CT (Computed tomography) scanners, are commonly found in hospitals around the world. However, the technology’s origins can be traced back to pioneering work at NASA.
Godfrey Hounsfield was born on 28 August 1919 in Newark, England. The young Hounsfield was sent to Magnus Grammar School in Newark.
Hounsfield did not shine at school, although he showed some aptitude in physics and mathematics. He was rather lacking in self-confidence and tended to be somewhat introverted. Since his childhood, he displayed an uncanny interest in fiddling with electrical gadgets and machineries.
At the outbreak of World War II, Hounsfield joined the Royal Air Force (RAF) as a volunteer reservist. This gave him the opportunity to study the books that the RAF provided for radio mechanics.
By 1967, Godfrey Hounsfield had been working for music and electronics company Electrical and Musical Industries (EMI) for 16 years on projects ranging from radar, guided weapons, and the UK’s first all-transistor computer.
In 1963, Johannesburg-born physicist Allan MacLeod Cormack, who later became an American citizen, had been working on the concept of scanning slices of the body from various angles and rotations.
In 1971, Hounsfield built the first working scanner. While an X-ray machine uses a single ray to create a two-dimensional image, the CT scan uses a row of X-rays in a tube that rotates around the body to take pictures from different angles. The result is a detailed image which, after a computer processes the data, creates a three-dimensional cross section of a patient’s body.
For these inventions, Hounsfield and Cormack received a Nobel Prize in physiology and medicine in 1979. Until the end of his life, Godfrey Hounsfield worked on perfecting the CT scanner, directing his interests towards magnetic resonance imaging.
He died on Aug 12, 2004 at the age of aged 84 years
British engineer Godfrey Hounsfield (1919 – 2004)
What constitutes a scientist? A scientist is an individual deeply immersed in the field of science, possessing expertise across various educational domains and refined skills within specific branches of knowledge. A scientist is characterized by advanced proficiency in a particular scientific discipline and employs scientific methodologies in their pursuits.
Tuesday, March 28, 2023
The most popular articles
-
Al-Khwarizmi was a Persian mathematician who spent most of his life in Baghdad. He lived during the reign of Caliph al-Ma’mum of the Abbasid...
-
Luis Alvarez was outstanding as scientist and engineer. Luis Alvarez is most famous for his Nobel Prize winning effort to discover and stu...
-
Archimedes of Syracuse He was Greek engineer who made the first measurement of specific gravity. He studied in Alexandria, after which he re...
-
Physicians have used herbs and other plants products to treat disease for centuries. During the 19th century, scientist began to pinpoint th...
-
Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen was born in Lennep, Germany, but moved to Apeldoorn, Holland as a child with his family, who w...
Other interesting articles
-
-
-
Paranoid Personality Disorder (PPD) is a nuanced mental health condition characterized by persistent distrust and suspicion towards others, often manifesti...
-