14. Shoe-fitting fluoroscope, circa 1930.
Courtesy of the Physics Department,
Grinnell College.

X-rays enable us to peer into the interior of many opaque objects without harm or alteration. As a result, fields outside medicine, such as archaeology, anthropology, art history, engineering, and environmental science, apply radiology to uncover facts that lie just beneath the surface. For example, X rays can determine whether an art object is genuine, a forgery or has had extensive repairs. Paleontologists employ X rays to reveal fossils inside solid rocks. X rays have also been used to disclose new information about controversial artifacts, such as the Turin shroud. A twenty-five hundred year-old Egyptian mummy which was X rayed at the UIHC forms part of the Medical Museum's current exhibit.

15. Fluoroscope screen and X-ray tube, 1930. Courtesy of the Department of Physics
and Astronomy, UI.