Jack Copeland, MD

Former distinguished professor and cardiothoracic surgery chief at the University of Arizona College of Medicine and former co-director of the UA Sarver Heart Center. Dr. Copeland joined UA from Stanford University in 1977 to develop a transplant program where he performed the first heart transplant in Arizona in 1979. In 1985, he pioneered the use of an artificial heart to keep a patient alive until a donor heart became available. Dr. Copeland co-founded SynCardia in 2001 which manufactures the world's only commercially approved total artificial heart. After 33 years at the University of Arizona, Dr. Copeland resigned and moved to San Diego where he joined the faculty at the Sulpizio Family Cardiovascular Center at the University of California, San Diego.