s new Living Earth Collaborative. Still another, Provost Holden Thorp (1991), personally sent Barnes a congratulatory email. “That felt cool,” Barnes said.

The Packard Foundation, via half of the famed Hewlett-Packard partnership that resulted in successful international companies admittedly derived to an extent from university lab research, established this program in 1988. The aim: to provide early-career scientists with flexible funding and freedom to explore new frontiers in their field.

Barnes, who began working at the university July 1, 2016, considered it long odds to win the award. With 50 U.S. universities each considering by his estimation 50 young professors in their first few years on faculty for only two slots to represent a school in the competition, he likened it to a lottery — with a five-year, $875,000 prize attached.

“Basically, it’s people in their third or fourth year on faculty, getting ready to go for tenure, who contend for this award,” Barnes said. “It’s super competitive. It was a longshot, but it paid off.

“I’ll be honest: My approach to this was very aggressive. I hired two postdocs right away: Angelique Greene and Xuesong Li. It helped. Because those two postdocs along with graduate students Abigail Delawder and Kevin Liles plus undergraduate Mary Danielson generated a lot of data. We ended up getting it primarily based on that.”

And perhaps it didn’t hurt that his application also included recommendations from chemistry department chair Bill Buhro, the George E. Pake Professor in Arts & Sciences, and 2016 Nobel chemistry co-winner Fraser Stoddart of Northwestern University, Barnes’ doctoral adviser. Barnes also expressed gratitude for the efforts of Katherine Kornfeld, senior associate director in foundation relations, who assists with such awards.

The grant, he said, will go toward continued lab work in the area of hydrogels, “soft actuator” polymers and attaining his ultimate goal of creating artificial molecular muscles. In less than 15 months’ time at Washington University, Barnes and his group of postdocs and students have produced findings for two papers in progress.

Stimuli-responsive hydrogels reversibly contract and expand by adding or subtracting electrons. They go from clear to black (top), or rapidly change from yellow to black in 60 seconds (middle). The contracting WashU Bear design (bottom) contained a small amount of the proprietary redox-active polymer, so it contracted from roughly 2.5 cm to 2 cm while changing from yellow to black. (Courtesy: Barnes lab)

Working with 3-D materials on a centimeter scale, they use electrons and other ways of changing the size and shape of hydrogels, a gelatin-like polymer consisting mostly of water. Using their own proprietary blend, they have been able to contract hydrogels to 1/10 their size and volume. However, to Barnes, the next, big step is to elicit such reactions from stronger, larger and more dense materials — such as a rubberish polymer (elastomer) that someday could help to produce fast-acting prosthetics and more.

“That’s where the field needs to be, that’s the holy grail of this field,” Barnes said. “We’re still a long way from it.”

Barnes, a native of Louisville, Ky., earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees at the University of Kentucky, and his PhD at Northwestern. After a postdoctoral fellowship at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, he accepted an offer to work at Washington University and moved closer to his Kentucky home.

Barely 15 months later, he joined a group of less than 600 scientists and became a Packard Fellow. Said Barnes: “I’m still in disbelief.”

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