Thomas Roth (scientist)


Thomas Roth is an American scientist who researches sleep and sleep disorders. The founder of the Sleep Disorders and Research Center at Henry Ford Health, Roth is also Professor Emeritus of Wayne State University School of Medicine, and a Clinical Professor Emeritus of the University of Michigan College of Medicine.

Early life and education

Roth earned a B.A. at Hunter College in 1965, an M.A. at the University of Cincinnati 1969, and a Ph.D. at the University of Cincinnati in 1971. Roth married Karen Lee Harris in 1966, and they had two sons, Daniel and Adam, before divorcing in 1978. He subsequently married Toni Grissom in 1981 and the had 2 children, Jonathan and Andrea.

Career

Roth explained his early interest in sleep research as a result of a summer job:
"When I was a student there was a job opening in a dream laboratory in the department of psychiatry. I figured I could do anything for a summer, so I worked in the laboratory and became enthralled with learning about sleep. It occurred to me that we just did not know much about a third of our lives—the time we spend sleeping... even the most rudimentary description of sleep in science didn't exist yet. The average person spends 25 years of their life sleeping and we knew nothing about that. That summer job totally changed the way I worked, and sleep became my interest for life."
In 1978 Roth founded the Sleep Disorders and Research Center at Henry Ford Health. In 2014, after his retirement, he was honored at a reception of the SLEEP 2014 conference in Minneapolis.
Over his career, Roth has served in many leadership positions:

Selected publications

Books

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Articles

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Awards, honors