Santiago Ramón y Cajal was the first to describe the nervous system, including neurons, in exquisite detail. His original drawings, as well as information about current NIH neuroscience, are on exhibit in NIH Building 35, the Porter Neuroscience Center.
How medical researchers study diseases, by answering three basic questions. Focuses on Dr. Roscoe Brady's team at NINDS and their work with Gaucher disease.
Formally titled “Rewriting the Book of Nature: Charles Darwin and the Rise of Evolutionary Theory,” the exhibit describes the Charles Darwin’s life and the fortunes of the theory of evolution by natural selection.
Cracking the genetic code allowed us to study diseases at the molecular level, which has increased our knowledge of potential preventions and treatments for diseases. The study of genetics has become central to the science of medicine. This exhibit asks many questions: How do genes cause disease? Can gene therapy work? How do we manipulate genes and should we?
NIBIB: Improving Health Through Emerging Technologies
This exhibit places some examples of cutting-edge research, funded by the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering, in historical context. The virtual exhibit is under construction but you can visit the NIBIB Emerging Technology Exhibit in person in Building 31.
The quest to free us from a dependence upon certain flowers by developing a synthetic source for morphine and codeine and the development of new painkillers is described. This work at NIDDK resulted in the NIH Total Opiate Synthesis method.
The Real Time Picture Processor (RTPP) was one of the first special-purpose hardware computers developed for grayscale image processing and was designed to aid in biological image analysis.
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The National Cancer Institute Real Time Picture Processor
This looks at the history of the home pregnancy test and examines its place in our culture. Research that led to a sensitive, accurate pregnancy test was done by scientists in the Reproductive Research Branch of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development at the National Institutes of Health.
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Pregnancy Test - A Thin Blue Line The History of the Pregnancy Test
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Innovation and Invention: NIH and Prosthetic Heart Valves
This exhibition describes the discoveries that led to the heart-lung machine and open heart surgery, the number of experimental replacement valves that were invented and implanted, the role that NIH played in the 1960s and 70s in developing and testing these medical devices, and the public safety and regulatory responsibilities that were entrusted to the FDA.
This Siemens 1-A Electron Microscope was used for over three decades by Dr. Albert Kapikian, NIAID. The instrument was used to detect and characterize various viruses.
