Dr. Sivadasan Kanangat

Dr. Sivadasan Kanangat sadly and unexpectedly passed away at age 66. He was born in Kerala in India, son of P.V. Raghava Varier (d. 1983) and K. Padmavathi, and he grew up with his two older brothers, Radhakrishnan (d. 2021) and Sreenivasan. For his entire life, two things stood out - his intellectual curiosity & his devotion to family. Siva earned his PhD in microbiology and immunology at the University of Madras, and his ambition brought him to the United States in the late 1980s for his postdoc. His illustrious career in science spanned almost fifty years. He gracefully and impressively transitioned into a second act of his career that was clinically focused - at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, he began his role as a leader in histocompatibility and transplantation medicine for the last more than fifteen years of his career. He was proud to hold the role of HLA Laboratory Director and Professor in pathology at Rush University Medical Center in Chicago, and across multiple major medical centers in the midwest, including Loyola University. He was known to be passionate about mentoring the many students and clinicians who spent time in his laboratory. Siva was an outstanding researcher, clinician, collaborator, and teacher who dedicated time to advancing the careers of others. Siva was a kind and warm-hearted human who applied the same drive and dedication in his professional life to his personal life. As his career took him from Knoxville and Memphis in Tennessee to Chicago, his family remained most important. Siva married his wife, Usha, in the early ‘90s; together they have two children, their older daughter Smriti, and younger son Varun. The family is extremely close. Siva and Usha were always united in their number one mission: raising their children to be capable, accomplished, kind, and dignified. He was exceedingly proud to watch both his children grow up and begin their adult lives with so much promise. His daughter attended Columbia University, and he was especially excited to see her complete the first half of her MD-PhD training at Emory University and the NIH, following in his footsteps to pursue a career in medicine and research. Siva was also so very proud to have recently attended his son’s high school graduation in the top two percent of his class and to watch him start his first year at the University of Pennsylvania, beginning his own journey of being pre-med. Siva also remained extremely close to his family back home in Kerala; he spoke regularly and visited his mother and his brother and all his nieces and nephews. Siva was well-loved by his work community, his friends, & most deeply, by his entire family. Siva was a resilient but gentle man, who accomplished so much in his life. There are no words for the shock and deep sorrow his family feels in losing him. They are so grateful for all the milestones they shared, all the delicious meals cooked, all the stories told, all the road trips taken, all the selfies, every crystal-clear memory of who he was. They will forever continue to honor his kindness, love for science, and genuine desire to contribute to the betterment of this world. In lieu of flowers, the family requests that you make a donation in Siva's honor and memory to Gift of Hope Organ & Tissue Donor Network, as he was so dedicated to the cause of organ transplantation and patient care. Please see the following link if you would like to donate: https://give.giftofhope.org/give/563774/#!/donation/checkout Funeral arrangements entrusted to McCauley-Sullivan Funeral Home.

Dr. Sivadasan Kanangat

March 1, 2024