California, USA (CU)_ The well-known Indian American cancer researcher Nina Bhardwaj, MD, PhD, was honored with the 2022 Lifetime Achievement in Cancer Research award by the American Association of Indian Scientists in Cancer Research. The award is granted annually to a distinguished scientist in appreciation of their major contributions to cancer research that have had a lasting influence and exemplify a lifelong dedication to making progress against cancer.
Bhardwaj serves as the director of immunotherapy at Mount Sinai’s Tisch Cancer Institute. In addition, other distinguished roles of Bhardwaj include the medical director of the vaccine and cell therapy laboratory, co-director of the cancer immunology program, and holder of the Ward-Coleman chair in cancer research at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. Her study has considerably increased our knowledge of how cancer might be treated using innate immune cells to overcome immunosuppression in tumor microenvironments.
Bhardwaj’s team identified a subgroup of dendritic cells that play a crucial role in starting the immune response. She also created dendritic cell-based and dendritic cell-targeted vaccines to treat cancer and other infections. On achieving the great honor, Bhardwaj expressed pride. She said, “It was a wonderful surprise to receive this award and to join such a prestigious group of previous recipients. It was also extraordinary to be recognized by such an elite group of peers”.
Bhardwaj added, “When I started in this field, dendritic cells were not considered unique lineages and were thought to be a lesser sibling of monocytes. But with the support of Mount Sinai and, in particular, The Tisch Cancer Institute, we were able to make significant discoveries that helped to expand this field and led to many studies using dendritic cells as cellular vaccine adjuvants. Ultimately, it is exciting to have our efforts validated with this award and it inspires me to continue my work and advance the fight against cancer.”
