Miller-McCune
Wind farms drawing noise complaints, opposition
01/06/2011
How and at what distances sound from these giant wind power turbines affects human beings has triggered a brush war in the search for renewable energy. Leading research in this area is Alec Salt of Washington University in St. Louis, who’s been experimenting with the hearing of guinea pigs for about 10 years. The journal Hearing Research in August published Salt’s paper showing that the human ear might have more acute sensitivities to low-frequency sound, like the kind produced by wind turbines, than previously understood. Link to Article
The National Law Journal
Law grad maintains database of music industry-related court decisions
1/6/2011
Wondering if you can write off your leather pants as a business expense if you are in the music biz? You can’t, according to a 1997 court decision that’s one of more than 2,400 judicial rulings compiled on www.thediscography.org — a Web database created by Loren Wells, a recent graduate of Washington University in St. Louis School of Law. The site, which he launched last month, is supported and underwritten by the law school’s Center for Empirical Research in the Law.
Link to Article See also Music Industry Report
Related news release http://news.wustl.edu/news/Pages/21647.aspx
Consortium Finance Network
On campus: What’s up? What’s new?
01/06/2011
Business schools are always reinventing themselves. Washington University‘s Olin School sponsors “talent summits” for students and alumni around the country. They are specially planned networking sessions, opportunities for students and alumni to learn and update each other on affairs off campus and activities on campus, in the marketplace, in certain companies and in institutions everywhere. Corporate recruiters are invited. Link to Article
Daily Tech
New imaging method makes brain scans 7 times faster
1/6/2011
Researchers from the University of California – Berkeley, Washington University in St. Louis, the University of Minnesota, and Oxford University in the United Kingdom have discovered an advancement in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) technology that is capable of making brain scans seven times faster than before. Dr. David Van Essen, a neurobiologist at Washington University, is co-leader of the research project. Link to Article
Medical Device Daily
Washington roundup: Baucus, Grassley, ask about off-label device use at Reed
12/29/2011
Off-label device use and clinical trials sometimes look one and the same, and a Dec. 17 letter from Sens. Max Baucus (D-Montana) and Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) implicitly acknowledges the difference even as the letter focuses on a purported clinical trial at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center (Bethesda, Maryland). The letter asks administrators at Reed about the activities of Timothy Kuklo, MD, of Washington University (WU; St. Louis, Missouri), who resigned from his post at WU last year after allegations surfaced that he falsified study data for the Infuse bone morphogenic protein – made by Medtronic (Minneapolis) — while at Reed. It has also been alleged that Kuklo failed to disclose the consulting arrangement to WU and with the Department of the Army. Link to Article See also MedCompare.com
LawyersandSettlements.com
VA hospital malpractice? Congressman frustrated over veterans’ lack of applesauce
1/6/2011
Whether or not it’s a case of VA hospital malpractice, US Congressman Bob Filner says that the lack of applesauce available for veterans at the John Cochran VA Medical Center in Missouri is an indication of the overall problems at the facility, KMOX.com reports. On his last day as chairman of the House Veterans Affairs Committee, Filner recently toured the medical center with fellow Democrat Russ Carnahan of St. Louis. The two Congressmen said that they expect to receive a comprehensive report on the problems plaguing the medical center by springtime. The John Cochran Division of the St. Louis VA Medical Center is located in close proximity to St. Louis University and Washington University, its affiliated medical schools. Link to Article
HHS HealthBeat / U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
Compression alone
1/3/2011
Conventional CPR combines chest compression and mouth-to-mouth breathing to possibly save someone whose heart has stopped. But researchers say that while the combination is better in some cases, chest compression alone may be better in others. At Washington University in St. Louis, Peter Nagele combined data from three studies. He says adults who got compression only were 22 percent more likely to live. So he supports that approach for adults whose hearts suddenly stop beating. He says children, drowning victims and others who also need oxygen should get compression plus breathing. Link to Article / Online Audio
Southeast Missourian
(Cape Girardeau, MO)
Cape Girardeau County prosecutor says recusal in Buerkle case fitting, declines to discuss conflict
01/06/2011
A private message made public on YouTube has put Cape Girardeau County’s prosecuting attorney on the defense, raising questions about whether a romantic relationship caused Morley Swingle to recuse himself from a case he worked on for 11 months. Mike Downey, a St. Louis lawyer who teaches legal ethics courses at Washington University, said ethics regarding romantic relationships of publicly elected prosecutors is a murky issue. Link to Article
KPLR-TV (St. Louis, MO)
News 11 at Noon (1/2)
01/05/2011
Anneliese Schaefer of the Hope Center for Neurological Disorders at Washington University in St. Louis discusses the center’s research and its collaboration with Hope Happens, a charitable organization that raises money for medical research. Hope Happens was founded in 2002 as ALS HOPE by Christopher Hobler and his family after he was diagnosed with ALS in 2001. Link to Broadcast
Daily RFT
Homophobe physicist’s solution to Gulf oil spill was right in your kitchen cabinet
01/05/2011
Last spring, Washington University physicist Jonathan Katz got kicked off a panel assembled by Secretary of Energy Steven Chu that was supposed to figure out how to stop the BP oil spill. It’s really too bad that Katz’s gender politics got in the way of his work because a recent experiment has proven that Katz’s proposed solution to stop the leak would have been far more effective than the one BP did use, which failed and left the well gushing for another two months. Katz’s proposal: cornstarch.
Link to Article
Related news release http://news.wustl.edu/news/Pages/21662.aspx
St. Louis American
New funding for new bioscience companies
1/6/2011
Do you have a science-based technology or idea that might be the basis of a new start-up business in St. Louis? Could you use initial funding and expert advice to prove your innovation further and to help secure private funding for a new business? If so, the St. Louis i6 Award for Commercialization could be just what you need. It’s a new program, announced on Dec. 21, to advance ideas for successful start-up companies. The i6 award was designed through a regional consortium consisting of the City of St. Louis, St. Louis County, the BioGenerator, and major research institutions, including the Danforth Center, Saint Louis University, University of Missouri-St. Louis and Washington University. Link to Article
News in Higher Education
Science Magazine
How new COMPETES science law broadens NSF education programs
1/5/2011
Only one of the seven directorates at the National Science Foundation (NSF) has “education” in its title. But the reauthorization of the America COMPETES Act, which President Barack Obama signed into law yesterday, spells out program changes meant to ensure that every component of the $7 billion agency is involved in training the next generation of researchers and improving public scientific literacy. Link to Article
New York Times
Journal’s article on ESP Is expected to prompt outrage
1/6/2011
One of psychology’s most respected journals has agreed to publish a paper presenting what its author describes as strong evidence for extrasensory perception, the ability to sense future events. The decision may delight believers in so-called paranormal events, but it is mortifying scientists. Advance copies of the paper, to be published in The Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, are generating a mixture of amusement and scorn among psychological researchers. Some say the report deserves to be published, in the name of open inquiry; others insist that its acceptance only accentuates fundamental flaws in the evaluation and peer review of research in the social sciences. Link to Article
CNN
Retracted autism study an ‘elaborate fraud,’ British journal finds
1/5/2011
A now-retracted British study that linked autism to childhood vaccines was an “elaborate fraud” that has done long-lasting damage to public health, a leading medical publication reported Wednesday. An investigation published by the British medical journal BMJ concludes the study’s author, Dr. Andrew Wakefield, misrepresented or altered the medical histories of all 12 of the patients whose cases formed the basis of the 1998 study — and that there was “no doubt” Wakefield was responsible. Link to Article
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