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Organized with the assistance of Professor John Clifton (Harpenden) and chaired by Professor Peter Williams (Manchester), this seminar examined the early developments of medical physics in the UK between 1945 and 1990. Participants discussed a range of themes including medical physics before and during the war, the role of the King's Fund and the formation of the Hospital Physicist's Association (HPA), expansion of medical physics outside radiotherapy and to non-radiation physics (ultrasound, medical instrumentation, bioengineering, use of digital computers), developing regional services and links with industry. The seminar finished with a discussion on the changing scene in the 1980s, covering topics such as funding, academic and undergraduate medical physics, imaging, CT, NMR and others. Participants included Mr Tom Ashton, Dr Barry Barber, Professors Roland Blackwell and Terence Burlin, Dr Joseph Blau, Mr Bob (John) Burns, Professors John Clifton, David Delpy, Philip Dendy and Jack Fowler, Dr Jean Guy, Mr John Haggith, Drs John Haybittle, Alan Jennings and John Law, Professors John Mallard and Joe McKie, Mr David Murnaghan, Professor Angela Newing, Dr Sydney Osborn, Professor Rodney Smallwood, Dr Adrian Thomas, Dr Peter Tothill, Mr Theodore Tulley, Professors Peter Wells and John West and Mr John Wilkinson
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DEVELOPMENT OF PHYSICS APPLIED TO MEDICINE IN THE UK, 1945–1990 The transcript of a Witness Seminar held by the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at UCL, London, on 5 July 2005 Edited by D A Christie and E M Tansey
Volume 28 2006
©The Trustee of the Wellcome Trust, London, 2006 First published by the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at UCL, 2006 The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at UCL is funded by the Wellcome Trust, which is a registered charity, no. 210183. ISBN 0 85484 108 3 ISBN 978 085484 108 0
All volumes are freely available online following the links to Publications/Wellcome Witnesses at www.ucl.ac.uk/histmed
Technology Transfer in Britain:The case of monoclonal antibodies; Self and Non-Self: A history of autoimmunity; Endogenous Opiates; The Committee on Safety of Drugs • Making the Human Body Transparent: The impact of NMR and MRI; Research in General Practice; Drugs in Psychiatric Practice; The MRC Common Cold Unit • Early Heart Transplant Surgery in the UK • Haemophilia: Recent history of clinical management • Looking at the Unborn: Historical aspects of obstetric ultrasound • Post Penicillin Antibiotics: From acceptance to resistance? • Clinical Research in Britain, 1950–1980 • Intestinal Absorption • Origins of Neonatal Intensive Care in the UK • British Contributions to Medical Research and Education in Africa after the Second World War • Childhood Asthma and Beyond • Maternal Care • Population-based Research in South Wales:The MRC Pneumoconiosis Research Unit and the MRC Epidemiology Unit • Peptic Ulcer: Rise and fall • Leukaemia • The MRC Applied Psychology Unit • Genetic Testing • Foot and Mouth Disease: The 1967 outbreak and its aftermath • EnvironmentalToxicology:The legacy of Silent Spring • Cystic Fibrosis • Innovation in Pain Management •The Rhesus Factor and Disease Prevention • The Recent History of Platelets in Thrombosis and Other Disorders • Short-course Chemotherapy for Tuberculosis • Prenatal Corticosteroids for Reducing Morbidity and Mortality after Preterm Birth • Public Health in the 1980s and 1990s: Decline and rise? • Cholesterol, Atherosclerosis and Coronary Disease in the UK, 1950–2000 • Development of Physics Applied to Medicine in the UK, 1945–1990
CONTENTS Illustrations and credits
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Abbreviations
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Witness Seminars: Meetings and publications; Acknowledgements E M Tansey and D A Christie
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Introduction Jeff Hughes Tran