While Sarnoff was assisting his father in the operating room, he made observations which challenged conventional thoughts on cardiac physiology.
A succession of prominent cardiac investigators work in Sarnoff's lab, including Eugene Braunwald, Joseph Gilmore, Jere Mitchell, William John Powell Jr, Edmund Sonnenblick, Andrew Wallace and Myron Weisfeldt.
He and his wife LoLo began Rodana Research Corporation followed by Survival Technology Inc (STI), a publicly traded company registered with NASDAQ.
Although the auto-injectors were first developed for military use to administer a nerve gas antidote, Sarnoff used them to immediately treat heart attacks so that the patient could survive until a medical team could arrive.
As STI prospered financially, Sarnoff was inspired to encourage young medical students to pursue cardiovascular research.
After discussions with Ellis Rolett, the chair of cardiology at Dartmouth, in 1979 Sarnoff agreed to meet four young medical students.
As the fellowship grew, students would attend a yearly meeting and present their findings to their peers and to the Sarnoff Cardiovascular research community of mentors, advisors and past fellows.
Through the remaining years of his life, Sarnoff and sponsors from a handful of medical schools reviewed and selected fellowship recipients.
At the last Annual Meeting during his lifetime, which was a few weeks prior to his death, many of the Fellows and their mentors gathered by the telephone to speak a few words to him and to thank him for the influence he had on their lives.
Each year hundreds of people attend the Sarnoff Annual Meeting where a new set of young cardiovascular researchers is presented.