Case Western Reserve "Firsts"
Dayton Miller's composite
"x-ray portrait"
- 1896
- First full x-ray of the human body (his own) by professor Dayton C. Miller
- 1905
- First modern blood transfusion using a coupling device to join blood vessels, by surgeon George Crile
- 1906
- First environmental analysis of Lake Erie's drinking water, by chemistry and chemical engineering professor Albert Smith
- 1907
- Albert Michelson named first American scientist to win the Nobel Prize (Physics)
- 1912
- Development of process of chlorinating drinking water, by Professor Roger Perkins
- 1915
- First simulated milk formula for infants, by alumnus and pediatrics professor Henry Gerstenberger
- 1916
- First Magnesium metal made in U.S., by William R. Collings, '16
- 1927
- Discovery of the cause of ptomaine food poisoning and development of an antiserum, by immunologist Enrique Ecker and colleagues
- 1935
- First surgical treatment of coronary artery disease, by Professor Claude Beck
- 1950s
- Development of the first heart-lung machine for use in open heart surgeries, by Professor Frederick Cross
- 1952
- Launch of the School of Medicine's "new curriculum," an organ systems-based approach that became the international model for medical education
- 1953
- Launch of operations research as a new management discipline, by professors C. West Churchman, Russell Ackoff, and Robert Rinehart
- 1958
- First President of NACA (later NASA), Case President T. Keith Glennan
- 1959
- Case astronomers first to detect Super-Giant Stars
- 1961
- First successful genetic alteration of human cells in a test tube, by Professor Austin Weisburger
- 1964
- Launch of organizational behavior as a new management discipline, by several faculty in the Division of Organizational Sciences
- 1969
- Dr. William Insull describes the role of cholesterol in blood vessel disease
- 1973
- Discovery of "Lucy"—at the time, the earliest known hominid ancestor of present-day man—by anthropologist Donald Johanson
- 1975
- Discovery that human rennin, an enzyme produced by the kidney, is involved in hypertension
- 1990
- Discovery of the gene for osteoarthritis, by a national team led by rheumatologist Roland Moskowitz
- 1991
- First triple organ transplant in Ohio—a kidney, liver, and pancreas—by Dr. James A. Schulak and colleagues
- 1997
- Creation of the first artificial human chromosome, by a team led by Professor Huntington Willard
- 2004
- Launch of new War Crimes Research Portal by Case School of Law