Thomas Starzl was born on 11 March 1926 in Le Mars, Iowa, USA. He was married to Joy Denise Conger. He died on 4 March 2017 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA.
He was a surgeon who performed the world's first liver transplant in 1963 and the first successful liver transplant in 1967. His research on the anti-rejection drug cyclosporin changed transplantation from an experimental procedure into one that gave patients more hope that they could survive an otherwise fatal organ failure.