One of the science teachers at my school recently asked me to do some research on available apps as well as hardware/software options for interactively demonstrating and teaching human anatomy to students. Here’s what I emailed him tonight:
I’ve done some research about app options for human anatomy / dissection and this is what I’ve come up with.
The dissection app which was demoed at the last Apple iPhone event, and I mentioned to you, is “Essential Anatomy“ by 3D4Medical.com. It’s $24 commercially and likely discounted if we would purchase in bulk (more than 20 licenses).
This 4 minute video provides a good overview of the app, more videos are available on their official YouTube channel.
This press release includes a few more details about the app.
To start, I’d recommend we secure funding for you to get an iPad Air 2, or an iPad Pro (available in November) so you could work with the app and use it for in-class demonstrations / activities with students. There definitely are other dissection and anatomy apps to check out and consider, the “Essential Anatomy” one I most recently heard about because of the Apple event. You could “mirror” your iPad to your Mac laptop using AirServer software (which we have extra licenses for) but ideally it would be great to get an AppleTV in your classroom for you to use when mirroring the app / doing demos. The new version of AppleTV is supposed to go on sale later this month.
The Anatomage Table is more like the interactive, touch screen table we saw at the OKC Memorial, and it’s been utilized at Stanford among other places.This brochure gives more details. They are apparently developing a new version now as well:
Curious about the new Table hardware? Lucky for you, we have a sneak peek of it during our latest photo shoot. pic.twitter.com/RXp6JE4TGN
— Anatomage (@Anatomage) October 12, 2015
I know there are lots of other options for virtual dissection.. I’ve tweeted to Joanne Manaster to see what her recommendations are… she’s a very connected science educator I met several years ago who should be responsive on Twitter.
@sciencegoddess what are your favorite human anatomy virtual dissection websites / apps / digital tools?
— Wesley Fryer, Ph.D. ??? wesfryer.com/after (@wfryer) October 13, 2015
I hope this information is helpful – let me know if I can help with the procurement/purchase of an iPad or other items.
