13 Facts About Yoji Ito

Yoji Ito was an engineer and scientist who had a major role in the Japanese development of magnetrons and the Radio Range Finder.

Yoji Ito was born and raised in Onjuku, then a fishing village in the Chiba Prefecture of Japan.

Yoji Ito's father was the primary schoolmaster and encouraged his children to achieve science and mathematics excellence.

Still in the Navy, Yoji Ito was sent to Germany for graduate study where he was a student of Heinrich Barkhausen at the Dresden Technische Hochschule.

The NTRI had been formed in 1922, and was just becoming fully operational when Yoji Ito was sent there.

In early 1939, led by Yoji Ito they built a 10-cm, stable-frequency Mandarin-type magnetron that, with water cooling, could produce 500-W power.

In parallel with the VHF work, Yoji Ito returned to the magnetron applications, resulting in Japan's first pulse-modulated microwave RRF set.

Yoji Ito was made a department head at the NTRI and was promoted to captain.

Yoji Ito personally led the development of Japan's first airborne microwave RRF system.

Yoji Ito was involved with Japan's countermeasures equipment, particularly receivers to warn when vessels or aircraft were being observed by American radars.

Captain Yoji Ito was among this large group of individuals.

In 1947, with the hope of making a peaceful contribution of technologies cultivated in his naval days, Dr Yoji Ito founded the Koden Electronics Company Co.

Unfortunately, Yoji Ito died in 1955, but the firm continues as a worldwide supplier of marine electronic equipment.