Roy Sundick, Ph.D., a 40-year member of our former Department of Immunology and Microbiology, died while on vacation in the Caribbean last week. He was 72.
He received his doctorate in Immunology from SUNY Buffalo in 1972, from where he also holds a master's degree in the same discipline.
Dr. Sundick was a highly-valued faculty member who joined the department as an assistant professor in 1974. He was named a professor in 1991, and retired in 2015, spending his entire teaching career with the School of Medicine. An immunologist, Dr. Sundick's research spanned studies of autoimmune thyroiditis in a chicken model to development of new adjuvanted vaccines for use in chickens, fish and humans, work that resulted in several patents and industrial collaborations.
A memorial was held April 1.
In lieu of flowers, his family asked that donations be made to:
Wayne State University School of Medicine
Sundick Memorial Fund
Department of Microbiology, Immunology, and Biochemistry
7374 Scott Hall
540 E. Canfield Ave., Detroit, MI 48201
"Dr. Sundick was a superb and highly-committed teacher, in every sense of the word. He provided well-organized and informative lectures for medical students and graduate students. He mentored a bevy of Ph.D. students who have moved on to positions of significance in industry and academia," said his colleague, Department of Microbiology, Immunology, and Biochemistry Professor and Chair Philip Pellett, Ph.D. "He provided outstanding mentorship by gentle example to many students in the department, as well as to junior faculty. Dr. Sundick was the lead instructor for two of my initial cycles as an instructor for the Immunology and Microbiology laboratory course for second-year medical students. I learned a lot from how he interacted with the students and gave them space to learn. Finally, Roy was a friend to all of us. I enjoyed his company, and I will miss him."
Dr. Sundick received the WSU College Teaching Award in 2000, 2005, 2008 and 2012, and Competitive Graduate Research Assistantships in 2000 and 2011. He was a member of his department's Promotion and Tenure, Annual Merit Review and Graduate committees. He also participated in several School of Medicine and university-wide committees, including the WSU Radiation Safety and Radioisotope Committee, and the University Graduate Council and two subcommittees. He served as a reviewer for several peer-reviewed journals.
"This guy was an absolute gentleman and a real class act -- the consummate scholar. Everything he did was beautiful. You could count on him for anything. Anything you asked, he would do it," said friend and neighbor Paul Montgomery, Ph.D., former chair of the Department of Immunology and Microbiology.
Dr. Sundick was a prolific, published researcher, funded by the National Institutes of Health and WSU, an invited international, national and regional lecturer, and wrote many books and chapters throughout his career. He was a member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the International Avian Immunology Cytokine Group, and treasurer of the Detroit Immunological Society.
Dr. Sundick is survived by his wife Elena Stepanova, son James and daughter Arianna Sundick, M.D.