Looking for intriguing short stories of medicine, modern and old, to browse a while?
Sickle (in front, orange) and normal red blood cell. Sickle cell anaemia is a genetically-inherited trait that affects red blood cells but provides resistance to malaria. (Source: Wellcome Images, available under Creative Commons licence.)
Check out the Wellcome Collection.
Billed as ’a free destination for the incurably curious’, it presents a collection of excellent photographs and accompanying stories.
Under different sections (Life, Genes & You, Mind and Body, Sickness & Health, Time & Place, Science & Art, Education), a panel of images link to stories, videos and audio tracks. Click on images to see larger copies of them.
There is a recording of Florence of Nightingale, speaking from 1890, transcribed from a wax cylinder original.
Fans of the TV series Bones, might enjoy a video describing how bones are examined, including how to determine the age and sex of skeletons.
Freelance science writer, editor and broadcaster Georgina Ferry gives a brief history of X-ray crystallography. Ferry is also the author of Max Perutz and the Secret of Life, that I hope to review. (When I can find time to read it…!)
In a room filled with skulls of the famous, the phrenologist Gall examines Pitt the Younger and Gustavus IV, the King of Sweden, both currently plagued by Napoléon. Coloured etching, 1806. (Source: Wellcome Images, available under Creative Commons licence.)
The Wellcome Trust also has a medical library, including the Wellcome Images collection, that the Wellcome Collection website draws on.
Happy browsing!
(Share your favourite finds in the comments.)
Other articles at Code for life:
Darn it, Grant, you do realise that I will now be sidetracked for hours??!