The Journal of clinical investigation
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Historical Article
The birth of clinical body plethysmography: it was a good week.
Nearly fifty years ago, Arthur B. DuBois, Julius H. Comroe Jr., and their colleagues published two papers on the use of body plethysmography to measure lung volume and airway resistance. ⋯ Remarkably, the methods described then are still in use today in clinical pulmonary function laboratories. Though body plethysmography had been used before, there were serious technical problems; it was extraordinary that DuBois managed to solve most of these in one week. Times have changed and molecular medicine now dominates the JCI, but these articles remind us that biomedical research goes beyond the molecular.
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A small group of members of the American Society for Clinical Investigation began chatting in 1916 about the possibility of launching a new biomedical research journal. By October 1924, they managed to make the idea a reality with the publication of the first issue of the Journal of Clinical Investigation. Our 80th birthday seems an appropriate time to reflect on the history of biomedical science as it has been played out on our pages.