Background and Education. Physician and educator Elizabeth Blackwell was born on February 3, 1821, in Bristol, England. Brought up in a liberal household that stressed education, Blackwell eventually broke into the field of medicine to become the first woman to graduate from medical school in the United States.
â¢ ASSAY (noun) The noun ASSAY has 4 senses: 1. an appraisal of the state of affairs. 2. a substance that is undergoing an analysis of its components. 3. a written report of the results of an analysis of the composition of some substance.
If the assay involves addition of exogenous reactants (the reagents), then their quantities are kept fixed (or in excess) so that the quantity (and quality) of the target is the only limiting factor for the reaction/assay process, and the difference in the assay outcome is used to deduce the unknown quality or quantity of the target in question.