Richard K. Gershon
Yale University
December 24, 1932 - July 11, 1983
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Scientific Discipline: Immunology and Inflammation Membership Type:
Member
(elected 1980)
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Richard K. Gershon contributed one of the most important discoveries in cellular immunology. He demonstrated that immune responses are regulated by antigen-specific, regulatory T lymphocytes (T cells), which suppress cell-mediated immunity towards the end of an immune reaction. This discovery led him to demonstrate that T lymphocytes were responsible for acquired immune tolerance and the feedback inhibition of the immune response. These studies have opened new areas in immunology and biology to investigation and provided new concepts and tools for experimental medicine.
Gershon graduated from Harvard in 1954 and earned his M.D. at Yale Medical School in 1959. From 1956 to 1960 he completed postdoctoral fellowships at the University of Paris and Yale Medical School in the department of pathology. After completing his internship and residency at Yale Medical School in 1964, he became a professor of pathology. In 1977 he was the director of the Laboratory of Cellular Immunology at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.
