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Knowledge, money and data: an integrated account of the evolution of eight types of laboratory

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 January 2011

ARJAN VAN ROOIJ
ARJAN VAN ROOIJ
Affiliation:
Institute for Science Innovation and Society (ISIS), Radbound University Nijmegen, PO Box 9010, 6500 GL Nijmegen, the Netherlands. Email: a.vanrooij@science.ru.nl.
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Abstract

This paper aims to build an integrated account of the history of twentieth-century laboratories. The historical literature is fragmented, which has led to the impression that one type of laboratory has dominated, or has become more important than other types. The university laboratory has also unjustly shaped the conceptualization of other types of laboratory. This paper approaches laboratories as sites of organized knowledge production, and as entities engaged in different activities for different audiences at any point in time. Eight types of laboratory are identified, and their developments in the twentieth century are sketched. The two world wars of that century and models of innovation, building links between knowledge production in the laboratory and the impact of this knowledge outside the laboratory, are important catalysts of this history. The paper underlines that different types of laboratory have existed side by side, and continue to exist side by side.

Type
Research Article
Information
The British Journal for the History of Science , Volume 44 , Issue 3 , September 2011 , pp. 427 - 448
Copyright
Copyright © British Society for the History of Science 2011

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