by David Wallace
Dr. Richard T. Silver died on April 17, 2026, at the age of 97. He was born on January 18, 1929. In the 97 years between those two dates, he built a career that is difficult to summarize without sounding like a highlight reel, and yet every line of it is true. He introduced interferon as a treatment for myeloproliferative neoplasms. He was among the initial investigators on the first clinical trials of imatinib for chronic myeloid leukemia, one of the most important cancer drug stories of the modern era. He developed and popularized the bone marrow biopsy technique that is now used around the world, and he wrote the 1970 textbook that taught a generation of hematologists how to read one. He founded a cancer research charity in 1968 that has since awarded more than $17 million in grants. He journeyed up the Upper Xingu River in the Mato Grosso to study the blood groups of an indigenous community. And on weekends, he played the clarinet.
For thousands of us living with an MPN, what he did in clinic mattered most. For me personally, his research on interferon was the single biggest reason I started the treatment I am on today. But the life he lived was far bigger than any one disease.
The Doctor
Dr. Silver was professor emeritus of medicine at Weill Cornell Medicine (WCM), a past attending physician at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital, and director emeritus of the Richard T. Silver, MD Myeloproliferative Neoplasms Center at Weill Cornell. That center is named after him for his contributions at WCM.
He trained in internal medicine, hematology, and oncology at Cornell-NYPH and at the National Cancer Institute and spent the rest of his professional life at Weill Cornell. For years he served as a principal investigator and as vice chairman (and acting chairman) of a large National Cancer Institute-sponsored cooperative cancer chemotherapy group, giving him a seat at the table where the standards of modern cancer care were being written.
Interferon, CML, and the Bone Marrow Biopsy
Three contributions in Dr. Silver’s clinical research stand out, and any one of them would have been a distinguished career in itself.
Interferon for myeloproliferative neoplasms. Dr. Silver is most widely known in our community for introducing interferon as a treatment for MPNs, including polycythemia vera, essential thrombocythemia, and myelofibrosis. When he began publishing on it in the 1980s, the idea was unconventional. Four decades later, ropeginterferon alfa-2b (Besremi) is FDA-approved for PV and is widely considered the most likely currently approved drug to meaningfully modify the long-term course of the disease. Every PV patient who walks into a clinic today with interferon as an option on the table owes that option, in substantial part, to him.
First trials of imatinib for chronic myeloid leukemia. Because of his foundational research in CML, Dr. Silver was selected as one of the initial investigators in the first clinical trials of imatinib, the drug that became Gleevec. Gleevec turned CML from a frequently fatal disease into one that is managed with a daily pill, and it is the prototype that every modern targeted cancer therapy has been compared to ever since. Dr. Silver was there at the start of that story.
The bone marrow biopsy. Long before interferon or imatinib, he developed and popularized the bone marrow biopsy technique that is now used worldwide to diagnose hematologic disorders. His 1970 textbook, The Morphology of the Blood and Marrow in Clinical Practice, became a foundational reference. Almost every MPN patient reading this has had a bone marrow biopsy. The procedure itself is part of his legacy.
The Explorer
Medicine was not his only pursuit. Early in his career, Dr. Silver served as a visiting Fulbright professor at the University of Bahia in Salvador, Brazil, where he helped establish a residency training program. While in Brazil, he journeyed into the Mato Grosso to study the blood groups of an indigenous community along the Upper Xingu River, and he published his findings.
That work led to his election as a Fellow of the Explorers Club, the storied New York institution that has counted astronauts, polar explorers, and deep-sea pioneers among its members. He held numerous committee positions there and served on its board of directors. It is a rare physician who earns that honor. It is a rarer one whose scientific curiosity carries him from a Manhattan clinic to a jungle river and back again.
The Philanthropist
In 1968, Dr. Silver founded the Cancer Research & Treatment Fund (CR&T), built on his conviction that innovative blood cancer research would produce breakthroughs benefiting all forms of cancer. He was right. In the decades since, CR&T has awarded more than $17 million in research grants, funding work that has shaped modern hematologic oncology. The foundation remains active today and continues the mission he set in motion more than 55 years ago.
The Teacher
Dr. Silver mentored residents and fellows with genuine enthusiasm, and many of the people he trained went on to successful careers as investigators and clinicians. In a field as specialized as MPN research, this mattered enormously. When you sit across from your MPN specialist today, there’s a good chance the medicine they practice traces back, one mentor at a time to Richard T. Silver.
Active well into his 90s, he wrote or co-authored 332 peer-reviewed papers, 4 books, and 46 book chapters, along with countless abstracts for national and international meetings. He held 12 distinguished visiting professorships. He convened and co-chaired 16 International Congresses on Myeloproliferative Neoplasms, helping to build the global scientific community that drives MPN research today.
He received a Lifetime Academic Achievement and Service Award from the dean of Weill Cornell Medicine and a Special Achievement Award from its Alumni Association. In addition to the Silver MPN Center, Weill Cornell honored him by naming the Richard T. Silver Distinguished Professor of Hematology and Medical Oncology and the Richard T. Silver Visiting Professor in his honor, positions that will carry his name forward in perpetuity. He served as a life member of the Cornell University Council and as past president and senior advisor of the Weill Medicine Alumni Association.
The Musician
Here is the detail that made me smile when I read it. Dr. Silver was an accomplished clarinetist. He and his wife Barbara endowed the Barbara and Richard T. Silver Associate Professorship in the Department of Music at Cornell University and the Barbara and Richard T. Silver Wind Symphony. A man whose career was spent listening carefully to patients also spent his life listening carefully to music.
A Personal Note
Dr. Silver’s work is very personal to me. His published research on interferon was the single biggest factor in my decision to start the treatment I am on today. The photo above was taken at the Joyce Niblack Memorial Conference on Myeloproliferative Neoplasms in 2023, where I had the privilege of meeting him in person. I never had the honor of being his patient, but I am one of thousands of PV patients whose treatment decisions were directly shaped by his career and one of many in this community who feels his loss personally. He was and always will be an inspiration to me.
How to Honor His Memory
Memorial contributions in Dr. Silver’s name can be directed to the Cancer Research & Treatment Fund (CR&T), the charity he founded in 1968, which continues the work he cared about most. For PV patients and families reading this, the other way to honor him is to keep asking good questions of your hematologists, to keep pushing for access to MPN specialists, and to keep advocating for the patient-centered, evidence-based care that defined his practice.
Dr. Silver gave us better science, better doctors, and better odds. He also gave us the clarinet on weekends. Rest in peace to a man who knew how to live a full life and spent it making ours longer.
David Wallace is the founder of PV Reporter and MPN Cancer Connection, top-tier patient advocacy resources for the polycythemia vera and myeloproliferative neoplasm community. Biographical details in this article are drawn from the memorial notice published by the Cancer Research & Treatment Fund (CR&T), the charity Dr. Silver founded in 1968, and are used with gratitude.
