Richard Carroll, cancer researcher

Richard G. Carroll, 52, of Wallingford, a cancer researcher at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, died Friday, Sept. 24, of complications from pancreatic cancer at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania.

In 1999, Dr. Carroll joined the medical school's department of molecular and cellular engineering. He later shifted to the department of pathology and laboratory medicine.

He was principal investigator at Penn for several grants from the National Institutes of Health to explore ways to condition the immune system to fight cancer. His last project was to determine how pancreatic tumors avoided the immune system, said James Riley, associate professor of pathology and laboratory medicine at Penn.

After the diagnosis of his illness in November, Dr. Carroll was closely involved in developing techniques that might fight pancreatic cancer, said Carl June, a professor of pathology and laboratory medicine. Dr. Carroll was also involved in research on other types of cancer.

As his illness progressed, he volunteered to join early-stage clinical trials at Penn and an experimental clinical trial developed in his own laboratory. As recently as the day before his death, he was helping to edit research articles, his colleagues said.

Dr. Carroll grew up in Connecticut and spent his summers on Cape Cod fishing with his grandmother. He became fascinated with biology after he cleaned his first fish when he was around 9, said his wife, Laurie Kunkel Carroll.

He earned a bachelor's degree in biology with a minor in chemistry from the University of Notre Dame.

For three years, he tested military demolition products for Ensign-Bickford Co. in Simsbury, Conn.

Dr. Carroll then earned a doctorate in biochemistry from the University of Connecticut and took a fellowship to study how proteins could be produced in test tubes to create drugs.

He and his wife, who was earning a master's degree in physical anthropology, met in a University of Connecticut lab when they dissected a dead cat together. The story amused their daughters.

Dr. Carroll did postgraduate work at the National Cancer Institute in Frederick, Md. From 1992 to 1999, he was a researcher with the Henry M. Jackson Foundation for the Advancement of Military Medicine in Maryland, developing cell- and gene-therapy approaches to treat HIV-1 infection.

He wrote or cowrote more than 50 articles published in scientific journals.

An accomplished, self-taught guitar player, Dr. Carroll was a fan of the Grateful Dead and the Rolling Stones.

In addition to his wife, he is survived by daughters Megan and Bonnie; his father and stepmother, Richard P. and Carol; and three sisters.

A Funeral Mass was said Sept. 28 at St. John Chrysostom Church, Wallingford. Burial was in SS. Peter and Paul Cemetery, Marple Township.

Memorial donations may be made to the trustees of Penn in care of the Richard Carroll Fund, 435 Creekside Dr., Downingtown, Pa. 19335.