The AMINCO-Bowman Spectro-photofluorometer

AMINCO Steps In

Dr. Bowman had to improvise with his design. Authorized only to buy one expensive monochromator, for example, he built the other one from parts he obtained from his contacts in the New York junk shop trade. One of his parts, a Steinheil quartz prism spectrograph, had been "liberated" from Germany during the war. He made his first prototype SPF with a mixture of used and new parts, including diffraction gratings and mirrors attached to a stone benchtop and "glued" in place with wax."

Because of exciting results with the prototype, the American Instrument Company (AMINCO) of nearby Silver Spring, Maryland, became interested in marketing the new instrument. The company assigned an engineer, Hugh Howerton, to collaborate with Dr. Bowman on a commercial version of the SPF-one that could be made without wax and war relics. The first AMINCO-Bowman SPF was exhibited at the 1956 Pittsburgh Analytical Instrument Conference.

In order to build interest in its product and promote research in the field of fluorescence, AMINCO funded a postdoctoral fellowship in fluorescence analysis for research at the National Heart Institute. The first AMINCO fellow, Dr. Daniel Duggan, studied hundreds of fluorescent compounds. His research convinced Dr. Bowman and AMINCO that they should proceed with the production of the SPF.

He made his first prototype SPF with a mixture of used and new parts.

AMINCO engineer Hugh Howerton presenting a symposium about the SPF. Dr. Bowman is seated in the front row

Dr. Daniel Duggan, a postdoctoral fellow at NHI, with the first laboratory prototype of the SPF

Fluorescence News (1970s-1990s)

In the decades following Dr. Axelrod's groundbreaking work, many other scientists have used the SPF in their research. Dr. Bowman could never have imagined these applications back in 1955. He provided a tool for a new generation of scientists, who take the fluorescence phenomenon for granted and use variants of his instrument in their search for new ways to learn about the human body.
Today, fluorescence and updated versions of the SPF are used in measuring the quantity or cellular location of drugs, salts, proteins, or DNA. Other examples of research using fluorescence include: sequencing DNA; detecting viral or bacterial DNA during PCR (polymerase chain reaction) tests of potential bioterror samples; studying protein and drug activity and binding; measuring cell markers in AIDS; researching how muscles work; and tracing neuron receptors to map the brain.

He provided a tool for a new generation of scientists.

Photomicrograph of mouse fibroblast cells stained with three different dyes: two for different cytoskeletal components (green stain for actin fibers, orange for tubulin fibers), and one (violet) for the DNA coiled and packaged inside cell nuclei.