Francis Duck Author & Translator

​Adrian Thomas has been fascinated by history ever since his junior school days. He developed his interest in the history of radiology when he was a junior doctor at the Hammersmith Hospital in the 1980s. He has written many articles and book chapters and has co-authored books on the history of radiology, including a biography of Sir Godfrey Hounsfield, the inventor of X-ray computed tomography. Adrian is secretary and past-chair of the International Society for the History of Radiology. He is honorary historian at the British Institute of Radiology, and lectures on the history of radiology for the Diploma of the History of Medicine of the Society of Apothecaries. He is past-president of the British Society for the History of Medicine. He is visiting professor at Canterbury Christ Church University, and has a long-standing interest in role development in radiography. 

Francis Duck igraduated in Physics from Nottingham University and joined the Medical Physics Department at University College Hospital, London, in 1966, initiating his lifelong career in medical ultrasound. This took him to Canada and the United States before returning to the United Kingdom to settle in Bath as a medical physicist in the National Health Service. Here, with colleagues from the Physics Department at the University of Bath, he pioneered several innovative developments in ultrasound scanning and also took a leading role in setting international standards for its safe medical use.  More recently he has developed his interest in the history of science, and particularly the interface between physics and medicine, culminating in his monograph Physicists and Physicians, which traces three centuries of the contributions from physicists and engineers to medicine. In 2007 he was awarded the MBE for services to health care. He was formerly visiting professor at the University of Bath.