[1] Root received his MD from Johns Hopkins University in 1963 and did his residency in internal medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital from 1963-1965.
He served as chief resident and instructor in the Department of Medicine at the University of Washington from 1968 to 1969.
In 2006, he was invited by the University of Pennsylvania Infectious Disease Department to assist a project in Botswana.
He was killed by a crocodile attack while on a wildlife tour of the Limpopo River in the Tuli Nature Reserve.
While at least one article has aligned the story to the popular notion of unstable dugout canoes turning over,[2] the trip pictures taken by his wife reveal Root and his guide riding in a sound commercially manufactured vessel.