Mike Magee
On March 9, 1967, the classic “Star Trek” series “The Devil in the Dark” was aired for the first time. this enterprise Received an emergency call from a miner on earth Janus VI. They were actually melting, and one injured resident, Horta, aimed it with a liquefied acid ray.
A compassionate Spock heard the appeal and worked to reveal the reasons and motivations to “melt” with the creature. It turns out that all she has to do is protect the baby from perceived threats. Kirk agreed and agreed with Spock, calling on Dr. McCoy to visit the patient's condition.
McCoy encountered “a patient with rock skin.” With his help Tricoder, Handheld diagnostic sensor “Bone” (McCoy's nickname is in the historic 19th-century American language”Saw bones” Refers to surgeons) When severe and deep wounds are found, immediate attention is required.
Kirk manages to “put down” a hundred pounds Thermal structureMcCoy professionally applied it to wounds. All of this is a setup that makes his boaters wonder if this will work, which will produce the iconic heaviest line in the history of the series. McCoy (Obviously Stimulating) Publisher – “How do I know? I'm a doctor, not a bricklayer.”
For decades, modern doctors, who are equally challenged, have been expressing their frustrations. However, the AMA has been scientifically tracking their dissatisfaction only since 2011. Compared with Peepe pique in 2021, burnout levels decreased in 2025. However, in the stimulus, the integration of new technologies is still at the top of the list.
No one knows the blessing of technology better than McCoy. His original “23rd century Tricoder“It is a miracle of diagnostic science, but it also increases moral dilemma and patient expectations. The fictional tool was originally the size of a portable tape recorder, used as a universal data sensor and analyzer. The Medical Edition is a “handheld high-resolution scanner” (24th century in the 24th century), and this edition (in the 24th century version) has an extended screen range that was inspired by HP-41.
On May 10, 2011, Qualcomm teamed up with entrepreneurs to create the Ticorder X Award, a $10 million incentive for anyone who can implement the Star Trek model in a handheld medical triangle. Five years later, the competition was officially concluded, awarded $3.7 million, and multiple contestants, none of whom successfully replicated all their abilities.
This is not to say that the dreamer in Star Trek Mode once gave up being McCoy’s successor. In 2013, 15-year-old Aspen Palatnick conducted a summer internship at Long Island’s historic Cold Spring Laboratory to learn the basics of genomic analysis. Seven years later, after working with his original professor Michael Schatz, they developed the “world's first mobile genome sequence analyzer,” called the iPhone app, called Igenomics.
Leng Chungang touted their success in its December 7, 2020 success, noting that “iPhone apps are meant to complement the tiny DNA sequencing device made by Oxford Nanobore. Palatnick, a software engineer at Facebook, has experienced in building iPhone applications, and when he joined Schatz lab, he and Schatz were unable to achieve on smaller devices. DNA: Align, analyze, research conducted on large server clusters or high-end laptops…fly in suitcases with nanopores and laptops and other servers for analysis on remote-controlled fields (unrealistic). Genomics helps by making genomic research more portable, accessible and affordable.”
“Portable, accessible and affordable!” This is something Bones McCoy can fall behind. In fact, he would be surprised to see what he has produced in 2025 and how new technologies can enhance rather than complicate the work of doctors, nurses and medical scientists.
Consider, for example, a publication that was mass deleted on June 3, 2025. In the journal Science, you might be excited: “In the week of April 2023, the area around Oak Garden State Park in Washington, Florida is filled with garbage. A bobcat passes by, perhaps stalking the grey squirrels in the east. A Rattlesnake on the back of an eastern diamond emits a huge, wild, wild, wild, and violent oak in the lower tier. Osprey and people from African, European and Asian ancestors…scientists don't see these creatures directly, but they use cutting-edge DNA technology to find evidence for them.
The new technology “shot gun sequencing” can read, analyze and reconstruct large DNA sequences of billions of short sequences. But what is really shocking is the availability of the device on site. “Compared with previous machines, at least one new machine is smaller than a cigarette bag and can be plugged into a laptop.”
David Duffy, a biologist at the University of Florida's Whitney Marine Biological Sciences Laboratory, initially wanted to take the article “toward the delta,” but dissuaded: “We are not claiming we are there,” Duffy said. “We mean, we're closer to the fact than we were a few years ago. You can predict that this will be reality in the future.”
Mike Magee, MD, is a medical historian and regular contributor to THCB. He is the author of Code Blue: The Inside Medical Industry Complex of America. (Grove/2020)
