Calls for the "translation" of research from bench to bedside are increasingly demanding. What is translation, and why does it matter? We sketch the recent history of outcome-oriented translational research in the United States, with a particular focus on the Roadmap Initiative of the National Institutes of Health (Bethesda, MD). Our main example of contemporary translational research is stem cell research, which has superseded genomics as the translational object of choice. We explore the nature of and obstacles to translational research and assess the ethical and biomedical challenges of embracing a translational ethos.
R einforced by the dismal U.S. performame on the Third International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS), deploring our lack of scientific literacy has become quite popular recently. By the broadest defition, more than 90% of Americans are scientifically illiteratean appalling statistic by anyone's standards and possibly a threat to our well-being. Yet with all this agreement we see astonishing ambiguity-and two different defitions of scientific literacy. The first emphasizes practical results and stresses short-term instrumental good, notably training immediately productive members of society with specific facts and skills. We call this science litemcy, with its focus on gaining units of scientific or technical knowledge. Second is scientific litemcy, which emphasizes scientific ways of knowing and the process of thinking critically and creatively about the natural world. Advocates of the second assume that it is good to have critical thinkers, that scientific litemcy is an inScientific tXinSic good--on m0rd and other principled grounds. literacy ptavidesBeing scientifically literate helps people to live and fulfilling, and not in the distasteful sense of eating good-for-you bran flakes). According to this view, 1 "good" lives (in the philosophers' sense of reflective a necessary but not sufficient science is beautiful, exciting, and fun. Becoming scientifically literate produces skeptical, creative habits basis for making of mind that are valuable for everyone.The two approaches are often in tension and have informed social different implications for education, testing, and public funding of science. Promoting scientific literacy decisions.requires a new way of teaching for which few teachers are prepared. It stresses long-term process over L short-term product and questions over answers. The student may possess less knowledge, but has skills for adapting to the challenges of a rapidly changing world. Political leaders and iducators resist working toward the long-term goals of scientific literacy because of pressures to generate immediate outcomes such as higher test scores or more people with B.A.' s trained for technical jobs. In contrast, we advocate integrating the short-term goals of knowing science (facts and skills) and the long-term goals of scientific literacy. We must have a society rich in both critical, creative scientific thinkers and enough knowledgeable experts to do today's work.We need both science literacy and scientific literacy for effective participation in the real world. Some people do need specific information, but informed decision-making is a social process and also requires a society of scientifically literate thinkers to make wise choices and to help combat racism, sexism, bigotry, and social injustice by allowing us to distinguish reliable scientific information fiom unsubstantiated claims and pseudoscience.Scientific literacy improves decision-making when we select a doctor or medical treatments. It teaches us to ask why we should take the entire course of an antibiotic, and why ...
Regenerative medicine is not new; it has not sprung anew out of stem cell science as has often been suggested. There is a rich history of study of regeneration, of development, and of the ways in which understanding regeneration advances study of development and also has practical and medical applications. This paper explores the history of regenerative medicine, starting especially with T.H. Morgan in 1901 and carrying through the history of transplantation research in the 20th century, to an emphasis on translational medicine in the late 20th century.
Diagrams make it possible to present scientific facts in more abstract and generalized form. While some detail is lost, simplified and accessible knowledge is gained. E.B. Wilson's work in cytology provides a case study of changing uses of diagrams and accompanying abstraction. In his early work, Wilson presented his data in photographs, which he saw as coming closest to "fact." As he gained confidence in his interpretations, and as he sought to provide a generalized textbook account of cell development, he relied on increasingly abstract diagrams. In addition, he came to see that highly abstract and even schematic drawings could provide more than pictures directly from life.KEY WORDS: Abstract(ion), cell, cytology, diagram, drawing, fact, knowledge, photograph, Wilson.Rather than considering more familiar questions about the way that theories get represented or illustrated, this paper turns the emphasis around and asks first about the nature of illustrations or diagrams as a guide to what they are intended to illustrate. The focus, then, is on the illustrations themselves and the way that they are used within a text. Whether they are taken to be representing anythingeither nature directly, knowledge generally, or theories more specifically -is a question to be addressed later. The particular example selected for discussion is the classic work of cytologist Edmund Beecher Wilson in cellular development.Wilson began to study the details of cell development at a time when few others did, especially in the United States. By 1895, he had decided to portray the early developmental stages visually in one volume and to compile the wider range of known facts about the cell into a second volume. His path to these two books is instructive since it undoubtedly influenced his determination to present his information in what he saw as the most compelling way. Photographs and diagrams played respectively central roles in depicting what he accepted as established knowledge in each work. E. B. WILSONAs a midwestern American who taught in a one room schoolhouse for a year, Wilson decided that he had better pursue an education. Acting on the advice of his cousin Samuel Clarke, Wilson followed Clarke to Antioch College for a year
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