Abstract:

BACKGROUND: Digital human project is a new field regarding the integration of life science and information science. International series of plans have been performed, such as the visible human project, virtual human project, and digital human project.
OBJECTIVE: To review the progress of digital human research and its application.
METHODS: A computer-based online search of CBM and CNKI published between January 2000 and January 2010 was performed with key words “visible human, virtual human, digital human” in English and Chinese. Also Google search engine was used to retrieve the relevant Web information resources.
RESULTS AND CONCLUSION: Digital human research has entered physiological stage from physical human stage. At present, with the digital medicine developing rapidly, medical information researchers should focus on how to use information technology in digital medicine, accurate medicine, minimally invasive medicine, telemedicine, and how to implement these rapid changes in medicine. This article introduces a series of digital human research program and some digital human models. Also, it introduced the progress of digital human research, the scientific significance of studying digital human in the medical field.