Renato M. E. Sabbatini

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Renato M.E. Sabbatini
Renato M.E. Sabbatini

Renato Marcos Endrizzi Sabbatini (born 20 February 1947) is a Brazilian biomedical and computer scientist, educator, publisher, science writer, entrepreneur and administrator, born in Campinas, Brazil. He holds a doctoral degree in physiology from the University of São Paulo.

His main contributions as a researcher and publisher concern the following areas[1]: neuroethology; medical informatics; health sciences; internet and web applications in medicine, biology and health; artificial intelligence; artificial neural networks; distance education and e-learning; telemedicine; biological and health impacts of non-ionizing radiation and history of neuroscience.

He is currently the president of the Edumed Institute, a non-profit R&D institution and director of Edulogica Educação & Tecnologia, a consultant and commercial enterprise specializing in distance education.

Contents

[edit] Research and education

Dr. Sabbatini began his scientific career in neurophysiology in 1966, while he was a medical student at the Medical School of the University of São Paulo at Ribeirão Preto [2]. He began to work in basic biomedical research under the supervision of Prof. Miguel Rolando Covian, an Argentine neurophysiologist, who encouraged him to found, after he graduated in 1968, the first research laboratory of neuroethology in Latin America[3], at the Department of Physiology. Also there, he started in 1970 one of the first Brazilian and Latin American groups of research, development and education on the computer applications in biomedicine. Sabbatini got a doctorate in behavioral neuroscience in 1977 and immediately thereafter went to spend two and a half years doing postdoctoral work in the same field at the Max Planck Institute of Neurobiology's Primate Behavior Department (in Munich, Germany), under Dr. Manfred Maurus.

After returning to Brazil, Dr. Sabbatini accepted an invitation by Dean Prof. José Aristodemo Pinotti, to move to the State University of Campinas in 1983, Sabbatini founded the Center for Biomedical Informatics, one of the first interdisciplinary group of its kind in Brazil [4], and a collaborating professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering of the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and in the Department of Physiology of the Institute of Biology. In 1997, he created and was appointed chairman of the newly created area of medical informatics and biostatistics in the Medical School[5]. In these capacities, until his retirement from active duty with the University after 35 years of dedication to teaching and research, Sabbatini advised many students in their research projects and dissertations. He also wrote a large number of papers and books in many fields, and created a series of new graduate courses and disciplines in biomedical computing, artificial intelligence, distance education, electronic publishing, Internet applications and telemedicine.

Starting in 1993, with the advent of the WWW in Brazil, Sabbatini became a leader in the research of new technologies and in the development of a large number of on-line courses in health sciences, using videoconferencing, satellite-based teleconferencing and the internet[6]. He has worked intensively in building teaching capacity in this field in Brazil and was a member of the first Distance Education Working Group of the State University of Campinas[7]. He also founded the Edumed Institute for Education in Medicine and Health, working until this day as CEO and Chairman of the Board, and director of its International Center for Information Technologies in Health. The Edumed Institute has organized a national consortium comprising dozens of universities and medical associations with the aim of developing a national network of distance education.

Dr. Sabbatini's initiatives in technological innovation in Brazil has been recognized several times, including, in August 2007, by Info Exame Magazine's shortlist on the "50 Champions of Innovation" of 2007[8]

[edit] Organizational work

Sabbatini was one of the specialists in Brasil to promote the birth of medical informatics as a new science, being involved in the creation of the Brazilian Society for Health Informatics (where he served as first vice-president, 1986-1987 and second president, 1987-1988 [9]), the Brazilian Journal of Health Informatics, and the First Brazilian Congress on Health Informatics, and the series of International Conferences on Telemedicine and Distance Education (TELMED). Among other things, he created and edited three other periodicals in medical informatics, Informedica, Intermedic and Informatica Médica magazines, served as Medical Informatics Director to the Brazilian Medical Association and as a national and international consultant to the World Health Organization, Pan American Health Organization[10], Inter-American Development Bank[11], São Paulo State Research Foundation, National Research Council and others.

[edit] Entrepreneurial work

Together with family members, Sabbatini founded a number of high-tech companies in Germany and Brazil, working as a part-time consultant for them while he was a university-based researcher, and as CEO and chairman of the board for two of them after his retirement. These companies were Vortex GMBH (one of the first European software producer for the TRS-80 microcomputer), Dataquest Ltd. (publishing and education in IT), Webpraxis International Ltd. (consultancy and development projects for the Web) and EduLogica Technology and Education Ltd. (distance education and educational technology). He also helped to conceive, plan and establish other companies, such as ProfSat.

[edit] Popularization of science

Dr. Sabbatini has a long history of writing about science to laypersons, having started with articles and columns in major Brazilian magazines and newspapers, such as Folha de São Paulo and O Estado de São Paulo. From 1991 to 2001, he wrote a series of weekly science and informatics columns in the main newspaper of Campinas, Correio Popular. For this effort, he won the prestigious 1992 award of the Brazilian National Research Council, as the Best Science Popularizer (Prêmio José Reis de Divulgação Científica) [12]. He has taught and lectured extensively on science journalism (graduate program at UNICAMP [13]) and is active in this professional field.

[edit] Electronic publishing

Starting 1996, Sabbatini created with his colleagues in the State University of Campinas a number of websites devoted to promote the awareness of general public to health-related information, such as, among others: the Brazilian Virtual Hospital (the third of its kind in the world), the Virtual Sports Center [14], the Brazilian Virtual Veterinary Hospital, the Virtual Odontology Center, the Visible Human Image Database in South America [15], the Health & Life On-line Magazine, the Brain & Mind On-Line Magazine, the NutriWeb On-Line Magazine, several bulletins and newsletter distributed by email lists. He created and acted as technical director to the first Brazilian project of scientific electronic publishing, the e*pub Group, where several pioneering, exclusively on-line publications were created under his technical direction, such as the On-Line Journal of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery and the On-Line Journal of Dentistry and Oral Medicine. Dr. Sabbatini is a member of the editorial board of Critical Reviews in Biomedical Engineering[16]

[edit] History of neuroscience

Another field where Dr. Sabbatini has been active is the history of neuroscience. He organized for the first time in Brazil a systematic course on the subject [17] and is associate editor of the section on the history of neuroscience in the Brain & Mind magazine[18], having published nine articles on different aspects of international history[19]. A book, the first in Brazil, is being published in the fourth quarter of 2007.

[edit] Skeptics movement

One of the founders of the organized skepticism/rationalism movement in Brazil, Dr. Sabbatini founded in 2001 the Brazilian Society of Skeptics and Rationalists, which has currently more than 300 members [20]. The Society discusses actively and promotes ethical responsibility in the mass media. It has a website, which features on-line articles on pseudoscience, antiscience and skepticism by Dr. Sabbatini and others, and has a web-based discussion group.

[edit] Affiliations to learned societies

[edit] Selected publications

[edit] Health informatics

[edit] Neurosciences

[edit] See also

[edit] External links

[edit] References

  1. ^ Certified curriculum vitae, National Council of Scientific and Technological Development, Brazil
  2. ^ History of the Department of Physiology, Faculty of Medicine of Ribeirão Preto
  3. ^ Site of the Neuroethology Lab, Dept. Physiology, Faculty of Medicine of Ribeirão Preto
  4. ^ Biomedical Informatics Center, Central UNICAMP Archives
  5. ^ Timeline of 40 Years of UNICAMP, Faculty of Medical Sciences, State University of Campinas
  6. ^ Report on Distance Education COnference at UNICAMP
  7. ^ Report of the Distance Education Working Group, State University of Campinas
  8. ^ "50 Champions of Innovation" of 2007
  9. ^ History of the Brazilian Society of Health Informatics
  10. ^ Telemedicine and Telehealth Will Be Part of the WHO Strategy for Health for All 2000. Medical Informatics Magazine News, 1(3), May 1998
  11. ^ BID Places Health on the Super Information Highways. Medical Informatics Magazine News, 1(1), Jan 1998
  12. ^ Official List of Awardees, José Reis Award, CNPq
  13. ^ LABJOR/UNICAMP: Docents of the 1999 Class in Scientific Journalism
  14. ^ List of collaborators, Virtual Sports Center
  15. ^ NIB Participates in the Visible Human Database Project. Medical Informatics Magazine News, 2(3), March 1999
  16. ^ Editorial Board of Critical Reviews in Biomedical Engineering
  17. ^ On-Line Course on the History of Neuroscience
  18. ^ Brain & Mind Magazine Staff
  19. ^ Section of History of Neuroscience, Brain & Mind Magazine
  20. ^ History of the Brazilian Society of Skeptics and Rationalists
  21. ^ List of former directors, Brazilian Society of Physiology

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