Winners of Bear Cub grants announced

Washington University’s Bear Cub program is funding four innovative projects that have commercial potential. Pictured is William G. Hawkins, MD, who is developing a new treatment for pancreatic cancer.

New model will open immune cell’s secrets

Five decades after the discovery of a rare but potentially pivotal immune cell, scientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have found a way to eliminate it in mice. The finding, which appears in the journal Immunity, will enable more detailed investigations of the important roles the plasmacytoid dendritic cell (pDC) plays in fighting viruses and causing autoimmune diseases like psoriasis and lupus.