Robert Hooke (18 July 1635 - 3 March 1703) could be regarded as the father of Biomedical Communications – he has been called England’s Leonardo. He founded the field of Microscopic Biology through his published work - Micrographia.
“Modern science is replete with visual images, and the televisual image is the most powerful medium through which its ideas are now communicated to the lay public. We must not forget that this tradition of visual communication largely begins with Hooke’s Micrographia.” – Oxford Lecture on Hooke’s Accomplishments
Micrographia was the seminal publication of it’s time – the very first time someone looked through a microscope and documented what they saw.
Some readers ridiculed Hooke for paying attention to such trifling pursuits: a satirist of the time poked fun at him as “a Sot, that has spent 2000 £ in Microscopes, to find out the nature of Eels in Vinegar, Mites in Cheese, and the Blue of Plums which he has subtly found out to be living creatures.”
(The text and illustrations in Micrographia can be found here: http://www.chlt.org/sandbox/lhl/Hooke1745/)
Hooke was also the first person to coin the word “cell”. He was the first to realize the true nature of fossils and devised microscopes to study them. He invented the iris diaphragm, the diving bell, the air pump and constructed the first prototype of a respirator. He was the first to realize and conceptualize the wave properties of light. He defined Hooke’s Law – a property pertaining to the action of springs. He was a true pioneer of many other branches of science and medicine.
For more information about Robert Hooke and his contributions to science and creative thought, please visit these websites:
Robert Hooke’s Biography (University of California Berkeley).
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