Dickinson Woodruff Richards, Jr. (October 30, 1895 - February 23, 1973) was an American physician and physiologist. He attended Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, graduating with an M.A. in 1922 and his M.D. degree in 1923. In 1945 Richards moved his lab to Bellevue Hospital, New York and began collaborations with Andr矇 Cournand working on pulmonary function. Their research focussed on methods to study pulmonary function in patients with pulmonary disease. Their next area of research was the development of a technique for catheterization of the heart. Using this technique they were able to study and characterize traumatic shock, the physiology of heart failure. They measured the effects of cardiac drugs, and described various forms of dysfunction in chronic cardiac diseases and pulmonary diseases and their treatment, and developed techniques for the diagnosis of congenital heart diseases. He was a co-recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1956 with Andr矇 Cournand and Werner Forssmann. He also served as an advisor to Merck Sharp and Dohme Company, and edited the Merck Manual. He retired from his positions at Bellevue and Columbia in 1961. He died in 1973 at the age of 77.