Marquette University was John Kuranz’s first stop after graduating from Waukesha High School. He entered the military, earned an engineering degree from the University of Chicago and was assigned to the Manhattan Project. In 1957, Kuranz obtained a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Southern California. After World War II, he founded the Nuclear Chicago Corporation, a manufacturer of nuclear instruments and chemicals. The company eventually evolved and grew into Siemens Gammasonics, the world’s largest developer and manufacturer of nuclear medicine systems. Thanks in part to John Kuranz’s efforts, it is estimated that nuclear medicine and technology are used to treat 100 million people each year. Kuranz served on the board of NASA’s Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel. In 1995, John Kuranz died in a plane crash at the age of 73.