history
Archivist's Choice – Favorite Historical NIH Photos
For September's Office of NIH History blog entry, Archivist Barbara Harkins picked out a few of her favorite photos to highlight from the collection—a difficult task when limited to only eight! We hope you enjoy these images, and please let us know which ones are your favorites in the comments.
Remembrances: Alexis Shelokov (1919–2016)
Alexis Shelokov, who studied the polio virus at the NIH in the 1950s and was a powerful scientific force in what would become the famed NIAID Laboratory of Infectious Diseases in Building 7, died on December 12, 2016, in Dallas, Texas. He had a prolific scientific career that took him around the world.
NIH Heart Surgery Artifacts – Aortic Valve Bypass Assembly
Sometimes as a museum curator, I come across a box in the collection with a vague marking and full of bits and pieces of … something. One of the coolest things is finding out what that something was and who created it. This photo shows pieces from the NIH lab of Dr. Stanley Sarnoff, dating from 1954-1962.
Biomedical Innovation at NIH — Then and Now
To paraphrase President Obama from his guest editorial in the November issue of Wired magazine, there’s never been a better time to be alive. One NIH institute leading us into the future is the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering (NIBIB), which supports avant-garde investigators at the nexus of engineering and the physical and life sciences with innovations that improve global health.
Developing Methods to Study the Brain's Visual System in Action
How does the brain know that what we’re looking at is standing still or moving? Dr. Robert H. Wurtz developed methods for studying the visual system, a technique now widely used for the study of higher brain functions, to find the answer to that question.
Sliding Through Science History, Part 2
Are you beginning to think that slide rules look alike? If you could see the types and number of scales, you’d understand that each slide rule model is different. There are specialized scales for cubes, spheres, voltage, etc. Check out a few of the slide rules that made history with IRP investigators.
Sliding Through Science History
What do Isaac Newton, Thomas Jefferson, Albert Einstein, and Apollo astronauts have in common? They all used slide rules! We're highlighting some of the slide rules in our collection used by scientists at the NIH in their quest to improve human health.
New NIH Museum Acquisitions: Benjamin to Buttons
It’s hard to imagine that just 26 years ago, getting email capability was a big achievement, because connectivity and computers go hand in hand. In 1990, the National Institutes of Health Utility Network (NUnet) connected all 36 NIH buildings on and off campus.
New NIH Museum Acquisitions: Computer Boards to Coloring Books
Have you ever had a PET scan? (That’s short for positron emission tomography.) This computer board, called a discriminator, was one of 64 in the Neuro-PET scanner designed and built at the NIH under the direction of Dr. Giovanni De Chiro.
Early Women Scientists of NIH, Part 2
Like many in the second wave of women scientists at the National Institutes of Health, Dr. Margaret Kelly began as a technician and got her PhD while she was working. Kelly focused on what caused cancer and what drugs could be used to fight it.
