Athens Olympics hammer throw champion Koji Murofushi is teaming up with the Tokyo Medical and Dental University to provide medical and scientific support to athletes and eventually produce more Olympic medalists in the future, the TMDU announced on Wednesday.

The TMDU will organize a new institute for sports science in October to support athletes in both sports medicine and sports science, and Murofushi will be in charge of the sports science division in the institute as a part-time professor at TMDU.

"We have given medical treatments to athletes as a medical university, but we need more support for the athletes to avoid injuries or help their rehabilitations," TMDU president Yasuyuki Yoshizawa said. "Now we have Murofushi on our staff and will get ready to provide total care for the athletes."

Murofushi said, "My job here is to make a smooth collaboration of sports medicine and sports science. Sports medicine helps the injured athletes, and sports science helps develop athletes. The new organization will help not only the youth develop but also aged athletes, like myself, continue to compete at the high level longer.

"People expect the younger athletes will win the medals in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics," the 39-year-old added. "But, in my opinion, the athletes in (their) 30s or older, including the former medalists, have the chance to win a medal if they maintain their performance level high. The new organization will help them and hopefully bring more Olympic medals to Japan."