Jayaraj Rajagopal

Jayaraj Rajagopal (born 1969) is an Indian-American physician-scientist. He is the Bernard and Mildred Kayden MGH Research Institute Chair[1] and Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School. He founded and serves as the Chief of the Stanbury Physician-Scientist Pathway[2] at the Massachusetts General Hospital Department of Medicine. His laboratory[3] focuses on epithelial biology, lung stem cell biology, regenerative biology, and lung diseases.

Education and training

Rajagopal received his undergraduate degree summa cum laude in biochemical sciences from Harvard College, with Hoopes and Henderson Prizes for his work with Jack Szostak and Jennifer Doudna concerning the mechanism of ribozyme catalysis.[4] He then received his MD degree from Harvard Medical School and trained in Internal Medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital, where he served as Chief Medical Resident[5] and completed subspecialty training in Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine. After finishing his medical training, he joined Doug Melton's laboratory for postdoctoral studies. While there, he began his work studying the development of the lung.

Research

Rajagopal's research centers on the use of stem cell biology and developmental biology to reframe the cellular basis of lung physiology and disease. He, alongside Darrell Kotton, described the first protocols to direct the differentiation of pluripotent stem cells to airway epithelium.[6] His laboratory then made a fundamental contribution to the field of cellular plasticity when he discovered that a fully mature functional murine or human cell can durably dedifferentiate into a stem cell.[7] His lab also demonstrated that a stem cell can serve as a niche for its own daughter cells,[8] extending the fundamental concept of the niche first described by Ray Schofield.[9] He and Aviv Regiv discovered pulmonary ionocytes and airway hillocks by marrying developmental and computational biology through the use of single cell sequencing technology.[10]

Select honors and awards

References
  1. "Endowed MGH Research Institute Chairs". Massachusetts General Hospital. Retrieved 2022-10-27.
  2. "Stanbury Physician-Scientist Pathway". Massachusetts General Hospital. Retrieved 2022-10-27.
  3. "The Rajagopal Lab". rajagopallab. Retrieved 2022-10-27.
  4. Rajagopal, J.; Doudna, J. A.; Szostak, J. W. (1989-05-12). "Stereochemical course of catalysis by the Tetrahymena ribozyme". Science. 244 (4905): 692–694. Bibcode:1989Sci...244..692R. doi:10.1126/science.2470151. ISSN 0036-8075. PMID 2470151.
  5. Maartens, Aidan (2017-10-01). "An interview with Jayaraj Rajagopal". Development. 144 (19): 3389–3391. doi:10.1242/dev.158220. ISSN 1477-9129. PMID 28974636. S2CID 44499484.
  6. Mou, Hongmei; Zhao, Rui; Sherwood, Richard; Ahfeldt, Tim; Lapey, Allen; Wain, John; Sicilian, Leonard; Izvolsky, Konstantin; Musunuru, Kiran; Cowan, Chad; Rajagopal, Jayaraj (2012-04-06). "Generation of multipotent lung and airway progenitors from mouse ESCs and patient-specific cystic fibrosis iPSCs". Cell Stem Cell. 10 (4): 385–397. doi:10.1016/j.stem.2012.01.018. ISSN 1875-9777. PMC 3474327. PMID 22482504.
  7. Tata, Purushothama Rao; Mou, Hongmei; Pardo-Saganta, Ana; Zhao, Rui; Prabhu, Mythili; Law, Brandon M.; Vinarsky, Vladimir; Cho, Josalyn L.; Breton, Sylvie; Sahay, Amar; Medoff, Benjamin D.; Rajagopal, Jayaraj (2013-11-14). "Dedifferentiation of committed epithelial cells into stem cells in vivo". Nature. 503 (7475): 218–223. Bibcode:2013Natur.503..218T. doi:10.1038/nature12777. ISSN 1476-4687. PMC 4035230. PMID 24196716.
  8. Pardo-Saganta, Ana; Tata, Purushothama Rao; Law, Brandon M.; Saez, Borja; Chow, Ryan Dz-Wei; Prabhu, Mythili; Gridley, Thomas; Rajagopal, Jayaraj (2015-07-30). "Parent stem cells can serve as niches for their daughter cells". Nature. 523 (7562): 597–601. Bibcode:2015Natur.523..597P. doi:10.1038/nature14553. ISSN 1476-4687. PMC 4521991. PMID 26147083.
  9. Schofield, R. (1978). "The relationship between the spleen colony-forming cell and the haemopoietic stem cell". Blood Cells. 4 (1–2): 7–25. ISSN 0340-4684. PMID 747780.
  10. Montoro, Daniel T.; Haber, Adam L.; Biton, Moshe; Vinarsky, Vladimir; Lin, Brian; Birket, Susan E.; Yuan, Feng; Chen, Sijia; Leung, Hui Min; Villoria, Jorge; Rogel, Noga; Burgin, Grace; Tsankov, Alexander M.; Waghray, Avinash; Slyper, Michal (August 2018). "A revised airway epithelial hierarchy includes CFTR-expressing ionocytes". Nature. 560 (7718): 319–324. Bibcode:2018Natur.560..319M. doi:10.1038/s41586-018-0393-7. ISSN 1476-4687. PMC 6295155. PMID 30069044.
  11. "Awards". International Society for Stem Cell Research. Retrieved 2022-10-27.
  12. "Faculty Scholars Program". HHMI. Retrieved 2022-10-27.
  13. "MGH Research Scholars 2014-2019". Massachusetts General Hospital. Retrieved 2022-10-27.
  14. "Jay Rajagopal, MD". New York Stem Cell Foundation. Retrieved 2022-10-27.
  15. "2014 MGH Research Scholars". ecor.mgh.harvard.edu. Retrieved 2022-10-27.
  16. "Martin Prize Recipients". ecor.mgh.harvard.edu. Retrieved 2022-10-27.
  17. "Henderson Prize". lifesciences.fas.harvard.edu. Retrieved 2022-10-27.
  18. "Prize Winners". prizes.fas.harvard.edu. Retrieved 2022-10-27.
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