Clinical Chemistry 57:8
1118–1126 (2011)
A Guide to the History of Clinical Chemistry
Larry J. Kricka1* and John Savory2
BACKGROUND: This review was written as part of the cel-
ebration of the International Year of Chemistry 2011.
CONTENT: In this review we provide a chronicle of the
history of clinical chemistry, with a focus on North
America. We outline major methodological advances
and trace the development of professional societies and
journals dedicated to clinical chemistry. This review
also serves as a guide to reference materials for those
interested in the history of clinical chemistry. The var-
ious resources available, in sound recordings, videos,
moving images, image and document archives, muse-
ums, and websites dedicated to diagnostic company
timelines, are surveyed.
SUMMARY: These resources provide a map of how the
medical subspecialty of clinical chemistry arrived at its
present state. This information will undoubtedly help
visionaries to determine in which direction clinical
chemistry will move in the future.
© 2011 American Association for Clinical Chemistry
The International Year of Chemistry 2011, designated
by the United Nations General Assembly, has the goal
of increasing public awareness of chemistry in meeting
world needs, increasing the interest of young people in
chemistry, generating enthusiasm for the creative fu-
ture of chemistry, and celebrating the 100th anniver-
sary of Madam Curie’s Nobel Prize. Clinical chemistry
most certainly must be featured in such an initiative
because it plays a key role in the diagnosis and treat-
ment of the sick and in the maintenance of health
through preventative medicine. Clinical chemistry also
has a direct link to the contributions of Marie Curie
through the development of the technique of RIA
(which led to Roslyn Yalow’s Nobel Prize). This tech-
nique has revolutionized endocrinology and has led to
remarkable contributions to other subspecialties (such
as toxicology and cardiology).
1
Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, University of Pennsylvania
Medical Center, Philadelphia, PA; 2 Department of Pathology, University of
Virginia, Charlottesville, VA.
* Address correspondence to this author at: Department of Pathology and
Laboratory Medicine, 3400 Spruce St., Philadelphia, PA 19104-4283. Fax 215-
662-7529; e-mail kricka@mail.med.upenn.edu.
Received March 18, 2011; accepted March 29, 2011.
Previously published online at DOI: 10.1373/clinchem.2011.165233
1118
Review
International Year of Chemistry 2011
To write this review we have delved into the ar-
chives of clinical chemistry to provide a guide to refer-
ence materials, with a focus on North America, to help
those interested in the history of clinical chemistry.
These archival materials provide a map of how this
medical subspecialty arrived at its present state, infor-
mation that will undoubtedly help visionaries to deter-
mine the direction in which clinical chemistry will
move in the future.
Clinical chemistry is the term most commonly
used around the world to define the field, although
clinical biochemistry and chemical pathology are also
widely used. Because chemistry is the foundation of the
science that underlies biochemistry and pathophysiol-
ogy, it is appropriate to use the term clinical chemistry.
To reach the level of sophistication that defines present
day clinical chemistry, major advances in analytical
chemistry, biochemistry, and pathophysiology have
been necessary. Clinical chemistry is that branch of
medical science that involves the analysis of biological
materials, usually body fluids, to provide diagnostic in-
formation on the state of the human body. Veterinary
clinical chemistry is a branch of clinical chemistry ap-
plied to animals. The production of accurate, precise,
and timely results, and the interpretation of these re-
sults and assessment of margins of error, are key ele-
ments in clinical chemistry and are the most important
skills of the clinical chemist.
Chronicle of the History of Clinical Chemistry
This discipline, which could originally be practiced in
small laboratories in which relatively few manual tests
were performed, now requires highly automated and in-
tegrated laboratories that perform millions of tests each
year (Fig. 1). There is a body of literature, albeit not exten-
sive, in which the history of clinical chemistry is chroni-
cled. Table 1 lists the most significant general reviews of
the field, most of which chronicle the development of
clinical chemistry from its beginnings in antiquity (1–11 ).
Johannes Büttner has contributed several articles
and books based on research of the roots of clinical
chemistry, with a primary focus on clinical chemistry
in Germany (3– 6 ). These texts include History of Clin-
ical Chemistry (5 ), edited by Büttner, which explores
the origins of clinical chemistry. The most ambitious
publication on the history of clinical chemistry is a
book by Louis Rosenfeld, Four Centuries of Clinical
History of Clinical Chemistry
Review
International Year of Chemistry 2011

Fig. 1. The clinical chemistry laboratory then and now.

(A), Then: Otto Folin in the biochemistry laboratory at McLean Hospital, Boston, MA in 1905 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:
1905_Otto_Folin_in_biochemistry_lab_at_McLean_Hospital_byAHFolsom_Harvard.png). (B), Now: the Autolab in the Depart-
ment of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, in 2011.

Chemistry (9 ), which describes the development of
knowledge of analytical chemistry and biochemistry
and the emergence of clinical chemistry. Contributions
beginning in the 16th century and leading to more re-
cent times are covered. Specific assays that formed the
cornerstone of the clinical chemistry laboratory in the
1960s are described, such as glucose, urea, creatinine,
electrolytes, cholesterol, some basic enzymes, total pro-
tein, and albumin/globulin. Of course, the contribu-
tions and impact of Donald Dexter Van Slyke, Stanley
Benedict, and Otto Folin are prominently featured, as
is the introduction of analysis by color comparison and
the Duboscq colorimeter, invented by Jules Duboscq in
1870. Rosenfeld’s extensive publication was preceded
in 1973 by an article by Wendell Caraway, a practicing
clinical chemist in Michigan who graced the clinical
chemistry scene in the post–World War II era. Caraway
was the president of AACC from 1965 to 1966 and was

Clinical Chemistry 57:8 (2011) 1119

Review
International Year of Chemistry 2011

Table 1. General history of clinical chemistry.

Title Year Reference

Scientific Development of Clinical Chemistry to 1948 1979 Caraway (1 )

Major Developments in Clinical Chemistry Instrumentation 1981 Caraway (2 )
Emergence of Clinical Chemistry in the 19th Century: Presuppositions and 1982 Hickel (3 )
Consequences
From Medicinal Chemistry to Biochemistry: The Making of a Biomedical 1982 Kohler (4 )
Discipline
History of Clinical Chemistry 1983 Büttner (5 )
Roots of Clinical Chemistry 1987 Büttner and Habrich (6 )
Clinical Chemistry as Scientific Discipline: Historical Perspectives 1994 Büttner (7 )
Laboratory Instrumentation in Clinical Biochemistry: A Historical Perspective 1997 Olukoga et al. (8 )
Four Centuries of Clinical Chemistry 1999 Rosenfeld (9 )
A Golden Age of Clinical Chemistry 2000 Rosenfeld (10 )
Clinical Chemistry since 1800: Growth and Development 2002 Rosenfeld (11 )

a pioneer in chronicling the history of clinical chemis-
try. His landmark papers (1, 2 ) are concise and present
a fascinating exploration of the origins of the field.
Major technological milestones that have contrib-
uted to the present day clinical chemistry laboratory
are listed in Table 2 (2, 12–23 ). The analytical balance
has been known since antiquity because the accurate
weighing of gold and other precious materials was vi-
tally important in ancient civilizations and contributed
to the development of trade and accumulation of
wealth. Spectrophotometry, a development that dates
back more than a century, has, in all of its forms, cer-
tainly contributed the most to the process of perform-
ing basic measurements in the routine clinical chemis-
try laboratory. Previously known as colorimetry, this
method was used for most of the early clinical chemis-
try assays such as urea, creatinine, uric acid, glucose,
total protein, and albumin. Chemical reactions be-

Table 2. Milestones in the application of instrumental techniques to clinical chemistry.

Instrument/technique Developer Year Reference

Analytical balance for urinalysis Bang IC 1913 Caraway (2 )

Duboscq colorimeter for the measurement Folin O 1904 Caraway (2 )
of creatinine in urine
Beckman DU spectrophotometer Cary AH and Beckman AO 1941 Caraway (2 )
Atomic spectroscopy
Flame photometry Hald P 1947 Hald (12 )
Atomic absorption Zettner A 1964 Zettner and Seligson (13 )
Gasometric analysis Haldane JS 1912 Caraway (2 )
Electrochemical techniques Hober R 1900 Caraway (2 )
Proficiency testing Sunderman FW Sr 1945 Sunderman (14 )
Zone electrophoresis Cremer HD and Tiselius A 1950 Cremer and Tiselius (15 )
Durrum EL 1950 Durrum (16 )
RIA Berson SA and Yalow RS 1959 Berson and Yalow (17 )
Monoclonal antibodies Schwaber J 1973 Schwaber and Cohen (18 )
Automation Skeggs LT 1957 Skeggs (19 )
Computers Sunderman FW Jr. et al. 1968 Sunderman (20 ), Sunderman et al. (21 )
Point-of-care testing/dry reagent technology Free AH et al. 1957 Free et al. (22 )
PCR Mullis K 1983 Mullis et al. (23 )

1120 Clinical Chemistry 57:8 (2011)

History of Clinical Chemistry
tween the analyte and a reagent that possessed some
degree of specificity were used with a final colorimetric
measurement and calculated against a standard curve.
Most reactions were relatively insensitive and required
relatively high volumes of sample that would lead to
protein precipitation. Hence, protein-free filtrates
were usually required and resulted in time-consuming
measurements. The introduction of enzymes as re-
agents and the use of measurement in the ultraviolet
wavelength range led to increased sensitivity, decreased
sample volume, and simpler analytical procedures.
Urease, which converts urea to ammonium ion, was
used as early as 1914 (24 ). The modern clinical chem-
istry laboratory now uses a wide variety of photometric
techniques, including fluorescence, fluorescence po-
larization, nephelometry, chemiluminescence, phos-
phorescence, and electrochemiluminescence. It is with
some hesitation that we include the technique of gas-
ometry into this list of important breakthroughs in
technology. Gasometric techniques were doomed to
extinction from their first use because they were so
cumbersome and fraught with mercury-related envi-
ronmental problems; however, the use of such meth-
ods led to a basic understanding of blood gases and
acid– base balance. There is no question that the inven-
tion of the continuous-flow autoanalyzer changed the
character of clinical chemistry testing so that minutes
rather than hours (or days) were needed to complete an
analysis, and personnel were then free to develop
emerging subspecialties such as toxicology, endocri-
nology, and later, molecular diagnostics. Other inno-
vative approaches to automation were also introduced,
including the centrifugal analyzer developed by Nor-
man Anderson in 1968 (25 ). This instrument was the
first clinical analyzer to incorporate a computer. The
final autoanalyzer, the SMAC (Sequential Multiple An-
alyzer with Computer), introduced in 1974, also had a
built-in computer. An instrument known as the Robot
Chemist, which was introduced by the Research Spe-
cialties Company in 1959, used conventional cuvettes
with automatic pipetting and mixing, but the mechan-
ical complexity of the instrument made it impractical.
One of us (J. Savory) worked with both the first auto-
analyzer and the Robot Chemist and can attest to the
above statement. Eventually automated pipetting was
perfected and it is now the approach of choice for au-
tomation in clinical chemistry laboratories, thanks
mainly to the introduction of the Beckman Astra in
1978. As early as 1949, Örjan Ouchterlony used anti-
bodies as reagents for immunodiffusion methods (26 ),
but the major breakthrough was with the application of
RIA, which was developed by Solomon Berson and Ro-
salyn Yalow and for which Yalow was awarded the No-
bel Prize. The introduction of this method made avail-
able for the first time highly specific and sensitive
Review
International Year of Chemistry 2011
Table 3. Histories of key techniques and
technologies in clinical chemistry.
Technique Reference
Filter paper electrophoresis Martin and Franglen (28 )
Clinical enzymology Büttner (29 )
Urinalysis White (30 )
Blood gas analysis Severinghaus and Astrup (31 ),
Breathnach (32 )
Dry chemistry (Eastman Kodak) Kaiser (40 )
Lipid and lipoprotein testing Sunderman (41 )
Enzyme immunoassay/ELISA Simpson (42 ), Young et al (43 )
Molecular (DNA/RNA) Meites (44 )
diagnostics
Immunoassay Wu (27 )
methods for measurement of a wide variety of hor-
mones, proteins, and drugs. This technique replaced
other bioassays for pregnancy, including follicle-
stimulating hormone, and indirect hormone tests such as
17-ketosteroids. Many immunoassay techniques are used
in clinical chemistry laboratories and are reviewed in Ta-
ble 3 (27 ). Other than the invention of RIA, the most
important development in immunoassay techniques was
the ability to produce monoclonal antibodies, which have
served as immensely important reagents with a large vari-
ety of applications. Controversy exists as to who first pro-
duced monoclonal antibodies in the laboratory, but this
achievement is often ascribed to Jerrold Schwaber (18 ).
Other important milestones in clinical chemistry and ac-
counts of their histories are listed in Table 2 and Table 3
(27–37 ), respectively. These milestones include the intro-
duction of computers to handle the massive amounts of
data produced by the modern clinical chemistry labora-
tory; the development of dry reagent technology, which
has revolutionized point-of-care and self-testing; profi-
ciency testing to improve quality; and, of course, PCR,
which has brought molecular diagnostics into the fore-
front of diagnostic testing.
As clinical chemistry developed as a medical sub-
specialty in different parts of the world, professional
societies and journals were founded to represent and
cater to the professional needs of clinical chemists.
There are historical accounts of clinical chemistry in
Britain (38, 39 ), France (39 ), Austria (40 ), the US
(41 ), and Scotland (42 ).
Histories have also been written of 2 important
early US clinical chemistry laboratories, the William
Pepper Laboratory of Clinical Medicine of the Univer-
sity of Pennsylvania (Fig. 2), (43 ) and the Children’s
Hospital of Columbus, Ohio (44 ). In addition, the his-
tory of the journal Clinical Chemistry has been summa-
rized by its long-time editor J. Stanton King (45 ).
Clinical Chemistry 57:8 (2011) 1121
Review
International Year of Chemistry 2011

Fig. 2. (A), William Pepper Laboratory of Clinical Medicine, Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, circa 1925,
(built 1894 –1897, Cope and Stewardson, architects, demolished in 1928) (©courtesy of the University of Pennsyl-
vania Archives); (B), the terra cotta frieze from the north face of the William Pepper Laboratory of Clinical Medicine
now displayed on the seventh floor of the Maloney building at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania.

One of the most fascinating aspects of the study of
the history of clinical chemistry is the lives of those who
founded the field. Otto Folin was one of the pillars of
the field of clinical chemistry, and his life and work are
captured in Samuel Meites’ biography of Folin (46 ).
Biographies of other key figures include those of Henry
Bence Jones (47 ) and Joachim Kohn (developer of cel-
luose acetate electrophoresis) (48 ).
The first professional organizations dedicated to
clinical chemistry sprang up in the 1940s, beginning
with the AACC in the US in 1948 (49 ). This was fol-
lowed by the founding of national societies for clinical
chemistry in many countries (e.g., the Association for
Clinical Biochemistry in the UK in 1953) (50 ) and also
an international body, initially known as the Interna-
tional Association of Clinical Biochemists (1952) that
subsequently became the IFCC (International Federa-
tion of Clinical Chemistry) in 1953 (51 ).
Museums of Clinical Chemistry
The size and weight of some of the larger clinical chem-
istry analyzers has no doubt posed a barrier to their
retention for exhibition in museum collections. Never-

1122 Clinical Chemistry 57:8 (2011)

History of Clinical Chemistry
theless, several museums have exhibits related to the
history of clinical chemistry that contain analyzers of
different types. The Chemical Heritage Foundation
(CHF) (52 ) has a number of clinical chemistry analyz-
ers on display, such as a Technicon AutoAnalyzer Sam-
pler Unit, in their permanent exhibition in Philadel-
phia, “Making Modernity.” The AACC also has a small
exhibit of historic instruments at its office in Washing-
ton, DC, which includes a Klett Photoelectric Color-
imeter, a Folin-Wu Sugar Tube, a Technicon Auto-
Analyzer System, and a Beckman Model DU
Spectrophotometer (53 ). The Beckman Coulter Heri-
tage Center and Caltech’s Science Museum’s Beckman
Room Exhibit (54 ) feature exhibits relating to the work
of Arnold O. Beckman and the analyzers produced by
the Beckman company. In addition, several companies
have virtual museums in the form of illustrated online
interactive timelines and histories, e.g., Beckman
Coulter (55 ), Ortho Clinical Diagnostics (56 ), Abbott
Laboratories (57 ), Roche (58 ), Instrumentation Labo-
ratory (59 ), and Olympus (60 ).
Sound Recording, Video, Movie, Image, and
Document Archives
Various archives of surviving photographs, moving
images and oral histories, and collections of artifacts
and memorabilia, make it possible to trace the growth
of clinical chemistry from its origins in small one-room
laboratories with a few staff performing a very limited
menu of manual tests to large modern laboratories
with large staffs overseeing an extensive menu of highly
automated tests.
The Science Museum in London, UK, has a web-
site, Brought to Life, which explores the history of medi-
cine. It includes images of early instrumentation (e.g., a
ureometer from the 1800s), urine test kits (e.g., the
Clearblue One Step Pregnancy test kit, England, 1988),
and biographies of famous clinical chemists [e.g.,
Leonard Skeggs (1918 –2002)] (61 ). Getty Images (62 )
also provides numerous images relating to home test-
ing (e.g., pregnancy and diabetes testing).
The Wellcome Images: 2000 Years of Human
Culture archive at the Wellcome Library, also lo-
cated in London (63 ), contains numerous images
relating to test strips (e.g., pregnancy tests, urine
tests) and glucose meters. A detailed and illustrated
history of pregnancy testing can be found on the
NIH archive (64 ). This source contains images of
test devices and early advertisements for over-the-
counter pregnancy tests.
The Wellcome Moving Image and Sound Collection
(a collection of moving images on 20th-century health-
care and medicine) contains what may be the earliest
movie of a hospital laboratory, shot around 1932 at the
Review
International Year of Chemistry 2011
Royal Hospital Sheffield (Sheffield, UK) (65 ). It shows a
clinical chemist performing a glucose test. This image
provides a graphic illustration of the changes in labora-
tory safety standards between now and then: he is mouth-
pipetting and not wearing gloves! (Fig. 3). Despite the
long and concurrent histories of the clinical laboratory
and movie/video cameras, there are relatively few other
examples of movies or videos showing the content and
workings of early clinical laboratories. Another notable
example is the movie taken by Peter Wilding in 1966 at the
clinical chemistry laboratory of the Los Angeles General
Hospital, California (66 ). This archive also has video re-
cordings of lectures on RIA by John Landon at the Uni-
versity of London in 1972.
In addition, the Nobel Prize website contains links
to a video lecture (“RIA: Tool for Biomedical Investi-
gation and Clinical Medicine”) presented by Rosalyn
Yalow (1977 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine) at
the 1978 Nobel Laureate Meeting in Lindau, Austria
(67 ). There are now available numerous grand rounds
video archives and live audio and synchronized Pow-
erPoint presentations of more recent lectures by fa-
mous clinical chemists, and these provide a historical
record of the state of knowledge and thinking at a par-
ticular point in time.
Notably, the Smithsonian Institution Archives
(Oral Histories in Medicine and the Health Sciences)
has a number of oral and video histories of relevance to
clinical chemistry, including histories of DNA se-
quencing and PCR (68 ).
A more extensive collection of interviews with
prominent clinical chemists is to be found on the
Oral Histories section of the CHF website (69 ). In
addition the CHF website includes images of clinical
analyzers such as the circa 1975 YSI (Yellow Springs
Instrument) Blood Glucose Analyzer, Model 23A
(70 ), and the Photovolt Hemoglobin and Glucose
Meter (71 ).
The Images from the History of Medicine website pro-
vides access to images in the collections of the History of
Medicine Division of the US National Library of Medi-
cine (72 ). This collection contains images of clinical
chemists (e.g., Donald S. Fredrickson), chemistry labora-
tories of various military and university hospitals (e.g.,
University of Virginia Hospital in 1929, the chemistry lab-
oratory in the laboratory of pathology at St. Elizabeth’s
Hospital Blackburn, UK, circa 1910), and posters for cho-
lesterol testing and for the National Medical Laboratory
Week. One of the latest image archive initiatives has been
the AACC History Division Analyzer Archive. The objec-
tive of this project is to collect images of the full scope of
clinical laboratory analyzers (including chemistry, immu-
noassay, hematology, and other areas) and associated au-
tomation equipment (73 ).
Clinical Chemistry 57:8 (2011) 1123
Review
International Year of Chemistry 2011
Fig. 3. A hospital biochemist performing a blood glucose test at the Royal Hospital Sheffield, UK, circa 1932 [frame
grabbed from Hospital Laboratory, Skinner and Watson (65)].
©Reproduced with permission from the Wellcome Library, London.
The advent of YouTube in 1985 has provided a
source for numerous contemporary videos of clinical lab-
oratories, commercial diagnostic tests, and the testing that
is performed. These films will provide future historians
with a wealth of historical data on clinical chemistry from
the end of the second millennium onwards. A notable
entry on YouTube is the introductory video for the 45th
annual meeting of the AACC in New York, NY, in 1993,
which documents the contribution of the Northeastern
US to the development of clinical chemistry (74 ).
Whither Clinical Chemistry?
At the AACC National Meeting in 1984, one of us (J.S.)
presented the National Lectureship Lecture, which was
entitled “On Such a Full Sea Are We Now Afloat,” a quo-
tation from Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar. The year, 1984,
was a time of some despondency by clinical chemists be-
cause the exciting early times of method development in
the hospital laboratory had been virtually taken over by
commercial manufacturers of instruments and reagents.
The purpose of the lecture was to point out the golden
future of the field, with the introduction of molecular di-
agnostics, the applications of robotics, and the routine use
of mass spectrometry in the clinical chemistry laboratory
1124 Clinical Chemistry 57:8 (2011)
of the future. Now, some 27 years later, these predictions
have come to pass.
As we conclude this present history we are cau-
tiously offering our predictions for the next quarter
century. We expect that as the cost of healthcare con-
tinues to spiral almost out of control, major develop-
ments in technology related to clinical chemistry will
be made to reduce these costs. More point-of-care test-
ing linked to telemedicine will be introduced to de-
crease the number of hospital visits for patients with
chronic conditions and hence reduce overall healthcare
costs. We will mimic the electronics industry and see
more technology convergence and cost reduction for
handheld devices. Emphasis will continue to be placed
on more specific markers for disease and testing for a
patient’s vulnerability to acquiring an illness. Cancer
and heart disease will continue to be targeted, but there
will be an intense initiative to develop early markers for
neurodegenerative disorders. Despite a great deal of
research into the pathogenesis of Alzheimer and Par-
kinson disease, little progress at the early detection and
treatment has been made. This will change and we an-
ticipate that the clinical chemistry laboratory will play
an important role.
History of Clinical Chemistry
As members of the clinical chemistry fraternity we
can take great pride in our heritage and look forward to
the future with considerable optimism.
Author Contributions: All authors confirmed they have contributed to
the intellectual content of this paper and have met the following 3 re-
1. Caraway WT. The scientific development of clin-
ical chemistry to 1948. Clin Chem 1973;19:373–
83.
2. Caraway WT. Major developments in clinical
chemical instrumentation. J Clin Chem Clin
Biochem 1981;19:491– 6.
3. Hickel E. The emergence of clinical chemistry in
the 19th century: presuppositions and conse-
quences. J Clin Chem Clin Biochem 1982;20:521–
30.
4. Kohler RE. From medicinal chemistry to
biochemistry: the making of a biomedical disci-
pline. New York: Cambridge University Press,
1982. 399 p.
5. Büttner J. History of clinical chemistry. Berlin:
Walter de Gruyter; 1983. 91 p.
6. Büttner J, Habrich C. Roots of clinical chemistry.
Darmstadt: GIT-Verlag; 1987. 158 p.
7. Büttner J. Clinical chemistry as scientific
discipline: historical perspectives. Clin Chim Acta
1994;232:1–9.
8. Olukoga AO, Bolodeoku J, Donaldson D. Labora-
tory instrumentation in clinical biochemistry: an
historical perspective. J R Soc Med 1997;90:
570 –7.
9. Rosenfeld L. Four centuries of clinical chemistry.
New York; London: Taylor & Francis, 1999.
10. Rosenfeld L. A golden age of clinical chemistry:
1948 –1960. Clin Chem 2000;46:1705–14.
11. Rosenfeld L. Clinical chemistry since 1800:
growth and development. Clin Chem 2002;48:
186 –97.
12. Hald PM. The flame photometer for the measure-
ment of sodium and potassium in biological ma-
terials. J Biol Chem 1947;167:499 –510.
13. Zettner A, Seligson D. Application of atomic ab-
sorption spectrophotometry in the determination
of calcium in serum. Clin Chem 1964;10:869 –90.
14. Sunderman FW Sr. The history of proficiency test-
ing/quality control. Clin Chem 1992;38:1205–9.
15. Cremer HD, Tiselius A. [Electrophoresis of pro-
teins on filter paper]. Biochem Z 1950;320:273–
83.
16. Durrum EL. A microelectrophoretic and micro-
ionophoretic technique. J Am Chem Soc 1950;72:
2943– 8.
17. Berson SA, Yalow RS. Quantitative aspects of the
reaction between insulin and insulin-binding an-
tibody. J Clin Invest 1959;38:1996 –2016.
18. Schwaber J, Cohen EP. Human x mouse somatic
cell hybrid clone secreting immunoglobulins of
both parental types. Nature 1973;244:444 –7.
19. Skeggs LT Jr. An automatic method for colorimet-
ric analysis. Am J Clin Pathol 1957;28:311–22.
20. Sunderman FW Jr. Computer applications in lab-
oratory medicine: the delineation of normal val-
ues. Ann NY Acad Sci 1969;161:549 –71.
21. Sunderman FW Jr, McKibbin CW, Savory J. A
computer program of clinical laboratory data.
International Year of Chemistry 2011
quirements: (a) significant contributions to the conception and design,
acquisition of data, or analysis and interpretation of data; (b) drafting
or revising the article for intellectual content; and (c) final approval of
the published article.
Authors’ Disclosures or Potential Conflicts of Interest: No authors
declared any potential conflicts of interest.
References
Clin Chem 1968;14:818.
22. Free AH, Dams EC, Kercher ML, Free HM, Cook
MH. Simple specific test for urine glucose. Clin
Chem 1957;3:163– 8.
23. Mullis K, Faloona F, Scharf S, Saiki R, Horn G,
Erlich H. Specific enzymatic amplification of DNA
in vitro: the polymerase chain reaction. Cold
Spring Harb Symp Quant Biol 1986;51(Pt 1):263–
73.
24. Van Slyke DD, Cullen GE. A permanent prepara-
tion of urease, and its use in the determination of
urea. J Biol Chem 1914;18:211–28.
25. Anderson NG. Computer interfaced fast analyz-
ers. Science (Wash DC) 1969;166:317–24.
26. Ouchterlony O. Antigen-antibody reactions in
gels. Acta Pathol Microbiol Scand 1949;26:507–
15.
27. Wu AH. A selected history and future of immu-
noassay development and applications in clinical
chemistry. Clin Chim Acta 2006;369:119 –24.
28. Martin NH, Franglen GT. The use and limitations
of filter-paper electrophoresis. J Clin Pathol 1954;
7:87–105.
29. Büttner J. Evolution of clinical enzymology. J Clin
Chem Clin Biochem 1981;19:529 –38.
30. White WL. A new look at the role of urinalysis in
the history of diagnostic medicine. Clin Chem
1991;37:119 –25.
31. Severinghaus JW, Astrup PB. History of blood gas
analysis. Int Anesthesiol Clin 1987;25:1–224.
32. Breathnach CS. The development of blood gas
analysis. Med Hist 1972;16:51– 62.
33. Curme H, Rand RN. Early history of Eastman
Kodak Ektachem slides and instrumentation. Clin
Chem 1997;43:1647–52.
34. Rifai N, Cooper GR, Brown WV, Friedewald W,
Havel RJ, Myers GL, Warnick GR. Clinical Chem-
istry journal has contributed to progress in lipid
and lipoprotein testing for fifty years. Clin Chem
2004;50:1861–70.
35. Lequin RM. Enzyme immunoassay (EIA)/enzyme-
linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). Clin Chem
2005;51:2415– 8.
36. Van Weeman B. The rise of EIA/ELISA. Clin Chem
2005;51:2226.
37. Gingeras TR, Higuchi R, Kricka LJ, Lo YM, Wittwer
CT. Fifty years of molecular (DNA/RNA) diagnos-
tics. Clin Chem 2005;51:661–71.
38. Coley NG. Medical chemists and the origins of
clinical chemistry in Britain (circa 1750 –1850).
Clin Chem 2004;50:961–72.
39. Coley NG. Early blood chemistry in Britain and
France. Clin Chem 2001;47:2166 –78.
40. Kaiser E. Clinical chemistry in Austria. Past–
present–future: reflections on the occasion of the
25th anniversary of the Austrian Society for Clin-
ical Chemistry. Eur J Clin Chem Clin Biochem
1994;32:579 – 82.
41. Sunderman FW Sr. The foundation of clinical
Review
chemistry in the United States. Clin Chem 1994;
40:835– 42.
42. Simpson E. Clinical biochemistry in Scotland. A
random history. http://www.elliottsimpson.com/
history/introduction.php (Accessed March 2011).
43. Young DS, Berwick MC, Jarett L. Evolution of the
William Pepper Laboratory. Clin Chem 1997;43:
174 –9.
44. Meites S. History of clinical chemistry in a chil-
dren’s hospital (1914 –1964). Clin Chem 2000;46:
1009 –13.
45. King JS. Clinical chemistry: a fragmentary history
(1969 –1977). Clin Chem 1994;40:2106 –10.
46. Meites S. Otto Folin: America’s first clinical bio-
chemist. Washington (DC): AACC; 1989. 428 p.
47. Rosenfeld L. Henry Bence Jones (1813–1873): the
best “chemical doctor” in London. Clin Chem
1987;33:1687–92.
48. Rocco RM. Joachim Kohn (1912–1987) and the
origin of cellulose acetate electrophoresis. Clin
Chem 2005;51:1896 –901.
49. Choate EJ. History of the Northeast Section,
AACC. Clin Chem 1979;25:1857– 60.
50. The Association for Clinical Biochemistry. History.
http://www.acb.org.uk/site/history.asp (Accessed
March 2011).
51. Lines J, Heeren J. IFCC celebrating 50 years.
Sherwood R, ed. Milan: IFCC; 2002. 168 p.
52. The Chemical Heritage Foundation. http://www.
chemheritage.org (Accessed March 2011).
53. Kibak P. AACC collection preserves history of lab
instruments: devices show how technology has shaped
blood analysis. http://www.aacc.org/publications/cln/
2008/July/dailies/Pages/wed_daily2.aspx (Accessed
March 2011).
54. California Institute of Technology. The Beckman Room:
the Caltech Science Museum. http://archives.
caltech.edu/about/beckman-room.html (Accessed
March 2011).
55. Beckman Coulter Milestones. http://download.
streamingmediahosting.com/beckmancoulter/BC_
Timeline/timeline.html (Accessed March 2011).
56. Ortho Clinical Diagnostics. Who we are: overview
and history. http://www.orthoclinical.com/en-us/
localehome/whoweare/Pages/OverviewHistory.aspx
(Accessed March 2011).
57. Abbott. A history of medical innovation. http://
www.abbott.com/global/url/content/en_US/10.30:
30/general_content/General_Content_00069.htm
(Accessed March 2011).
58. Roche Diagnostics. US history. http://www.
roche-diagnostics.us/about/history.htm (Ac-
cessed March 2011).
59. Instrumentation Laboratory. Key milestones of our first
50 years. http://www.instrumentationlaboratory.com/
50forwardminisite/flash%20show.aspx (Accessed
March 2011).
60. Olympus Corporation. History of diagnostic sys-
tems. http://www.olympus-global.com/en/corc/
Clinical Chemistry 57:8 (2011) 1125
Review
International Year of Chemistry 2011
history/analyzer/ (Accessed February 2011).
61. Science Museum. Brought to life: exploring the his-
tory of medicine. http://www.sciencemuseum.
org.uk/broughttolife.aspx (Accessed March 2011).
62. Getty Images. http://www.gettyimages.com (Ac-
cessed March 2011).
63. Wellcome Images. 2000 Years of human culture.
http://images.wellcome.ac.uk/ (Accessed March
2011).
64. A thin blue line. The history of the pregnancy test
kit. history.nih.gov/exhibits/thinblueline/ (Ac-
cessed March 2011).
65. Skinner EF [produced and titled by], Watson AL
[photographed by]. Hospital laboratory [motion
picture]: Fulwood convalescent hospital. Circa 1932.
Wellcome Library Moving Image and Sound Collection.
https://catalogue.wellcome.ac.uk/record⫽b1656284⬃
S3 (Accessed July 2011).
1126 Clinical Chemistry 57:8 (2011)
66. Wilding P. Clinical chemistry laboratory in 1966.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v⫽5eH2zzYROQY
(Accessed March 2011).
67. The Nobel Laureate meetings at Lindau. http://
www.lindau-nobel.org/MediaContainer.AxCMS?
LaureateID⫽6982&type⫽lectures (Accessed
March 2011).
68. US National Library of Medicine. National Insti-
tutes of Health. Guide to Oral Histories in Medi-
cine and the Health Sciences. Record units 9549
and 9577. http://www.nlm.nih.gov/hmd/oral_
history/si.html (Accessed March 2011).
69. Chemical Heritage Foundation. Oral histories. http://
www.chemheritage.org/discover/collections/oral-
histories/index.aspx (Accessed February 2011).
70. Chemical Heritage Foundation. YSI Blood Glucose
Analyzer, model 23A. http://www.chemheritage.
org/discover/collections/collection-items/scientific-
instruments/ysi-blood-glucose-analyzer-model-23a.
aspx (Accessed March 2011).
71. Chemical Heritage Foundation. Collections: photovolt
hemoglobin and glucose meter. http://www.
chemheritage.org/discover/collections/collection-
items/scientific-instruments/photovolt-hemoglobin-
and-glucose-meter.aspx (Accessed March 2011).
72. NIH, US National Library of Medicine. Histori-
cal collections. http://www.nlm.nih.gov/hmd/
collections/index.html. (Accessed July 2011).
73. AACC History Division Analyzer Archive. http://
www.aacc.org/members/divisions/history/analyzer/
pages/default.aspx. (Accessed July 2011).
74. Clinical chemistry history - contributions from the
Northeast US. Part 1 and part 2. http://www.youtube.
com/watch?v⫽wDg8IeOuZTI; http://www.youtube.
com/watch?v⫽Oaii4Wfsg_8&feature⫽related (Ac-
cessed July 2011).