Michel Ter-Pogossian

Ter-Pogossian was born on April 21, 1925 in Berlin to Armenian parents from the Ottoman Empire that escaped the Armenian Genocide.[7][8] He was the only child.[9] His family later moved to France, where Ter-Pogossian grew up.[9][7] He developed an early interest in science and experimented with toy physics and chemistry kits as a child.[9][8][7] Ter-Pogossian attended the University of Paris, from which he received his bachelor's degree in mathematics[1] in 1942[3][7][8] or 1943.[10][9] He subsequently studied at the Institute of Radium under Irène Joliot-Curie, graduating in 1946.[3][9][10] He was active in the French Resistance during World War II.[7][8]

Ter-Pogossian moved to the United States in 1946 to complete his studies.[9][8] He preferred to the US over Britain because the former seemed "more exciting."[7][8] He enrolled at Washington University in St. Louis as a graduate student in 1946.[10] He was drawn to the university by and studied under Arthur Compton, who was also the university's chancellor at the time.[3][9] He simultaneously worked in the physics department as a research assistant.[10][9] Ter-Pogossian received his master's degree in 1948,[9] and his Ph.D. in nuclear physics from Washington University in 1950.[10][3]

He joined the Mallinckrodt Institute of Radiology at Washington University in 1950.[10][9][11] In the same year he also joined the faculty of Washington University School of Medicine as an Instructor in Radiation Physics.[7][2] He was named professor of radiation physics in 1961, Professor of Biophysics in Physiology in 1964, and Professor of Radiation Sciences in 1973.[2][7]

Between 1963 and 1991 Ter-Pogossian served as Director of the Division of Radiation Sciences at the Mallinckrodt Institute.[2][7][8][lower-alpha 1] After resigning from administrative duties in 1990, Ter-Pogossian devoted all his time to research.[7] He was a self-proclaimed "research junkie".[10][8] He became emeritus professor in 1995.[2][7][9]

Ter-Pogossian spent his entire professional career at Washington University's Mallinckrodt Institute of Radiology.[3] His research focused on "increasing the number of practical clinical applications of cerebral scanning."[11] His worked resulted in improvement of medical imaging, radiation therapy, brachytherapy. He developed a new type of nuclear medicine gamma camera, known as the "Ter-Pogossian camera."[10][3]

In 1951 Ter-Pogossian developed a pioneering scanner that detected radioactivity concentrations in living material.[1][8] In the mid-1950s he "reported the first biomedical application of a sodium iodide detector for the diagnosis and localization of intracranial tumors."[1]

Ter-Pogossian was married to Ann (née Scott). They had two sons and a daughter.[3][8] He was a resident of Clayton, Missouri.[12] He traveled extensively and was a gourmet and a scuba diver.[10] He was described by Ronald G. Evens as a "citizen of the world."[3]

He died on June 19, 1996 of apparent myocardial infarction in Paris, where he was vacationing.[8][10][3][7]

Ter-Pogossian was an "internationally known pioneer in the use of cyclotron-produced radionuclides in biomedical research."[10] Frans Wackers noted that he is "widely recognized as one of the fathers of PET imaging."[7] He has been called "the father of PET" by some.[5][3][10][9] Ter-Pogossian emphasized that PET is the product of teamwork and elaborated:[13]

...when somebody referred to me as the father of PET, I said, "I'd rather be the mother of PET, because many offspring have many fathers, and only one mother. As a matter of fact, some offspring have no father at all!" Of course there are many fathers. [...] [it's obvious that] there are masses of fathers of PET. Again, the important point is—I'm not suggesting that to you; it is probably obvious—is again the convergence of so many different disciplines. The development of the scintillation counter, artificial radioactivity, and so on.

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