Vamsi K. Mootha is an
India
India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...
n-born
American physician-scientist and
computational biologist. He is an Investigator of the
Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Professor of Systems Biology and Medicine at
Harvard Medical School
Harvard Medical School (HMS) is the graduate medical school of Harvard University and is located in the Longwood Medical Area of Boston, Massachusetts. Founded in 1782, HMS is one of the oldest medical schools in the United States and is consi ...
, Investigator in the Department of Molecular Biology at
Massachusetts General Hospital. He is also an Institute Member of the
Broad Institute
The Eli and Edythe L. Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard (IPA: , pronunciation respelling: ), often referred to as the Broad Institute, is a biomedical and genomic research center located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. The institu ...
.
Mootha and his research group have made major contributions to mitochondrial biology and genomics. His group characterized the mammalian mitochondrial proteome and has produced a widely utilized resource called MitoCarta. Working with clinical collaborators, his team used the inventory to identify a very large number of mitochondrial disease genes. Mootha and his team used “integrative genomics” to identify all of the molecular components of the mitochondrial calcium uniporter, a key channel of communication between the organelle and the rest of the cell. He and his team used genomics to make the unexpected discovery that in animal models, low oxygen can alleviate mitochondrial disease. As a postdoctoral fellow he developed
Gene Set Enrichment Analysis, an algorithm that is widely used in genomics and has been implemented into a popular software tool.
He is a 2004 recipient of the
Macarthur Foundation "genius award". He received the 2008 Daland Prize from the
American Philosophical Society
The American Philosophical Society (APS), founded in 1743 in Philadelphia, is a scholarly organization that promotes knowledge in the sciences and humanities through research, professional meetings, publications, library resources, and communit ...
, the 2014 Keilin Medal from the Biochemical Society, and a 2014
Padma Shri
Padma Shri ( IAST: ''padma śrī''), also spelled Padma Shree, is the fourth-highest civilian award of the Republic of India, after the Bharat Ratna, the Padma Vibhushan and the Padma Bhushan. Instituted on 2 January 1954, the award is conf ...
Award from the
Republic of India, the fourth highest civilian award given by the Indian government. He was elected to the United States National Academy of Sciences in 2014 and the National Academy of Medicine in 2021.
Mootha graduated from Kelly High School in Beaumont, Texas. As a high school student he won first place in the mathematics category of the
International Science and Engineering Fair. He received his
BS in Mathematical and Computational Science from
Stanford University and his M.D. from
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of high ...
in the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology. He completed his internship and residency in internal medicine at
Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, and then pursued postdoctoral training with
Eric Lander at the Whitehead Institute/MIT
Center for Genome Research
The Eli and Edythe L. Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard (IPA: , pronunciation respelling: ), often referred to as the Broad Institute, is a biomedical and genomic research center located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. The institut ...
.
Mootha Laboratory
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References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mootha, Vamsi
Living people
Telugu people
MacArthur Fellows
American people of Telugu descent
Systems biologists
Stanford University alumni
Harvard Medical School alumni
American people of Indian descent
Harvard Medical School faculty
People from Beaumont, Texas
Howard Hughes Medical Investigators
Scientists from Andhra Pradesh
Massachusetts General Hospital faculty
Recipients of the Padma Shri in medicine
People from Kakinada
Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences
Year of birth missing (living people)
Members of the National Academy of Medicine