CAREER: Life Science in the Atomic Age: The Radioactive Revolution of Biomedical Research

本职业发展计划以生物实验材料为主题，整合研究与教学。这个为期五年的研究项目致力于放射性同位素在战后生物医学中的作用，这是一个科学历史学家几乎没有接触过的主题。这项研究将有助于解决第二次世界大战后生物学重新配置的核心问题，包括物理科学家和生物学家之间关系的变化，战后生物医学研究与“大科学”的对应程度，以及实验室研究与实地科学实践的关系。与这个研究项目相结合，PI将开发两门新课程，让普林斯顿大学的学生参与历史研究，了解战后生物学的发展。一个题为“原子时代的生物学”的本科生研讨会将重点讨论广岛核爆炸后相互交织的科学和政治发展，并关注生物物理学、辐射研究（包括人体研究）以及对环境健康和安全的科学评估。在题为“战后生物医学：大科学？”的研究生研讨会上，学生将从学科、机构、赞助和研究实践等方面探讨二战后生命科学的主要趋势。为补充研讨会讨论，PI将吸引一批杰出学者到普林斯顿参加为期三天的战后生物医学科学研讨会。最后，Pis自启蒙运动以来的生物学历史年度讲座课程将围绕生命科学家不断变化的材料和实践进行重新设计，将各种仪器，生物体和当代生物工具包纳入课堂教学。该项目还将包括第二个更有限的研究项目，研究晶体学家罗莎琳德·富兰克林对烟草花叶病毒三维结构知识的贡献。除了在20世纪50年代丰富我们对分子生物学的理解之外，这一历史性的重新评估将为科学领域的女性学术研究提供及时而重要的贡献。这项研究还有更直接的好处：通过将PI的奖学金扩展到性别与科学（她每年在这个领域教授一个研讨会），该项目将更充分地整合她的教学和研究活动。这项历史研究源于她的第一本书项目，该项目展示了烟草花叶病毒如何成为生物实验的重要材料，并作为生物医学和农业研究其他病毒的模型。

This Career Development Project integrates research and teaching around the theme of materials in biological experimentation. The five-year research project addresses the role of radioisotopes in postwar biomedicine, a subject that has been virtually untouched by historians of science. This study will help resolve central issues about the reconfiguration of biology after World War II, including the changing relationship between physical scientists and biologists, the degree to which postwar biomedical research corresponded to "big science," and the relationship of practices in laboratory research to those of field science.In conjunction with this research project, the PI will develop two new courses to teach Princeton students about developments in postwar biology by involving them in historical research. An undergraduate seminar, "Biology in the Atomic Age," will focus on the intertwined scientific and political developments in the aftermath of Hiroshima, with attention to biophysics, radiation research (including that on human subjects), and scientific assessments of environmental health and safety. Students in a graduate seminar entitled "Postwar Biomedicine: Big Science?" will investigate the major trends in life science after World War II, in terms of disciplines, institutions, patronage, and research practices. To complement the seminar discussions, the PI will draw a group of outstanding scholars to Princeton for a three-day workshop on postwar biomedical science. Finally, the Pis yearly lecture course on the history of biology since the Enlightenment will be redesigned around the changing materials and practices of life scientists, incorporating various instruments, organisms, and contemporary biological kits into classroom teaching.This project will also include a second and more limited research project examining the contributions of crystallographer Rosalind Franklin to knowledge of the three-dimensional architecture of tobacco mosaic virus. In addition to enriching our understanding of molecular biology in the 1950s, this historical reassessment will provide a timely and important contribution to scholarship on women in science. The study has more immediate benefits as well: by extending the PI's scholarship to include work on gender and science (an area in which she teaches a yearly seminar) the project will more fully integrate her teaching and research activities. This historical study grows out of her first book project, which shows how tobacco mosaic virus became an important material for biological experimentation and served as a model for biomedical and agricultural research on other viruses.