Research

More people live in poverty in Baltimore's suburbs than in the city itself, part of a nationwide shift that is challenging the largely urban assistance network built up over decades. Suburban poverty in the Baltimore area grew 58 percent between 2000 and 2011, compared with 4 percent in the city, according to research released Monday by the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank. Such lopsided growth in the last decade is the reason the suburban poor now outnumber the urban poor — an eye-opening change for a region long used to thinking of suburban residents as the haves and Baltimoreans as the have-nots.

In reference to "Harford County Council passes resolution condemning state gun law" (May 15), the article quotes a Harford County councilman who questioned the objectivity of gun policy research at Johns Hopkins University because New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg is a major benefactor. I direct the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research and have been conducting research on gun policy for the past 23 years. Over this time, I have led numerous studies related to gun violence and published the results in 78 articles in scientific journals.

It's a dream Ida Heck never really expected to come true. Her family has raised about $1 million since 2005 for research into the rare disorder that afflicts her 8-year-old daughter, Jenna, resulting in cognitive deficits, seizures, long-lasting migraines, glaucoma in one eye and a red birthmark on the right side of her face. She's been driven by a fervent hope that the money would help finance a breakthrough. Yet she had her doubts: "So often you give and give and give and never hear of any findings.

Editor: In response to "Harford County Council passes resolution condemning state gun law" (May 15th, 2013): The article quotes a Harford County Councilman who questioned the objectivity of gun policy research at Johns Hopkins University because New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg is a major benefactor.  I direct the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research, and have been conducting research on gun policy for the past 23 years....

Anna Whetstone, 23, was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis when she was 17. She was a high school junior in Hershey, Pa., playing on her school's field hockey team when she got hit in the head with a ball. "I was feeling fine at the time," she said, but over the next few days she had trouble with balance and "wasn't feeling well overall. " Computed tomography scans and an MRI discovered the telltale lesions that are signs of the degenerative disease. After the diagnosis, Whetstone switched from playing to coaching field hockey, but she continued dancing and she earned a neuroscience degree, with honors, at Moravian College in Pennsylvania.

In her April 23 column, “Forcing landlords to accept vouchers won't help the poor,” Marta H. Mossburg quoted me as saying that laws prohibiting landlords to accept Section 8 vouchers “exacerbate” the problem of finding housing for the poor. That's wrong. When Ms. Mossburg interviewed me for her column, I was clear: banning housing discrimination based on source of income will help increase housing options for the poor. I told her about fieldwork I've done with families in Baltimore; Mobile, Ala.; and New Haven, Stamford and Norwalk, Conn., where I repeatedly heard about landlords refusing to rent to parents who were trying to secure housing.

Edward L. "Mac" McDill, former chairman of the Johns Hopkins University's sociology department who was also the founding director of the Hopkins Center for Social Organization of Schools, died April 25 of prostate cancer at Gilchrist Hospice Care in Towson. The Mays Chapel resident was 82. "Mac was a friend and a mentor. He was the pillar of the department and held it together when we went through some pretty rough times," said Karl Alexander, who succeeded Dr. McDill as department chair.

Synthetic marijuana ranked in the top three substances abused by the nation's high school students in 2012, according to a new report compiled by the Center for Substance Abuse Research at the University of Maryland, College Park . The drug -- herbs treated with chemicals designed to mimic the effects of marijuana -- ranked third next to alcohol and marijuana, which 57 percent and 39 percent of students in grades nine through 12...

A Sinai Hospital cardiologist is launching a clinical trial of a type of coronary artery disease drug not yet tested in humans, building on a history at the Baltimore hospital of research to develop more effective treatments to prevent blood clotting. Dr. Paul Gurbel is studying an intravenous drug for patients undergoing cardiac stenting, when mesh tubes are implanted to widen blocked arteries. The drug, known for now as PZ-128, would be given to patients after stent implantation to prevent platelets from sticking together around the device, potentially leading to heart attack.

As Maryland Historical Society librarian Francis O'Neill described the winding route to reconstructing the history of Baltimore's homes, a small but eager crowd paid close attention. No one made for the exits, even as he laid new twists on old turns. "We're not Google," said his colleague, Eben Dennis. "There's not one place you can plug in a keyword and get a photo. " But for those willing to put in some effort, the society has almost a million pictures of buildings from the city and beyond.