Two ICMR awards for University of Hyderabad's Dr Nooruddin Khan

Hyderabad: Dr. Nooruddin Khan, assistant professor in the department of biotechnology school of life sciences at the University of Hyderabad (UoH) has been awarded two Indian Council of Medical Research awards i.e Shakuntala Amir Chand prize and Chaturvedi Kalawati Jagmohan Das Memorial Award at the annual award ceremony held on Wednesday at the National Academy of Medical Sciences, New Delhi.

The Shakuntala Amir Chand prize has been awarded to Dr Khan for his research work on molecular mechanisms of vaccine induced protective immunity which was announced to have the potential to devlop vaccine formulations against diseases. 

The Chaturvedi Kalawati Jagmohan Das Memorial Award was given for research contribution in the field of immunology. He is one of the few awardees to receive two ICMR awards. Dr Khan says, “It is a great honour and I will continue my research in this field.”

Dr Khan was given the memorial award for his research regarding regulatory mechanisms through which immune cells sense and respond to nutrient restriction. The research finding suggests that, ‘Activation of nutrient sensing pathway during amino acid starvation triggers homeostatic processes that elicits anti-viral properties which provides protection from inflammation associated pathologies during Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD).’

The chief guest of the award function was Anupriya Patel, the Minister of  Health and Family Welfare, Government of India.

Dr Khan is a visiting and courtesy Assistant Professor at the Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Cornell University, USA. His research work concentrates on vaccinations, infections and autoimmunity to treat infectious and metabolic diseases like HIV, Diabetes and others. 

Dr Khan says, “It is a great honour and I will continue my research in this field.”