A First Attempt at Non-Intrusive Medical Imaging: Alexander Graham Bell and the Assassination of US President Garfield
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| When |
Dec 10, 2012 from 04:00 pm to 05:00 pm |
| Where | G 4, Lecture hall, NIUS building, HBCSE-TIFR |
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Speaker: Prof. Dean Zollman, Kansas State University, Manhattan, Kansas, USA
Venue: G 4, Lecture hall, NIUS building, HBCSE-TIFR, V. N. Purav Marg, Near Anushaktinagar Bus Terminus, Mankhurd, Mumbai 400088.
Abstract:
In an assassination attempt, United States President James Garfield was shot on July 2, 1881. A bullet was lodged deep in President Garfield’s body. Knowledge of location of the bullet was needed quickly to decide on the medical treatment required to save Garfield’s life. Alexander Graham Bell proposed that he use his newly invented telephone and another relatively new development, the induction balance, to locate the bullet. These devices were invented using some fundamental principle of electricity and magnetism. Bell combined these devices to create the first metal detector and used it in an attempt at medical imaging inside a body without surgery. (X-rays had not yet been discovered.) His device successfully detected metal in carcasses of animals and in United States Civil War veterans but the attempt to find the location of the bullet in President Garfield was not successful. A combination of scientific, political, and personal reasons led to Bell’s failure. In this presentation I will demonstrate the basic principles of Bell’s attempt and the value of physics in this early attempt at non-invasive medical imaging. With this knowledge we will be able to understand the surprising reason for Bell’s failure to find the bullet in President Garfield.
*Supported by the US National Science Foundation grant number PHY-0851599.
About the speaker:
Dr. Dean Zollman is University Distinguished Professor and Distinguished University Teaching Scholar. For ten years begiinning in 2001 he was Head of the Department of Physics and William and Joan Porter Professor at Kansas State University.
He has focused his scholarly activities on research and development in physics education since 1972. He has received three major awards – the National Science Foundations Director’s Award for Distinguished Teacher Scholars (2004), the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching Doctoral University Professor of the Year (1996), and American Association of Physics Teachers’ Robert A. Millikan Medal (1995).
His present research concentrates on investigating the mental models and operations that students develop as they learn physics and how students transfer knowledge in the learning process. He also applies cutting edge technology to the teaching physics and to providing instructional and pedagogical materials to physics teachers, particularly those teachers whose background does not include a significant amount of physics.
Dr. Zollman earned his PhD in Theoretical Nuclear Physics from the University of Maryland – College Park (1970) and his MS (1965) and BS (1964) from Indiana University – Bloomington.
