Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin, June 11-15, 2008
organized by
Science Center, Tartu University Library, Tartu (Estonia)
INSERM ERM206 - TAGC, Marseille (France)
Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin (Germany)
Konrad Lorenz Institute for Evolution and Cognition Research, Altenberg (Austria)
Following a workshop recently held in Naples in May 2007 (cf. Brauckmann &
Thieffry, BioEssays 29 (2007): 1059-61), this second meeting will focus on
elaborated analyses of how the life sciences visualize and represent their objects of
study. The imagery produced by current experimental or in silico research will be
contrasted to former observational studies depicting organisms, embryos, cells, genetic
factors, and molecules from around 1800 to the 21st century. We will address the issue how
biological scientists mastered to manifest the dimensionalities living organisms exhibit
when taking shape. To fully trace the (epistemic) steps of representing 3D specimen, the
scientists will offer detailed information about their techniques, tricks and tools to
visualize genes, cells, embryos and species, using images of distinct scales and
dimensions. Besides clarifying the process of image construction, they will explicate what
their images reveal, what is filtered out, and if so, why. Scholars will supply these
information with historical case studieson the changing practices of
visualization, encompassing the specificity of different biological disciplines, specific
techniques, model organisms and styles of communication. Their task will be to delineate
an epistemic archeology of spatial forms which occur naturally beyond the range of unaided
vision, e.g., rotating embryos, differentiating cells and their components, the fine
structure of organisms, or yet the branching of species in models of evolution.
The progressive development of fate maps from the 1850s onwards provides an interesting
example of biologists' visual practices. Fate maps were developed to enable the projection
of developmental specifications onto static embryonic images. These maps were part of a
dynamic learning process, relying on the coordination of attentively watching eyes with
hands drawing and moulding wax models. Furthermore, we will follow the apparition and
change of meaning of graphical symbols, either depending on different theoretical
perspectives, or simply enforced by technical constraints. For example, arrows are used to
represent displacement or dimensional modification to translate Baer's observation how a
two-dimensional plate coils to three-dimensional tubes. Similarly, the development of
three dimensional organs such as drosophila wings and legs are projected onto
two-dimensional cell tissues (imaginal discs). From a historical perspective, getting from
2D to 3D has been an enormous problem, and still is, even if developmental biologists now
claim to have arrived at the 5th dimension by combining a 3-dimensional exploration across
time with the characterization of gene expression patterns. Dimensionality treatment also
appears to vary widely among the biological disciplines.
The recent development of systems biology revives the issue of the representation of
complex, heterogeneous and dynamic data sets graphically, using 2D or 3D graph-based
representations. As hinted during the Naples workshops, these abstract representations
(once properly formalized) can be used as powerful computational models to address
sophisticated biological questions (e.g. regarding the number, stability and robustness of
cell differentiation pathways).
Finally, all these questions bearing to the spatial and temporal deployment of
individual organisms can be transposed to population and evolutionary levels. In this
respect, we want to portray the corresponding specific styles of visualization and clarify
the modes of mapping mental images or concepts to material models.
During the workshop we will discuss the following issues (non exclusive list):
Does biological imagery show unique features when compared to other natural sciences?
How did shifts in the conception of cells or genes relate to different styles of
imaging?
To what extent have imaging techniques themselves influenced, directed and modulated
scientific observation and data analyses?
What is needed to redraw, reproduce a picture? Mere analogical rendering will not let us
redraw,
or fabricate the image we have just observed.
What is the feeling, or idea to be inside a cell-space, or inside a molecular space?
What and how visual representations are utilized for scientific lectures, public talks,
scientific articles, textbooks, mass media publications?
The workshop fulfills two main purposes, (1) it reconstructs some chapters of the
visual biography of genes, cells, and embryos in the life sciences and related specialties
(e.g., architecture), and (2) it traces the influence of specific issues, like
dimensionality, scale and pattern on biological imagery from around 1800 to the 21st
century. Finally, we want to initiate a practical collaboration on iconic images, which
will be further explored during a summer school in Tartu (Estonia) in 2009.
Sabine Brauckmann . Christina Brandt .
Denis Thieffry . Gerd B. Müller
