Robert Ledley
American Professor of Physiology and Biophysics and Professor of Radiology (1926-2012) · United States · On the map · Scientists · Died at 86
Robert Steven Ledley, professor of physiology and biophysics and professor of radiology at Georgetown University School of Medicine, pioneered the use of electronic digital computers in biology and medicine.
Robert Ledley is read about 7.5 times a day, in 8 languages.
A typical day, 30 days to 6 August 2026
The middle day of the days counted, so one week of news cannot move it. The line under it is the last 60 days, one point a day.
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Media & music
Photos 8
Terry Ledley operating the Standards Eastern Automatic Computer (SEAC) at the National Bureau of Standards in the early 1950s. Robert Ledley learned to program on this computer, first via paper tapes Terry brought to him and then by using the machine extensively himself.
NBRF "Christmas Tree" showing projects and journals initiated by the organization up to 1991. At the base is the establishment of the foundation in 1960. The ornaments represent (moving from bottom to top and from left to right): the Atlas of Protein Sequence and Structure (initiated in 1965), Computers in Biology and Medicine (journal founded in 1969), Pattern Recognition (journal founded in 1967), first protein datatape (1972), ACTA (prototype built 1974), Computer Languages (journal founded in 1972), first nucleic acid datatape (1979), Computerized Medical Imaging and Graphics (journal founded in 1981 -- this grew out of the 1976 journal Computerized Tomography and the 1977 journal Computerized Radiology), CENOG (prototype built 1978), Protein Information Resource (launched in 1984), 1990 was the NBRF's 30th year.
Robert Ledley pictured with FIDAC in 2007.
Robert Ledley posing with an IBM 360 that was used in conjunction with FIDAC. The sheets of paper on the left side of the photograph are printouts of digitized chromosome micrographs. Stacks of IBM punched cards are present near Ledley's right arm.
Robert Ledley at the exhibit of the ACTA whole-body CT scanner at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History.
The NBRF "Bat," a 3-D mouse (left) used for interacting with stereo images (right).
Robert Ledley operating CENOG at the NBRF circa 1980.Awards
About this person
In 1959, he wrote two influential articles in Science: "Reasoning Foundations of Medical Diagnosis" and "Digital Electronic Computers in Biomedical Science". Both articles encouraged biomedical researchers and physicians to adopt computer technology.
