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Elk restoration

4:18 pm

Thu June 2, 2011

Elk released from holding pen, some with new calves

By Véronique LaCapra

The elk brought to Missouri early last month as part of a restoration project have been released from their holding pen.

The Missouri Department of Conservation released the 34 elk along with five newborn calves on Wednesday.

The adult elk and calves have been fitted with GPS radio collars as part of a cooperative research project with the University of Missouri-Columbia. The collars will help researchers track the elk's health, movement patterns and preferred types of vegetation.

Medical research

3:05 pm

Sat May 28, 2011

Wash U zebrafish facility opens doors to large-scale genetic research, collaboration

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Credit (Véronique LaCapra, St. Louis Public Radio)

The zebrafish, Danio rerio, is a tropical freshwater fish belonging to the minnow family.

Credit (Véronique LaCapra, St. Louis Public Radio)

Developmental geneticist Liliana Solnica-Krezel speaks with visitors touring Washington University’s zebrafish facility on Friday. The large tanks on the left hold algae and small freshwater organisms called rotifers – food for the young zebrafish.

Credit (Véronique LaCapra, St. Louis Public Radio)

The tall metal units at the rear of this photo are robotic feeders. The 20 robotic feeding units in the new facility roll along tracks between the shelves of fish tanks, scanning barcodes that tell them how much food to dispense into each tank.

Credit (Véronique LaCapra, St. Louis Public Radio)

Liliana Solnica-Krezel, who spearheaded the building of the new Washington University facility, looks through a microscope at some two-hour-old zebrafish eggs, whose image is projected on the screen behind her.

Credit (Véronique LaCapra, St. Louis Public Radio)

A close-up view of the magnified, two-hour-old zebrafish eggs.

Credit (Véronique LaCapra, St. Louis Public Radio)

The Washington University zebrafish research facility can hold 7,000 tanks of fish, allowing researchers to conduct large, collaborative experiments and complete their research projects more quickly.

By Véronique LaCapra

Washington University is now home to one of the largest zebrafish research facilities in the world.

The one-inch long, striped tropical fish serve as models for studying human development and disease, from birth defects to heart disease to cancer.

Hepatitis C

6:00 am

Fri May 27, 2011

New drugs promise higher cure rates for hepatitis C

Credit (via Wikimedia commons)

High magnification micrograph of a liver with cirrhosis. Cirrhosis is a condition caused by hepatitis C.

By Véronique LaCapra

In the past couple of weeks, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved two new drugs for the treatment of hepatitis C, a virus that can cause liver damage and cancer.

The new drugs should greatly improve cure rates for the more than three million Americans affected by this potentially fatal disease.

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