David E. Fisher, MD, PhD is an internationally known researcher, clinician and academic, who is Chief of the Massachusetts General Hospital Department of Dermatology at Harvard Medical School in Boston, Massachusetts (USA). He also serves as Director of the MGH Cutaneous Biology Research Center and Director of the Melanoma Center at MGH.
A Professor of Dermatology and of Pediatrics at Harvard Medical School, Dr. Fisher came to the MGH from the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, where he previously Directed the Melanoma Program. Dr. Fisher’s research has focused on understanding the molecular and genetic events which underlie formation of melanoma as well as skin pigmentation. As a clinician, he has worked to translate these understandings into advances in diagnosis, treatment and prevention of human diseases related to the skin and associated disorders. A graduate of Swarthmore College with a degree in Biology and Chemistry, Dr. Fisher is also an accomplished concert cellist and graduated from the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. He received his PhD under Nobel Laureate Gunter Blobel at Rockefeller University and immunologist Dr. Henry Kunkel. After obtaining an MD from Cornell Univ Medical College, Fisher carried out specialty training in Internal Medicine as well as both Adult and Pediatric Oncology at Massachusetts General Hospital, Dana Farber Cancer Institute, and Boston Children’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School. He served as President of the Society for Melanoma Research, the largest international society dedicated to the study of melanoma and was also selected as Director of the US Department of Defense’s Melanoma Academy. Fisher was inducted into the National Academy of Medicine in 2020.