Egas Moniz

António Caetano de Abreu Fre Egas Moniz (29 November 1874 – 13 December 1955), known as Egas Moniz was a Portuguese neurologist and the developer of cerebral angiography.  

He is regarded as one of the founders of modern psychosurgery, having developed the surgical procedure leucotomy—​known better today as lobotomy—​for which he became the first Portuguese national to receive a Nobel Prize in 1949.

He held academic positions, wrote many medical articles and also served in several legislative and diplomatic posts in the Portuguese government. In 1911 he became professor of neurology in Lisbon until his retirement in 1944. At the same time, he pursued a demanding political career.

 In 1927 Moniz developed cerebral angiography, a technique allowing blood vessels in and around the brain to be visualized; in various forms it remains a fundamental tool both in diagnosis and in the planning of surgeries on the brain. He also helped develop thorotrast for use in the procedure.

In 1936, he published his first report of performing a prefrontal leucotomy on a human patient, and subsequently devised the leucotome for use in the procedure. The procedure enjoyed a brief vogue, and in 1949 he received the Nobel Prize, "for his discovery of the therapeutic value of leucotomy in certain psychoses.” Later this procedure fell into disrepute.

Source: wikipedia