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--Nsawhney92 (talk) 00:30, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

Dr. Nina Bhardwaj was born in Nairobi, Kenya. She came to the United States in 1971 as a college student, graduating from Wellesley College in 1975 with a BA in Biology with honors. Dr. Bhardwaj subsequently spent six years at the New York University where she obtained her M.S., M.D., and PhD degrees. This was followed by a residency in Internal Medicine at the Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston and a fellowship in Rheumatology at the Hospital for Special Surgery and Weill Medical College in New York. Dr. Bhardwaj continued her research at the Rockefeller University where she was a post-doctoral fellow and played an essential role in the discovery of dendritic cells. She then worked for many years as a Professor of Medicine in the Department of Pathology and Oncology at New York University School of Medicine. Her focus is on the biology of human dendritic cells and their application in vaccines and immunotherapies for the treatment of chronic virus infections and cancers.

Research




Work at NYU
Nina Bhardwaj, M.D., Ph.D. Professor of Medicine, Pathology and Dermatology Director, Tumor Vaccine Program Experimental Pathology, Immunology, Pathobiology	 / Immunobiology of antigen presenting cells; cancer vaccine development

Research and Clinical Interests The goal of the Bhardwaj lab is to understand the biology of human dendritic cells (DCs) in diseases like cancer and viral infections, and exploit the potential of DCs as therapeutic vaccines. Dendritic cells constitute a specialized class of cells in the body that is involved in the early detection of invading pathogens like bacteria and viruses and directing the body's defense mechanisms to mount an appropriate immune response to check the spread of infection. DCs are able to present on their surface antigenic peptides from pathogens, which are recognized by specific T cells. These T cells get activated and constitute an essential constituent of the ensuing immune response.

Elizabeth Glaser award


Recipients of this distinguished award, the only named research award developed specifically and exclusively for pediatric AIDS, are selected on the basis of their knowledge, innovation, and dedication. The five-year duration of each award is a means of building a network of scientists, whose collaboration and determination will bring solutions to the most critical challenges in pediatric AIDS research.

Scientific American: Top 50 Research Leaders (2004)


From the Scientific American article:

"MEDICAL TREATMENT: Nina Bhardwaj--Professor of medicine and director of the cancer vaccine program, New York University School of Medicine [now at Mt. Sinai]. Made progress toward creating dendritic cell vaccines.

Dendritic cells' key role in priming the immune system gives them formidable potential as therapeutic vaccines for fighting cancers and viruses such as HIV. These spiny cells' main job in the body is to display antigens--distinctive bits of undesirable                  invaders--to the immune system's foot soldiers, called killer T cells, for future recognition and attack. Nina Bhardwaj, already one of the world's leading experts on dendritic cells, significantly advanced prospects for dendritic cell vaccines this year with a series of discoveries about the cells' properties and behavior. Among these findings, Bhardwaj clarified several of the mechanisms that dendritic cells use to identify invaders and stimulate T cells. She also showed how tumor cells can suppress dendritic cells and, in another study, demonstrated that dendritic cells' activity appears not to be diminished by hepatitis C, a common co-infection in HIV patients. She is currently conducting two clinical trials of dendritic cell vaccines in HIV patients and planning for another vaccine trial in melanoma patients soon."

Selected Publications
Sabado RL, O'Brien M, Subedi A, Qin L, Hu N, Taylor E, Dibben O, Stacey A, Fellay J, Shianna KV, Siegal F, Shodell M, Shah K, Larsson M, Lifson J, Nadas A, Marmor M, Hutt R, Margolis D, Garmon D, Markowitz M, Valentine F, Borrow P, Bhardwaj N. Evidence of dysregulation of dendritic cells in primary HIV infection. Blood. 2010 Nov 11;116(19):3839-52. Epub 2010 Aug 6. Cited in Pubmed;. doi: 10.1182/blood-2010-03-273763. [Available on 2011/11/11].

Sabado RL, Bhardwaj N. Directing dendritic cell immunotherapy towards successful cancer treatment. Immunotherapy. 2010 Jan;2(1):37-56. Cited in Pubmed;. doi: 10.2217/imt.09.43. .

Bogunovic D, O'Neill DW, Belitskaya-Levy I, Vacic V, Yu YL, Adams S, Darvishian F, Berman R, Shapiro R, Pavlick AC, Lonardi S, Zavadil J, Osman I, Bhardwaj N. Immune profile and mitotic index of metastatic melanoma lesions enhance clinical staging in predicting patient survival. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2009 Nov;Epub 2009 Nov 13. Cited in Pubmed;. doi: 10.1073/pnas.0905139106.

Minkis K, Kavanagh DG, Alter G, Bogunovic D, O'Neill DW, Adams S, Pavlick A, Walker BD, Brockman MA, Gandhi RT, Bhardwaj N. Type 2 Bias of T Cells Expanded from the Blood of Melanoma Patients Switched to Type 1 by IL-12p70 mRNA–Transfected Dendritic Cells. Cancer Res. 2008 Nov 15;68:9441-50. doi: 10.1158/0008-5472.CAN-08-0900.

Skoberne M, Yewdall A, Bahjat KS, Godefroy E, Lauer P, Lemmens E, Liu W, Luckett W, Leong M, Dubensky TW, Brockstedt DG, Bhardwaj N. KBMA Listeria monocytogenes is an effective vector for DC-mediated induction of antitumor immunity. J Clin Invest. 2008 Nov;Epub 2008 Nov 6. Cited in Pubmed;. doi: 10.1172/JCI31350. .

Manches O, Munn D, Fallahi A, Lifson J, Chaperot L, Plumas J, Bhardwaj N. HIV-activated human plasmacytoid DCs induce Tregs through an indoleamine 2,3-dioxygenase-dependent mechanism. J Clin Invest. 2008 Oct;118(10):3431-9. Cited in Pubmed;. doi: doi:10.1172/JCI34823.

Adams S, Lowes M, O’Neill DW, Schachterle S, Romero P, Bhardjwaj N. Lack of Functionally Active Melan-A(26-35)-Specific T Cells in the Blood of HLA-A2(+) Vitiligo Patients. J Invest Dermatol. Epub 2008 Mar 13. Cited in Pubmed;.

O’Neill DW, Bhardwaj N. Armed and ready: How effector T cells deploy in reactive lymph nodes to modulate immunity. Nature Immunol. 2007;8(7):679-81. Cited in Pubmed;.

Velazquez EF, Jungbluth AA, Yancovitz M, Gnjatic S, Adams S, O'Neill D, Zavilevich K, Albukh T, Christos P, Mazumdar M, Pavlick A, Polsky D, Shapiro R, Berman R, Spira J, Busam K, Osman I, Bhardwaj N. Expression of the cancer/testis antigen NY-ESO-1 in primary and metastatic malignant melanoma (MM)--correlation with prognostic factors. Cancer Immun. 2007;7:11-17. Cited in Pubmed;.

Skoberne M, Somersan S, Almodovar W, Truong T, Petrova K, Henson P, Bhardwaj N. The Apoptotic Cell Receptor CR3, but not alphavbeta5, is a regulator of human dendritic-cell immunostimulatory function. Blood. 2006 Aug 1;108(3):947-55.

Beignon AS, McKenna K, Skoberne M, Manches O, DaSilva I, Kavanagh D, Larsson M, Gorelick R, Liffson J, Bhardwaj N. Endocytosis of HIV-1 Activates Plasmacytoid Dendritic Cells via Toll-Like Receptor-Viral RNA Interactions. J Clin Invest. 2005;115:3265-75.

Selected Reviews
Altfeld M, Fadda L, Frleta D, Bhardwaj N. DCs and NK cells: critical effectors in the immune response to HIV-1. Nat Rev Immunol. 2011 Mar;11(3):176-86. Cited in Pubmed;. doi: 10.1038/nri2935.

Khan S, Greenberg JD, Bhardwaj N. Dendritic cells as targets for therapy in rheumatoid arthritis. Nat Rev Rheumatol. 2009 Oct;5(10):566-71. Cited in Pubmed;. doi: 10.1038/nrrheum.2009.185.

Organizational Associations
American Society of Clinical Investigation; American Society of Clinical Oncology; Infectious Disease Society of America; American Association of Immunologists

Selected Awards
2002-2007	 Doris Duke Distinguished Clinical Scientist Award 2004	 Merit Award, NIH AI44628 2004	 Scientific American Top 50 Researchers Award (Medical Research) 2009 Elected Member, Association of American Physicians 2009-2011 NIH MERIT Award (3R37AI044628-11S1): Induction of lmmunity by Non-Replicating HIV-1 (PI) 2009-2011 NIH/NIAID Award (1RC1 AI087097): Immunosuppressive pathways in acute-HIV infection (PI)