Lewis Zimmerman

"Do you know how humiliating it is to have 675 Mark Ones out there, scrubbing plasma conduits... all with my face?"

Doctor Lewis Zimmerman was a character featured on Star Trek: Voyager and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.

He was portrayed by Robert Picardo, who also played the Emergency Medical Holograms installed on Voyager, Enterprise, and the backup copy revived in the 31st century.

Specializing in holographics, Zimmerman was responsible for the development of the Emergency Medical Hologram. He used his image and personality as a template to develop the Mark I EMH. Unfortunately his personality flaws made the EMH Mark I unsuitable for medical work as they had poor bedside manners. When future versions were developed Zimmerman petitioned that the EMH Mark I be decommissioned, but they were re-purposed to perform menial or dangerous tasks.

Zimmerman also spearheaded the development of a Long Term Medical Hologram, or LMH. He initially decided on using Doctor Julian Bashir as the template for the LMH, however he was forced to change his plans when it was revealed during the personality programming that Bashir had been genetically enhanced, which was illegal in the Federation.

By 2376 Zimmerman had become seriously ill, and was expected to only live a few more months. The Doctor on Voyager learned of this and had himself transmitted back to the Alpha Quadrant. At first Zimmerman refused to be treated by the hologram, but soon relented and allowed his "son" to treat him. He would later tell the Doctor he was proud that one Mark I was still doing what he intended them to do, and asked the Doctor to let him know how he was doing on a regular basis.

After Voyager returned to the Alpha Quadrant Zimmerman worked with the Doctor and Mr. Barclay to create an Emergency Security Hologram.