Better Health: Smart Health Commentary Better Health (TM): smart health commentary

Latest Posts

The Google Body Browser

b2bzsd.jpgGoogle has released an awesome in-browser anatomy viewer to demo the new 3D graphics capabilities of their Chrome development version. It lets you explore the human body in all its glory in a Google Earth-like fashion. Individual anatomic layers (skin, muscles, bones, etc.) can be selected or deselected for viewing, but can also be made semi-transparent on an individual level. Labels can be displayed, and all anatomy is fully searchable.

The catch is you will need a WebGL enabled browser to try it. WebGL is a technique that enables 3D graphics within the browser without the use of plugins. Chrome 9 Dev Channel, Chrome Canary Build and Firefox 4 beta have this enabled by default. In Chrome 8 (the current stable version), you can enable it by going to about:flags (type it in the address bar), and from there enable WebGL. Below are two videos, one demonstrating the body browser, and one of a presentation by the developers.

Link: Google Body Browser…

(Hat Tip: Google Operating System Blog)

*This blog post was originally published at Medgadget*

Latest Interviews

IDEA Labs: Medical Students Take The Lead In Healthcare Innovation

It’s no secret that doctors are disappointed with the way that the U.S. healthcare system is evolving. Most feel helpless about improving their work conditions or solving technical problems in patient care. Fortunately one young medical student was undeterred by the mountain of disappointment carried by his senior clinician mentors…

Read more »

How To Be A Successful Patient: Young Doctors Offer Some Advice

I am proud to be a part of the American Resident Project an initiative that promotes the writing of medical students residents and new physicians as they explore ideas for transforming American health care delivery. I recently had the opportunity to interview three of the writing fellows about how to…

Read more »

See all interviews »

Latest Cartoon

See all cartoons »

Latest Book Reviews

Book Review: Is Empathy Learned By Faking It Till It’s Real?

I m often asked to do book reviews on my blog and I rarely agree to them. This is because it takes me a long time to read a book and then if I don t enjoy it I figure the author would rather me remain silent than publish my…

Read more »

The Spirit Of The Place: Samuel Shem’s New Book May Depress You

When I was in medical school I read Samuel Shem s House Of God as a right of passage. At the time I found it to be a cynical yet eerily accurate portrayal of the underbelly of academic medicine. I gained comfort from its gallows humor and it made me…

Read more »

Eat To Save Your Life: Another Half-True Diet Book

I am hesitant to review diet books because they are so often a tangled mess of fact and fiction. Teasing out their truth from falsehood is about as exhausting as delousing a long-haired elementary school student. However after being approached by the authors’ PR agency with the promise of a…

Read more »

See all book reviews »

Commented - Most Popular Articles