Issue: 2012 January 9
Six Johns Hopkins researchers elected to 2011 AAAS
January 9, 2012
Six Johns Hopkins researchers have been elected by their peers as fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Barry Zirkin of the Bloomberg School of Public Health; Kit Hansell Bowen and Sarah Woodson of the Krieger School of Arts and Sciences; and Andrew Feinberg, Min Li and Paula Pitha-Rowe of the School […]
IOM committee calls for end to most research on chimpanzees
January 9, 2012
In a report released Dec. 15 on the use of chimpanzees in biomedical and behavioral research, the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies of Science called for a dramatic shift away from federally funded experimentation on humanity’s closest relative in the animal kingdom. The report concludes that scientific advances now provide effective alternatives to […]
Wm. Polk Carey, whose gift launched business school, dies at 81
January 9, 2012
At the turn of the 21st century, Johns Hopkins was one of only three top-ranked U.S. universities without a full-time business school. JHU had offered business courses since the early 1900s, but in a part-time format. Then, on Jan. 1, 2007, a sea change: The Johns Hopkins Carey Business School was launched with Wm. Polk […]
$9.5 mill federal grant to support ‘asthma genome’ project
January 9, 2012
A Johns Hopkins–led team of experts in genetics, immunology, epidemiology and allergic disease has embarked on a four-year effort to map the genetic code, or whole genome, of 1,000 people of African descent, including men and women from Baltimore. Researchers say that their initial goal is to find genetic variations underlying asthma and to explain why […]
Marsha Wills-Karp to chair SPH’s Environmental Health Sciences
January 9, 2012
Marsha Wills-Karp, a leader in the study of the molecular mechanisms of asthma, has been selected to chair the Department of Environmental Health Sciences at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Wills-Karp joined the Bloomberg School on Jan. 1 and will assume her full duties as department chair on March 1. “Marsha is […]
Scientists engineer mosquito immune system to block malaria
January 9, 2012
Researchers at the Johns Hopkins Malaria Research Institute have demonstrated for the first time that the Anopheles mosquito’s innate immune system could be genetically engineered to block the transmission of the malaria-causing parasite to humans. In addition, they showed that the genetic modification had little impact on the mosquito’s fitness under laboratory conditions. The researchers’ […]
Babies remember even as they seem to forget, psychologist finds
January 9, 2012
Fifteen years ago, textbooks on human development stated that babies of six months of age or younger had no sense of “object permanence,” the psychological term that describes an infant’s belief that an object still exists even when it is out of sight. That meant that if mom or dad wasn’t in the same room […]
Costly diagnostic MRIs unnecessary for many back pain patients
January 9, 2012
Johns Hopkins–led research suggests that routine MRI imaging does nothing to improve the treatment of patients who need injections of steroids into their spinal columns to relieve pain. Moreover, MRI plays only a small role in a doctor’s decision to give these epidural steroid injections, or ESIs, the most common procedure performed at pain clinics […]
Time for a change? Scholars say calendar needs serious overhaul
January 9, 2012
Researchers at The Johns Hopkins University have discovered a way to make time stand still—at least when it comes to the yearly calendar. Using computer programs and mathematical formulas, Richard Conn Henry, an astrophysicist in the Krieger School of Arts and Sciences, and Steve H. Hanke, an applied economist in the Whiting School of Engineering, […]
HIV treatment discovery is called Breakthrough of the Year
January 9, 2012
The finding of a team of researchers that HIV treatment with antiretroviral drugs can actually prevent transmission of the virus from an infected person to his or her uninfected partner has been named Breakthrough of the Year for 2011 by the journal Science. The clinical trial, known as HPTN 052, demonstrated that early initiation of […]