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Department of Medical and Biological Physics and Informatics

History of the department

The history of medical physics development of saint Volodymyr National University of Kyiv and Bogomolets National Medical University

O.V. ChalyI

Bogomolets National Medical University

 

  1. Does Medical Physics have a right to exist as a relatively new branch of physical science on the one hand and medicine on the other? Many physics often ask me this question. There are even some very well-known academics and Corresponding Members of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine among them.

 

Actually, the question seems right but the laws of physics remain the same for both the description of the phenomena of inanimate nature (inorganic world) and wildlife (organic world). At the same time, we are no longer surprised that there is such a branch of physical science as Thermophysics which largely has the same subject and research methods as Thermodynamics and Molecular physics. Also the Biophysics as a science that uses the laws of physics to study bio that is living systems is no longer surprising.

 

The definition of Medical Physics can be as follows: “Medical Physics is an applied section of physics in which the fundamental laws and physics achievements are used to explain the processes that occur in biomedical systems, in particular in the human body. The goal of their use is to solve the practical problems of medicine, primarily for the human health”. The last words in this definition allow us to draw a line (at the first glance quite thin) between Medical Physics and Biological Physics.

 

As for biomedical engineering, this is an area of technical scientific knowledge which includes a set of tools and methods aimed at performing diagnostic tests and medical procedures using appropriate medical equipment, its maintenance, creating new types of medical devices, systems and complexes, developing medical databases and their use for in practical needs of medicine.

 

  1. It can be assumed that the beginning of the development of scientific knowledge on the border of Physics and Medicine was laid during the Renaissance period (XV-XVI century). Although starting since Antiquity it has obtained very important results in this field of study.

 

To be certain, in the 6th century BC Pythagoras studied the pitch of sound which is one of the subjective characteristics of sound depending on the length of the string.

 

In the 5th century BC Plato created the first theory of vision.

 

In the 4th – 2nd centuries BC Aristotle the first and then Ptolemy studied the laws of light refraction which were later used in optical studies of biological objects.

 

In the 3rd – 2nd centuries BC Archimedes and Heron of Alexandria have created the foundations for modern biomechanics by studying mechanical devices (lever, block, etc.).

 

In the Middle Ages, in the 11th century, Abkhazian continued and expanded the studies of Greek thinkers in physiological optics.

 

In the 13th century Bacon discovered spherical aberration, which laid the foundation for the study of the human eye deficiencies. At the same time, the first spectacles were made at first in Europe, then in Asia and in the 15th century in Russia.

 

During the Renaissance, in the fifteenth century, Leonardo da Vinci continued his research in the field of hydrodynamics, biomechanics, and optics (in particular, he created the theory of binocular vision).

 

In the sixteenth century, Francesco Mavrolik wrote a Treatise on Physical and Physiological Optics, in which he explained visual defects such as myopia and hyperopia, and also he described the anatomy of the human eye. At the end of the 16th century, the first microscope and the first thermometer (thermoscope) were created by Zacharias Jansen and Galileo Galilei.

 

The formation of Physics as a science begins in the 17th century. Until that time, especially in Ancient Times, the term “physics” characterized all the information about nature, about wildlife as well as inanimate nature.

 

Subsequently, starting from the 17th century, and especially in the 19th and 20th centuries differentiation processes spread in science, even though the scientists have been working on achieving success in various of scientific fields (in particular, combining the abilities of both a physicist and a physician).

 

So, at the very beginning of the 17th century William Gilbert who was a doctor of Queen Elisabeth 1 of England and a professor at the University of Cambridge got interested in the forces between magnets and also by forces that provide the attraction of bodies to amber. He has even written a book – “Magnet”- which laid the foundations of Magnetostatics. In the 70s of the XVII century, an anatomist Luigi Galvani from Bologna discovered the electrical properties of living organism and called that an “animal electricity”. In fact, these works laid the foundation for the development of ideas about magnetic and electric fields in biological systems and ultimately led to the development of electromagnetic theory in the 19th century in the Faraday’s and Maxwell’s works.

 

At the same time, the research in the field of optics of living system continue. In 1604 Johannes Kepler proposed his own theory of vision. In the years 1610-1614 after the invention of the telescope, Galileo Galilei created a microscope that was more advanced than the Janssen’s microscope. In the 60-70s of the XVIII century the optical microscope was further improved by Robert Hooke and Antony Van Leeuwenhoek. This gave a significant impetus to the development of anatomy, histology and other branches of medicine, in which optical methods for studying microobjects are increasingly being used. The English physicist Robert Hooke was the first who discovered the cellular structure of biological objects with the help of a microscope and wrote the book “Micrography” about it in 1665. In this book R. Hooke introduced the term “cell” for the first time.

 

In the 18th century, Pierre Bouguer, Johann Heinrich Lambert, and August Beer established the laws of attenuation of light when it passes through the substance and it has allowed to further develop the method of concentrated colorimetry of biological objects.

 

In the XVIII-XIX centuries Leonard Euler, Daniel Bernoulli, Louis Navier, William Stokes, Jean Poiseuille and other scientists discovered the basic laws of modern hydrodynamics which made it possible to apply them to the processes of blood flow through blood vessels (this section of the mechanical movement of blood is called hemodynamics).

 

In the XIX century the basic laws of bioacoustics were established. They subsequently laid the foundation for modern diagnostic methods in otolaryngology (Christian Doppler, Lord Rayleigh, Ernst H. Weber, Gustav Fechner and others). In 1815 Bio discovered the law describing the rotation of the plane of polarization of light and it is widely used to study the concentration of optically active biological media. At the same time, more precisely in the 40s of the XIX century, physicist James P. Joule, physicist-chemist Hermann Helmholtz and ship’s doctor Julius R. Mayer discovered the law of conservation of energy. This is the universal law of energy conversion in animate and inanimate nature. In 1852 W. Stokes discovered the law which the luminescent radiation obeys.  Later, in the 20th century, it became possible to study the basic laws of various types of luminescence (in particular, bioluminescence) and used them in medicine (S. Vavilov, Y. Vladimirov and other scientists). In the years 1872-1873 Ernst Abbe developed the theory of image formation in an optical microscope which hasn’t lost its significance to this day.

 

The last years of the 19th century were marked by two discoveries which largely determined the subsequent development and current state of medical physics and physics in general. Namely,

 

  • in November 1895 Wilhelm C. Roentgen discovered X-rays, which from then to this day have been used as a powerful method of diagnosis and therapy. It should be noted that W. Roentgen in his research used X-rays tubes which were made by the Ukrainian scientist Ivan Pului back in 1881. This was 14 years before the Roentgen’s discovery. The practical use of x-rays in medicine began immediately in 1895-1896 around the world in many countries. So, the Russian physicist Pyotr Lebedev began to do this in January-February 1896;
  • in December 1900 the German physicist Max Planck introduced the concept of quantum – the minimum portion of energy, which laid the foundation for the development of quantum mechanics – the science of the microworld. It also allowed to explain the laws of blackbody radiation which were discovered earlier by Stefan, Boltzmann and Vin in the 70-90s of the XIX century, which created the scientific basis for the development of the modern diagnostic method of thermography.

 

The XX century is known for the rapid development of physics and its various applications including medicine and biology.

 

In 1901 Henri Becquerel and the spouses Curie the first reported about physiological effects of radioactive radiation, which had been discovered by H. Becquerel 5 years before, in 1896.

 

In 1904 Willem Einthoven discovered electrocardiography, a method for studying the electrical activity of the human heart, which is a powerful and precise method for diagnosing heart diseases in our time. More precisely, W. Einthoven used the ideas of Warren and his other predecessors about the possibility of recording the myocardial electrical activity and he created the first electrocardiograph at the beginning of the 20th century, for which he was awarded the Nobel Prize in medicine and physiology for 1924.

 

From the very beginning of the 20th century and until about the middle 30s of the 20th century, the foundations of quantum mechanics developed (N. Bohr, E. Schrodinger, W. Heisenberg, Luis de Broglie, P. Dirac and many other physicists). This laid the foundation for the development of many modern medical procedures which use the principles of quantum mechanics. So, in the 20-30s on the base of the de Broglie’s discovery of the wave nature of microparticles an electron microscope was created (X. Bush, M. Knoll, E. Ruska, Von Ardenne, V.K. Zvorykin and other scientists). It manages to reduce the difference by 2-3 orders of magnitude, that is, the minimum distance between two points that can be seen in the microscope separately. It should be noted that thanks to the revolutionary achievements of the modern optics in the last two years it has been possible to reduce the difference in the so-called scanning optical microscopes to a value of about 10 nanometers, which approaches the capabilities of an electron microscope.

 

In the years 1912-1913 British physicist William Hanry Bragg and his son Lawrence Bragg and Russian physicist Gregory Wulf developed a formula relating to the wavelength of electromagnetic radiation (in particular, x-ray) and the crystal lattice parameters of inorganic and organic crystals. Using X-rays and the Wulf-Bragg formula in the early 50s of the 20th century James Watson, Francis Crick, Rosalind Franklin and Maurice Wilkins discovered the spiral structure of DNA molecules which carry genetic information.

 

In 1928, Andronov created the theory of self-oscillations – undamped oscillations which are supported by external energy sources. Oscillations propagating in the heart muscle (myocardium) are inherently self-oscillations.

 

In the 40-50s of the twentieth century, Gabor developed the basics of the holographic method of recording information, which will be improved in the future (Denisyuk, Nakhodkin and other scientists), which allows to obtain optical three-dimensional images of objects using light interference and widely using the principles of holography in medicine.

 

In the 50s of the twentieth century a laser was developed, which later became a very powerful tool in surgery and therapy. The physical basis of the laser (optical quantum generator) was created and implemented by many scientists (Einstein, Fabrikant, Basov, Prokhorov, Townes and others).

 

In the middle of the twentieth century, resonance methods of quantum mechanics began to be successfully developed; yaks are now very widely used as diagnostic methods, namely: the electron paramagnetic resonance method (Zavoysky, in 1944), the method of nuclear magnetic resonance (Bloch and Parsell, 1946). All these methods, together with X-ray methods and positron emission tomography, are the basis of modern computed tomography – a research technique that allows you to obtain layered images of a certain part of the studied object, that is, in fact, its three-dimensional image. The practical implementation of a computer tomograph became possible in the 60-70s of the twentieth century thanks to the efforts of physicians, physicists and engineers (Ambrose, McCormick, Olendorf, Hounsfield, Lautenbur, Mansfield and other scientists). Note that these outstanding achievements of physics in medicine were awarded two Nobel Prizes – in 1979. The prize was received by McCormick and Hounsfield for creating an X-ray tomograph, and in 2003. Lautenbur and Mansfield received an award for the practical implementation of magnetic resonance imaging.

 

  1. This part of this article will be devoted to the development of the Kyiv School of Medical Physics from 1841 to the present.

Almost 80 years from the opening of the Faculty of Medicine at Kyiv University of St. Vladimir in September 1841 until April 1920, when the Kyiv Institute of Health was established on the basis of the University’s Faculty of Medicine, which was reorganized in December 1920 into the Kyiv State Medical Academy, and then exactly a year later, at the Kyiv Medical Institute, a separate department for teaching physics to medical students did not exist.

 

The first lecturer to give a physics course for medical students at Kyiv University was V.P. Chekhovich, who had been a professor at the Department of General Physics until 1846. Professor V.P. Chekhovich, a geologist, gave lectures on physics to that extent that it was taught in ecclesiastical institutions, and did not go beyond the gymnasium course.

 

The teaching of physics improved somewhat after arrival of Professor E.A. Knorra (1846-1858 pp.) and his successor, Professor M.I. Talyzina to Kyiv University, who headed the Department of Physics from 1858 to 1865. Due to the initiative of E. Knorra in 1856 an observatory at Kyiv University of St. Vladimir was built; it still exists in the center of Kyiv, on the corner of Vorovsky and Observatory streets.

 

Conducting research at the Department of Physics of Kyiv University, including the Faculty of Medicine, which remains famous in our time, was associated with the name of the famous scientist and teacher, the founder of the first physical school in Ukraine, Professor M.P. Avenarius (September 7, 1835 – September 4, 1895), who had been the Head of the Department of Physics for about 25 years, from 1865 to 1890, Professor M.P. Avenarius was a well-educated man. With the tireless teaching methods and remarkable scientific researches, he made a great contribution to the development of physical science.

 

During the years 1873-1877. M.P. Avenarius and his students obtained the exact values of the critical parameters for many substances, which were included in the main fund of physical quantities and remained unchanged for a long time. Although Professor M.P. Avenarius did not directly engage in scientific research in the field of medical physics, on his initiative the first special laboratory of medical physics at Kyiv University was created in 1873, headed by the doctor of medicine A.S. Shklyarevsky. He published in 1881-1882 pp. “Lectures in medical physics.” Relying on the analysis of the state of medicine, he advocated the need to teach physics to doctors. He defended his thesis for the degree of Doctor of Medicine on the topic “On the passage of white blood balls through the colloidal membranes.” He specialized mainly in pathological physiology and pathological anatomy. The main works of A.S. Shklyarevsky devoted to the problems of inflammation, permeability of the vascular wall, physiology of capillaries. He was the first to apply an experimental method to analyze the mechanism of movement of leukocytes.

 

The successor to Professor M.P. Avenarius as head of the Department of Physics at Kyiv University Vladimir for 13 years (1890-1903rr.) was professor M.M. Schiller (03.13.1848 – 11.23.1910), a specialist in the field of thermodynamics and electrodynamics, who headed the first department of theoretical physics in Ukraine and wrote about 90 scientific papers. Professor M.M. Schiller graduated from Moscow University in 1868. He worked in 1871 – 1874 at the University of Berlin. The scientific works of M.M. Shiller relate to many branches of physics: mechanics, thermodynamics, optics, molecular physics, etc. The scientific studies of M.M. Shiller were devoted to the experimental substantiation of the main provisions of one of the most outstanding scientific achievements of the XIX century – electrodynamics by J. Maxwell were very popular.

 

In 1896, a physical-medical society was founded at Kyiv University, the purpose of which was to bring medicine and other branches of natural science closer, to widely use the results of fundamental research in medical practice. The head of this society, which had existed for about 20 years, was the head of the department of skin diseases, Professor M.I. Stukovenko. It is interesting to note that almost 100 years after the foundation of the physico-medical society, his work was restored at the A. A. Bogomolets Kyiv Medical Institute thanks to the initiative of the head of the department of skin diseases, professor V.G. Kolyadenko and the head of the department of physics, professor A.V. Chaly.

 

Academician I.I. Kosonogov (31.03.1866 – 22.03.1922) headed the Department of Physics of the Kyiv University from 1903 to 1920. He graduated from the Kyiv University St. Vladimir in 1889 and was a student of M. P. Avenarius. His scientific works were devoted to the study of electrical and optical phenomena. In 1902, he discovered an optical resonance in the field of visible rays and with this phenomenon explained the cause of the bright color of heterogeneous bodies in structure. He first used an ultramicroscope to study the phenomenon of electrolysis. He was a talented experimenter and carried out valuable scientific researches on the physics of dielectrics and physical optics, paying great attention to the improvement of the methodology of teaching physics in both high school and in further studies. Professor I.I. Kosonogov has published a number of textbooks and textbooks on physics, including a guide to physics for university students.

 

The first head of the physics department of the Kyiv Medical Institute, which was established, as noted above, in 1920 on the basis of the Faculty of Medicine of the Kyiv University St. Vladimir, was Professor B.M. Yankovich, a student of Y.J. Kosonogov, who was at this positing from 1920 to 1922. He organized the first X-ray diagnostic room in Kyiv at Professor Surgical Clinic. N. M. Volkovich (1914), was chairman of the Union of Young Teachers of Higher Education in Kyiv. Scientific works of Professor B.M. Jankovic were devoted to the problems of theoretical mechanics.

 

The successors of Professor B.M. Yankovich at the position of head of the physics department of Kyiv Medical Institute were Professor G.S. Rudenko (Head of the Department in 1922-1925; 1929-1941; 1943-1948), Professor O.G. Goldman (Head of the Department in 1925-1929) and Associate Professor D.M. Trubchenko (headed the department in 1941-1943; 1948-1952). They focused on establishing a pedagogical process and setting up of educational laboratories. The only special task that needed to be solved was to prepare future doctors to master the physical equipment.

 

The election of Academician Goldman O.G. (3.11.1884 – 30.12.1971), who graduated from Leipzig (1908) and Kyiv (1909) universities and was the first director of the most famous scientific physical institution in Ukraine – the Institute of Physics of NAS of Ukraine, to the position of Head of the Physics Department of Kyiv Medical Institute had great importance in solving of this problem.

However, there were some reasons that slowed down the restructuring of the physics course in Kyiv Medical Institute on new principles. This should be attributed, first of all, to very weak provision of the department with high-quality physical equipment, especially immediately after organization of Kyiv Medical Institute in 1920.

 

The general direction of teaching physics to medical students did not, in fact, change until the 1950s. Only in the early 1950s the necessity of restructuring of physics teaching to medical students became obvious. From 1952 to 1968 the Department of Physics of Kyiv Medical Institute was headed by Associate Professor Y. V. Ignatovich, who graduated from Kyiv Institute of Public Education (1926). He authored a number of textbooks and manuals dedicated to physics teaching in a medical institute.

 

During this period, very important processes took place in the world of science, namely: biological physics made a decisive step from direct physical methods of research to a broad interpretation of physiological and pathological processes from a physicochemical point of view. Bioenergetics, neurocybernetics, molecular genetics, radiobiology, radiology, radiation hygiene and many other scientific fields emerged and developed rapidly. Theoretical and experimental physics gave rise to such scientific concepts as hydrodynamic circulation theory, relaxation theory of hearing, radical-chain theory of radiation damage, quantum representations in physiology and the like.

 

These achievements found their direct expression in the teaching work of the Physics Department of Kyiv Medical Institute. Special topics were introduced into the lecture course: X-rays, medical electronics, molecular genetics, cybernetics, topics such as the principles of relativity theory and quantum mechanics, paramagnetic resonance, optical quantum generators, problems of nuclear physics and semiconductors were discussed in detail. All these issues were reflected in “Physics Lectures”, published by the Department of Physics, including the special issue of “Physics and Medicine”, published in 1965. At that time, from 1968 to 1982, the department was headed by the candidate of pedagogical sciences, associate professor Bezdenezhnykh Ye.O., who graduated from Khabarovsk Pedagogical Institute in 1941. He authored more than 30 scientific papers, including a number of textbooks dedicated to the teaching of physics in medical high schools. Our veterans, participants of second World War, associate professors G.V. Maksyutin and E.P. Chorny, head of the laboratory M.P. Dudin worked very fruitfully at the Department of Physics.

 

At the same time, those teachers who created the core of the teaching staff of the Department of Physics (in the early 1980’s the department got a new name – Department of Medical and Biological Physics) of Kyiv Medical Institute (since 1995, Bogomolets National Medical University) – Associate Professors B.T. Agapov, O.V. Govorukha, A.V. Melenevskaya, M.I. Murashko, N.F. Radchenko, Senior Professor Assistant D.A. Makarchenko, Professor Assistants L.M. Denysenko, P.I. Ostroverkhov started their teaching and scientific career path. From 1982 to 1983 the department was headed by Doctor of Biological Sciences, Associate Professor B.T. Agapov, who graduated from Leningrad Electrotechnical Institute (1965).

 

For the purpose of specialization of practical classes at the department a special physical practicum was developed for the first time, in which each task was solved by means of methods and devices directly used in medical practice. In the laboratory classes students worked with ultrasonic devices, radioactive isotopes and physiotherapeutical equipment, sound level meter and electrophotocalorimeter, etc. The results of the work on creation of the special practicum were written in the manuals “Specialized Practicum in Physics” and “Laboratory Works in Physics”.

 

The new impulse for scientific research at the Department of Medical and Biological Physics was given by the transition of Doctor of Physical and Mathematical Sciences, Professor O.V. Chalyi in March 1983 from Kyiv State University to Kyiv Medical Institute and his election to the position of Head of the Department of Medical and Biological Physics. In recent years, actual scientific researches have been performed at the Department of Medical and Biological Physics, which made it possible to obtain new scientific results in cooperation with scientists from Bogomolets National Medical University and from a number of institutes of the NAS of Ukraine (Institute of Physics, Institute of Nuclear Physics, Institute of Semiconductors, Institute of Physical Chemistry, Institute of Surface Chemistry, Institute of Physiology, Institute of Materials Science, Institute of Cybernetics, Institute of Experimental Pathology, Oncology and Radiology), Taras Shevchenko Kyiv National University, Dragomanov National Pedagogical University, Halle University and Freiberg Mountain Academy (Germany), Pierre and Marie Curie University (France), University of Wisconsin-Madison (USA) and others.

 

In November 1986, the course “Fundamentals of Computational Engineering and Medical Informatics” was created at the Kyiv Medical Institute at the Department of Medical and Biological Physics, headed by Associate Professor T.I. Zhegri, who worked for many years at the Department of Physics. Since 1998, this course has been reorganized into the Department of Medical Informatics and Computer Learning Technologies, headed by Professor I. Bulah, Doctor of Pedagogical Sciences.

 

And in the same year, the Department of Physics was renamed to “Department of Medical and Biological Physics”. The staff of the department conducts extensive educational and methodological work and is a mainstay among the departments of medical and biological physics of higher medical educational institutions of Ukraine. The staff of the department has published a number of textbooks and the training manuals, among which the first Ukrainian-language textbook “Medical and biological physics” (the author’s team – Prof. O.V. Chalyi, Assoc. B.T. Agapov, Assoc. Prof. A.V. Melenevskaya, Assoc. M.I. Murashko, Assoc. Prof. N.F. Radchenko, Assoc. Prof. N.V. Stuchinskaya. In 2005, the second expanded and revised edition of this textbook was published, and in 2010-2011, English and Russian-language textbooks on medical and biological physics were published.

 

2000-2001 in the academic year, the NMU’s Department of Medical and Biological Physics  started  profile teaching of the basic discipline “Biophysics, Informatics and Medical Apparatus” in new curricula for three different specializations, namely: “medical and pediatrics”, “medical and preventive business” and “dentistry”. These specialized programs were developed by a committee led by Prof. O.V. Chalyi and were approved in the Department of Education and Medical Science of the Ministry of Health of Ukraine. In 2005 and 2010, updated programs in the discipline “Medical and Biological Physics” were issued under the credit-module training system. Other special programs were also published, such as Pharmacy, Perfumes and Cosmetics, and others. These are specialized programs of the departments of biomedical physics of the Lviv National Medical University and the National Pharmaceutical Academy (Kharkov).

 

During this time, the material and technical base of the laboratory practicum had been significantly improved at the Department of Medical and Biological Physics due to the acquisition of modern diagnostic and physiotherapy devices (electrocardiographs, reographers, UHF units, etc.). 2 display classes were created, in which students, faculties advanced training and lyceum of the Ukrainian Medical Lyceum have the opportunity to study the disciplines of physics and mathematics profile and to prepare for the licensing examinations “Crok-1” and “Crok -2”, used using modern computing techniques and computer-aided learning technologies.

 

In the 2017-2018 academic year, the management of the Bogomolets NMU decided to combine the Department of Medical and Biological Physics and the Department of Medical Informatics and Computer Technologies of Education into the Department of Medical and Biological Physics and Informatics.

 

At present, the scientific and pedagogical potential of combined department of medical and biological physics and informatics of the Bogomolets Medical University is very powerful, so far as the faculty has 30 teachers, there are 3 doctors and 19 candidates of sciences among them. Up to the end of the 2014-2015 academic years, the following 40 staff members of the Department of Medical and Biological Physics and Informatics work at the approved rates: Head of the Department (Corresponding Member of the National Academy of Pedagogical Sciences of Ukraine, Honored Worker of Science and Technology of Ukraine, Doctor of Physics and Mathematics Sciences, Professor O.V. Chalyi); 2 Professors (Doctor of Pedagogical Sciences, Professor N.V. Stuchinskaya; Doctor of Physical and Mathematical

hist1

Participants of the conference dedicated to the 80th anniversary of foundation of the Physics Department KMI – NMU

sciences, PhD in Engineering, Academician of the Academy of Sciences of Higher Education of Ukraine, Professor K.O. Chalyi), 15 Assistant Professors (Candidate of Physical and Mathematical Sciences V.G. Guryanov, candidate of pedagogical sciences A.I. Yegorenkov, candidate of pedagogical sciences I.P. Kryvenko, candidate of physical and mathematical sciences L.G. Lesko, candidate of physical and mathematical sciences Y.M. Lytvyn, candidate of physical and mathematical sciences I.F. Margolich, candidate of pedagogical sciences P.V. Mykytenko, candidate of physical and mathematical sciences O.I. Oliynyk, candidate of pedagogues V.V. Pashchenko, Candidate of Biological Sciences V.M. Rudneva, Candidate of Physical and Mathematical Sciences O.V. Zaytseva, Candidate of Physical and Mathematical Sciences D.V. Lukomsky, Candidate of Physical and Mathematical Sciences G.A. Sbrodova, Candidate of Physical and Mathematical Sciences G.V. Hrapychuk, Candidate of Physical and Mathematical Sciences O.M.  Chayka), and 3 Senior Lecturers (N.L. Gritsenko, Candidate of Physical and Mathematical Sciences O.K. Lyubchyk, I.I. Kucherenko) and 9 Lecturers (Candidate of Physical and Mathematical Sciences S.V. Gerasimenko, Candidate of Physical and Mathematical Sciences O.O. Godlevskaya, Candidate of Physical and Mathematical Sciences V.A. Nizhegorodtsev, M.D. Andriychuk, L.D. Desyatnyuk, S.V. Kolpakova, A.O. Krishtopa, O.M. Melnyk, I.M. Novikova).

 

Currently, the directions of the department activity are: study of modern problems of physical science, biological and medical physics, pedagogy of higher and secondary schools. Some of them are the statistical theory of ordering processes in open systems of different nature, physics of critical and metastable states, methods of physics of phase transitions for the problem of intercellular interaction (synaptic transmission of information), biophysical aspects of the interaction of electromagnetic radiation with biological facilities, biophysics of muscle contraction and excitability of membranes and structures, quantum-mechanical resonance methods for studying biological objects, problems of toxic substance exposure in the environment, methods of the probability theory and mathematical statistics to meet the medical and biological challenges, modern pedagogical aspects of physiology, biological and medical physics, current problems of continuing vocational education, etc.

 

The staff of the department is active in science and pedagogy. All this was reflected in the publications. In recent years, about 150 textbooks, manuals and monographs have been published (such as, in particular, ” Fluctuation models of self organization processes”, “Non-equilibrium processes in the physics and biology”, “Synergetic principles of education and science” and others). It was also more than 500 scientific articles have been published (including reviews and articles in leading national and foreign journals of Physics, such as “Ukrainian Physical Journal”, “Journal of Physical Research”, “Condensed Matt Physics”, “Biophysics”, “Successes of the physical sciences” , “Journal of Experimental and Theoretical Physics,” “Theoretical and Mathematical Physics,” “Journal of Physical Chemistry,” “Optics and Spectroscopy,” “Journal of Molecular Liquids”, as well as participated in many international and national conferences and symposia.

 

Of course, this relatively short article does not cover all the achievements and problems of medical physics and biomedical engineering (especially problems that have not yet been resolved). Those who wish to get acquainted with them can do so in more detail, for example, with the help of the previously mentioned textbook “Medical and biological physics”, which is recommended by the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine and approved by the Ministry of Health of Ukraine as a textbook for students of higher educational establishments III-IV levels of accreditation [1,2], as well as English and Russian editions of this textbook (Medical and Biological Physics, Vinnytsia: Nova Knyga Publishers; Medical and Biological Physics, Vinnytsia: The New Book) [3-5], as well as a number of textbooks and the manuals [6-15] used by the students of NMU named after O.O. Bogomolets and other higher medical (pharmaceutical) educational institutions of Ukraine.

 

In our time it is difficult to imagine modern medicine without the outstanding achievements of physical science and biomedical engineering.

 

A deep understanding of complex processes in living systems occurring at a deep molecular level requires the use of both precision diagnostic and therapeutic methods, as well as modern theoretical and experimental approaches.

 

The combination of both qualitative and quantitative levels of understanding of biomedical processes in cells and in the body as a whole is, of course, the direction in which medicine of the 21st century will develop, based on the achievements of all natural sciences.

 

Let us recall that from ancient times to the seventeenth century, when science was not yet so differentiated, the term “physics” combined the totality of knowledge about all nature, both animate and inanimate nature. Over time, especially during the last two centuries, differentiation processes began to accelerate in science. Of course, that is not a result of good living. Nature knows nothing about the process of crushing it that human beings do so successfully to simplify the process of knowing nature.

 

Consequently, it might be recalled the well-known “first principles”: “Nature knows better!” and “You have to pay for everything!”.  You have to pay a really high price by losing a holistic perception of the world.

 

Of course, in modern science, simultaneously with the processes of differentiation, processes of integration take place and become of great value, which allow us to get an idea of the objects of study as a whole. Medicine, like philosophy, synergetics and some other modern scientific approaches, is very much in need and based on such integration tendencies. Therefore, on the one hand, medical physics and biomedical engineering can be regarded as one of the new branches of the ever-growing physical and technical “tree”, while on the other, it is a necessary bridge between medicine and physics and technology, which is becoming wider.

 

There is no doubt that in the 21st century, the achievements of modern medical physics and biomedical engineering will have a growing impact on the development of theoretical and clinical medicine, thereby determining the level of training of highly qualified physicians.

 

Literature

 

  1. Медична і біологічна фізика / За ред. О.В.Чалого, видання друге – Вінниця, Нова Книга, 2017.
  2. Медична і біологічна фізика / За ред. О.В.Чалого. – Вінниця, Нова Книга, 2013.
  3. 3. Medical and Biological Physics. / Edited by A.V.Chalyi, Second edition – Vinnytsia: Nova Knyga Publishers, 2013.
  4. MedicalandBiologicalPhysics. / Edited by Prof. A.V.Chalyi. – Vinnytsia: NovaKnygaPublishers, 2010.
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