Campus Prepares for Name Change Dedication Ceremony Honors Danforth Family, Foundation

Washington University School of Medicine Digital Commons@Becker Washington University Record Washington University Publications 9-14-2006 Washington University Record, September 14, 2006 Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.wustl.edu/record Recommended Citation "Washington University Record, September 14, 2006" (2006). Washington University Record. Book 1082. http://digitalcommons.wustl.edu/record/1082 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Washington University Publications at Digital Commons@Becker. It has been accepted for inclusion in Washington University Record by an authorized administrator of Digital Commons@Becker. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Medical News: Trial looks at non-drug Internationally acclaimed: Saint Louis Washington People: "Retired" Chancellor treatment for moderate, severe asthma Symphony music director to lecture Danforth continues to work for community 8 Sept. 14, 2006 Volume 31 No. 6 Washington University in St Louis Campus prepares for name change Dedication ceremony honors Danforth family, Foundation BY ANDY CLENDENNEN tire campus community via WUTV, broadcast on channel 22 On Sept. 17, the Hilltop Cam- ofWUSTL's cable TV. pus will be named the Dan- Chancellor Mark S. Wrighton forth Campus. The name will and David W. Kemper, chairman honor William H. Danforth, of the Board of Trustees, will de- M.D., the 13th chancellor of the liver introductory remarks. University, his family and the Harold T. Shapiro, Ph.D., pres- Danforth Foundation for the role ident emeritus and professor of they have played in the Univer- economics and public affairs at sity's evolution. Princeton University, will give the The dedication ceremony starts keynote address. His talk is titled at 3:30 p.m. in Graham Chapel, "A Larger Sense of Purpose: High- followed by a reception in Holmes er Education and Society" — the Lounge and Brookings Quadran- same as his most recent book. gle. The events are open to the en- FoDowing Shapiro's message, tire University community, but soprano Megan Higgins, who re- faculty, staff and students plan- ceived a master's degree in music ning to attend need to register in 2005 from the University, and by Sept. 14 at danforthcampus pianist Sandra Geary will perform .wustl.edu. Mozart's "Allelujah" from Exsul- Seating in Graham Chapel will tate, jubilate. be limited. A video simulcast of After the performance, senior the dedication ceremony will be Laura Kleinman, a Danforth and Chancellor William H. Danforth poses with students during the 1994 Homecoming festivities. As chan- provided in the nearby jerzewiak Truman Scholar who is majoring cellor, Danforth had a deep, abiding concern for everyone connected to the University — students, fac- Family Auditorium (Room 300 of in philosophy in Arts & Sciences, ulty, staff, alumni and friends. A profile of Danforth appears on page 8, and on page 4, longtime friends the Arts & Sciences Laboratory will deliver remarks. and colleagues share their fond recollections of Danforth and his late wife, Elizabeth (Ibby). Science Building) and to the en- See Ceremony, Page 7 A Hilltop History: Early landscape architects charmed by 'vantage point,' liken it to Greece's Acropolis BY ANDY CLENDENNEN souri Gov. Sterling Price signed into law the less suitable as many St. Louisans moved Road had yet to be paved so it turned into a charter incorporating the school. away to escape the air pollution, dirt and muddy mess every time it rained, and the Abolitionist William Wilberforce once Shortly after — Feb. 12,1857, to be exact din of a typical 19th-century inner city. The west end of Forest Park was known as the wrote "Things great have small begin- — Gov. Trusten Polk signed into law the new streetcar line on 18th Street shook the "Wilderness." nings." amended charter renaming the school physics lab and observatory. But the hilltop vantage point reminded Washington University could be a prime Washington University, and an era was In spring 1892, Robert S. Brookings, Ed- several of the Acropolis in Greece, and it example of what Wilberforce meant. begun. ward Rowse, Henry W Eliot and William didn't take long for construction on the The precursor to Washington University, The city, the school and the student Huse formed a committee to find a new site new home of Washington University to Eliot Seminary, started out as just one body all began to grow. And over the next for the University. The following June, they start. building — Academic Hall — at the inter- four decades the realization set in that the located 103 acres just beyond the western The issue of design was still to be deter- section of 17th Street and Washington Av- school would need to relocate to a place limits of the city — which would cost mined. The University hired the firm of enue in downtown. The building opened that had more space. $185,000. Frederick Law Olmstead from Massachu- for classes in 1856, three years after Mis- Plus, the downtown area was becoming It was far from a sure thing — Skinker See History, Page 5 Fossett Laboratory for Virtual How do you measure a broken heart? Planetary Exploration planned Researchers find long-sought answer BY BARBARA REA Donnell Distinguished Univer- sity Professor and chair of the BY GWEN ERICSON process and have come to recog- cardiologists couldn't get a truly Whether you are old enough Department of Earth and Plan- nize the syndrome of diastolic accurate read of the heart's ability to have experienced 3-D etary Sciences (E&PS) in Arts & Is it possible to accurately meas- heart failure," said senior author to fill because filling is affected by technology during its "golden Sciences, together with WUSTL ure the intrinsic filling function Sandor J. Kovacs, M.D, Ph.D., as- factors such as blood pressure, age" in a movie theater, or had alumnus and extraordinary ex- of the heart? School of Medicine sociate professor of medicine, of blood volume, body movements your introduction via the plorer Steve Fossett, did just scientists have found the answer to cell biology and physiology and of and posture. For about 50 years, newer IMAX format, virtually that, with the result being the that 50-year-old question. biomedical engineering and ad- researchers tried and failed to all would development of the Fossett Lab- Sound esoteric? Consider that junct associate find a method that was inde- agree that oratory for Virtual Planetary about half of people with heart professor of pendent of these factors. That stereoscopy Exploration. failure have problems related to physics. failure meant that diastolic dys- — the abili- Fossett and Arvidson have how well the heart fills with blood "When heart function — particularly in its ty to create enjoyed a mutually beneficial during the relaxation phase — re- muscle loses its early stages — could be over- the illusion relationship since Fossett's first ferred to as diastole. normal ability looked, even with a thorough of a third "Solo Spirit" balloon mission Furthermore, these problems to simultane- physical examination. dimension operation in 1997, with E8cPS often develop earlier than prob- ously relax and Kovacs and Leo Shmuylovich, — trans- faculty and students developing lems with the contraction phase of spring back an M.D./Ph.D. student in physics forms the scientific experiments as well as the heartbeat — called systole. after contract- in Arts & Sciences, both members Fossett experience communications and data sys- And consider that a person can Kovacs ing, it fails to of the Cardiovascular Biophysics and allows tems. Grateful for the help pro- have normal systole and yet have move properly Laboratory, developed their for a tremendous amount of vided and impressed by the un- abnormal diastole. That fact, cou- during filling. This causes blood method for measuring intrinsic detail that otherwise would go dergraduate student perform- pled with the lack of a reliable way to start backing up into the lungs diastolic function by mathemati- unnoticed. ances, Fossett began funding a to measure intrinsic filling func- with the patient developing life- cally analyzing echocardiograms Imagine taking that ability fellowship program four years tion, has caused abnormalities of threatening pulmonary edema of the heart. Their method is de- and applying it to teaching and ago that attracts top-notch stu- the filling process to be incom- (fluid in the lungs) and related scribed in the July issue of the research in the study of earth dents. In fact, two former pletely recognized. symptoms," he continued. Journal of Applied Physiology. and planetary sciences. Ray WUSTL Rhodes Scholars have "Only in the last decade have Until this discovery of a Echocardiograph machines Arvidson, Ph.D., James S. Mc- See Lab, Page 2 physicians really become aware of method for reliably measuring in- obtain images of the heart using the importance of the diastolic trinsic diastolic (filling) function, See Heart, Page 2 2 RECORD WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY IN ST. LOUIS School of Law celebrates Constitution Day Sept. 18 BY CYNTHIA GEORGES jointly promoted by the WUSTL \ School of Law, the Cornell Law The School of Law will join School, the University of Arizona more than 100 other U.S. law Law School and the American Bar schools in a nationwide dis- Association. cussion of judicial independence as Judge Catherine Perry, U.S. Dis- part of the country's second annual trict Court, Eastern District of Mis- Constitution Day observance Mon- souri, will discuss the meaning of day, Sept. 18. judicial independence following the "Our participation in a national simulcast, scheduled in the Bryan dialogue focused on the Constitu- Cave Moot Courtroom in An- tion and judicial independence un- heuser-Busch Hall. derscores our "I am honored to be asked to commitment to talk about judicial independence foster under- and the essential separation of pow- standing of the ers," said Perry, J.D., a 1980 alumna critical role of of the WUSTL law school.

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