Radiologist and medical imaging pioneer;

born April 5, 1923, died March 12, 2006

ON OCTOBER 1, 1971, James (Jamie) Abraham Edward Ambrose, a consultant radiologist at Atkinson Morley's Hospital in Wimbledon, south London, made medical history by carrying out the first computed tomography (CT) scan on a live patient, revealing a detailed image of a brain tumour. The actual scanner was the product of joint development by Ambrose, the physicist Godfrey Hounsfield and a dedicated team of physicists and engineers.

The radiology department at Atkinson Morley's had for a long time been one of the busiest in the world, using invasive radiological procedures in the diagnosis of neurological disease.

Jamie Ambrose's mastery of these techniques made him a man in demand. By the early 1960s the department was performing more than 1000 such tests a year, and he was undertaking the majority of these.

However, his great desire was to find non-invasive diagnostic methods, a quest in which he had the support of the senior neurosurgeon at the hospital, SirWylie McKissock. He began to develop the use of ultrasound and radioisotope scanning for the diagnosis of brain and spinal disease and injury, and by 1969 he was able to report results at a meeting of the British Medical Association.

He was already an eminent figure in the radiological world when, in 1969, the Department of Health asked him to meet Hounsfield, an electronics engineer who was working for EMI and whose ideas for a new imaging technique had been falling on stony ground. Ambrose gave Hounsfield a much more sympathetic reception, seeing the marvellous potential in his idea and lobbying the Department of Health on his behalf.

Funding followed and in 1969 the development work began on what was to become the first computed tomography scanner. By August 1970 they had produced the design and specification of a prototype and, just over a year later, the first working model was ready.

After the first scan, Jamie Ambrose conducted clinical trials, and in November 1972 the scanner was displayed before 2000 doctors at the Radiological Society of North America's annual meeting in Chicago, where Jamie Ambrose's lecture on the trials received a standing ovation.

Inevitably, there followed an enormous demand for information. Jamie Ambrose spread the word internationally and he became an earnest, though modest, ambassador for computed tomography.

Jamie Ambrose was born in Pretoria, South Africa, in 1923.

At the outbreak of the Second World War he tried to volunteer, but was too young. He marked time by studying engineering in Johannesburg until his 18th birthday, when he reapplied and was accepted for flying training with the South African Air Force.

After his training he was mobilised to the Mediterranean war zone as a fighter pilot. He was attached to the Royal Air Force and served from 1941 to 1945, flying Spitfires in the Middle East, Italy and southern France.

Following demobilisation, he returned to South Africa, switching to medicine and gaining a place at Cape Town University. He graduated in 1952 and two years later came to England, where he began radiological training at the Middlesex Hospital, then moving on to a senior registrar post at Guy's.

He became a consultant at Atkinson Morley's in 1962.

In 1983 he suffered a heart attack. If he had died then, it would have been a tragedy, because it would have deprived him of a retirement which was one of the happiest periods of his life. Within months of retiring in 1988, he and his wife moved north to North Connel in Argyll, where they lived on the shores of Loch Etive.

Here, he was able to pursue his love of plants, music and wildlife. He attended the Oban Medical Society and was a regular at Scottish Wildlife Trust meetings.

He leaves his wife, Sheena, a son, a daughter and five grandchildren.