Juan Rosai was a world-renowned surgical pathologist whose career spanned over five decades and profoundly shaped modern pathology practice globally. Born in Italy in 1940 and raised in Argentina, he received his medical degree in Buenos Aires before commencing his pathology career under the mentorship of Eduardo Lascano. He subsequently moved to the United States, completing his pathology residency at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis under Professor Lauren V. Ackerman. Throughout his distinguished career, Rosai held prominent leadership positions including Professor and Director of Anatomic Pathology at the University of Minnesota, Chairman of Pathology at Yale University School of Medicine, and James Ewing Alumni Professor and Chairman of Pathology at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York City.
Dr. Rosai made seminal contributions across numerous fields of pathology, providing the first descriptions of multiple disease entities including the eponymous Rosai-Dorfman disease and desmoplastic small round cell tumor. He authored over 400 scientific peer-reviewed papers and was the principal author of the definitive textbook Rosai and Ackerman's Surgical Pathology, translated into multiple languages and now in its tenth edition. His research spanned virtually all subspecialty areas with particularly significant contributions to neoplasms of the thyroid, thymus, and vascular system. Rosai was among the earliest pioneers to recognize the transformative potential of digital pathology for facilitating second opinion consultations and advancing objective measurements in histopathology through reproducible digital analysis.
In 2005, Dr. Rosai founded the International Center for Oncologic Pathology Consultations at the Centro Diagnostico Italiano in Milan, which became a global hub for expert pathology services utilizing digital telepathology. He served as Editor-in-Chief of the International Journal of Surgical Pathology until 2014 and made significant contributions to the WHO Classification of Tumors series. Throughout his illustrious career, he received numerous prestigious honors including the Distinguished Pathologist Award, the Maude Abbott Lectureship, and the Fred Waldorf Stewart Award. Juan Rosai's enduring legacy continues through his groundbreaking discoveries, comprehensive educational resources, and visionary leadership that guides generations of surgical pathologists worldwide.
