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Biomedical Computing

Digitizing Life in the United States

Joseph November

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Winner of the Computer History Museum Prize of the Special Interest Group: Computers, Information, and Society

Imagine biology and medicine today without computers. What would laboratory work be like if electronic databases and statistical software did not exist? Would disciplines like genomics even be feasible if we lacked the means to manage and manipulate huge volumes of digital data? How would patients fare in a world absent CT scans, programmable pacemakers, and computerized medical records?

Today, computers are a critical component of almost all research in biology and medicine. Yet, just...

Winner of the Computer History Museum Prize of the Special Interest Group: Computers, Information, and Society

Imagine biology and medicine today without computers. What would laboratory work be like if electronic databases and statistical software did not exist? Would disciplines like genomics even be feasible if we lacked the means to manage and manipulate huge volumes of digital data? How would patients fare in a world absent CT scans, programmable pacemakers, and computerized medical records?

Today, computers are a critical component of almost all research in biology and medicine. Yet, just fifty years ago, the study of life was by far the least digitized field of science, its living subject matter thought too complex and dynamic to be meaningfully analyzed by logic-driven computers. In this long-overdue study, historian Joseph November explores the early attempts, in the 1950s and 1960s, to computerize biomedical research in the United States.

Computers and biomedical research are now so intimately connected that it is difficult to imagine when such critical work was offline. Biomedical Computing transports readers back to such a time and investigates how computers first appeared in the research lab and doctor's office. November examines the conditions that made possible the computerization of biology—including strong technological, institutional, and political support from the National Institutes of Health—and shows not only how digital technology transformed the life sciences but also how the intersection of the two led to important developments in computer architecture and software design.

The history of this phenomenon has been only vaguely understood. November's thoroughly researched and lively study makes clear for readers the motives behind computerizing the study of life and how that technology profoundly affects biomedical research today.

Reviews

Reviews

Computers changed research in the life sciences in the 1950s and 1960s. Historian Joseph November engagingly relates how... November's style is convincing and compelling.

A fine pick for medical, science and computer collections alike.

Yes, it's about computers, but very readable.

A well-written, engaging piece of historical scholarship... One cannot help but appreciate November's talent at synthesizing and distilling a vast array of highly technical subject matter, making it accessible to not only polymaths, but also any intelligent, dedicated reader.

An interesting account of information technology's grand entry into biomedicine in the US and its impact on advances in numerous life science disciplines.

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About

Book Details

Publication Date
Status
Available
Trim Size
6
x
9
Pages
360
ISBN
9781421404684
Illustration Description
17 b&w illus.
Table of Contents

Acknowlegments
Abbreviations, Acronyms, and Initialisms
Introduction
1. Putting Molecular Biology and Medical Diagnosis into Metal Brains: Operations Research and the Origins of Biomedical Computing
2

Acknowlegments
Abbreviations, Acronyms, and Initialisms
Introduction
1. Putting Molecular Biology and Medical Diagnosis into Metal Brains: Operations Research and the Origins of Biomedical Computing
2. Building Tomorrow's Biomedicine: The National Institutes of Health's Early Mission to Computerize Biology and Medicine
3. The LINC Revolution: The Forgotten Biomedical Origins of Personal Computing
4. A New Way of Life: Computing in the Lab, in the Clinic, and at the Foundation
5. Martians, Experts, and Universitas: Biomedical Computing at Stanford University, 1960–1966
Conclusion
Notes
Essay on Sources
Index

Author Bio
Joseph A. November
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Joseph A. November

Joseph November is an assistant professor of history at the University of South Carolina.