The mathematician speaks the language of all sciences using his special tool. Without him modern technology would not exist because mathematics interprets and explains all other sciences. However, when mathematics becomes too complex, the mathematician puts aside his pencil and paper and turns to an electronic computer. Since computers can carry out mathematical calculations from 100 to 1,000,000 times as fast as a human being, they are necessary today and will be essential tomorrow. [Illustration: The much-publicized electronic computers are vital in modern science, but they can’t add two and two without trained personnel to operate them.] A computer, however, doesn’t replace the mathematician any more than an adding machine replaces an accountant. The mathematician must help to design the computer, understand what material to store in its memory banks, know how to feed problems into it, and be able to read the results that come out. Medicine The medical profession is dedicated to repairing and healing the human body. Although many mysteries still surround medicine, doctors are trying to solve these mysteries of the body through research. A medical scientist may decide to specialize exclusively in the use of radioactive materials. If so, he is called a radiologist and is an expert in the use of radiation beams, injection of radioisotopes, and implantation of radioactivity into the body, as well as in the use of the more familiar radium and X-ray devices. The practicing physician also, after receiving special training and licensing, may use radiation and radioisotopes as another tool in his little black bag. For instance, a suspected thyroid disorder can be diagnosed by following the behavior of a small, harmless dose of radioactive iodine in the patient. A tumor may be brought under control with the use of a strong beam of radiation directed at the diseased tissue. Behind the physician stand teams of medical research scientists testing the effects of radiation on tissues and cultures and serums in the laboratory. They strive to increase knowledge of the medical benefits of atomic energy. Nurses in nuclear medicine understand how to handle radioactivity. Pharmacists who enter the field prepare radioactive pharmaceuticals for clinical uses. Related Fields It is convenient to discuss scientific activity in the general categories of physics, chemistry, biology, geology, engineering, mathematics, and medicine, but strict lines are not actually drawn around these areas. There are in the United States today about 2000 individuals who are engaged in a profession that did not even exist twenty years ago: these are the health physicists, who are neither medical men nor physicists. They have backgrounds in physics, true, and they combine this training with training in physiology, botany, chemistry, mathematics, and instrumentation.