Late Mutsuo Sugiura
The gastroscope, or more widely the endoscope, is
an indispensible tool for inspecting stomachs and diagnosing ulsers or
tumors. More and more people swallow it for such inspection. It is not
well known, however, that the gastroscope was first developed by a Japanese
team of a doctor and optical engineers. Mutsuo Sugiura, together with Dr.
Tatsuro Uji, and his subordinate, Shoji Fukami, first developed it in the
world. He named it as a "gastro camera". Various endoscopic methods
and fiberscope technologies have been developed since then, and are used
extensively to inspect, diagnose, and treat wide variety of diseases, as
well as in the area other than medical.
The story was illustrated in the NHK TV documentary feature, "Project X: Challengers: The Development of a Gastro-camera Wholly Made in Japan"
Mr. Toshio Nakatsubo of Olympus Talks about Development of Gastroendoscope (html, pdf)
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Updated on January 23, 2002