Meet Dr Radha Rangarajan, the new director of Lucknow’s CDRI

In a significant move, Dr Radha Rangarajan has assumed office as the new director of Lucknow’s Central Drug Research Institute (CDRI). She is only the second woman to achieve this post after Dr Madhu Dixit, who was the CDRI-director between 2015-2017.

Dr Rangarajan has been active in the field of public health for the past 20 years, with her work focusing on product development and translational research. She joined Lucknow’s CDRI, a multidisciplinary research laboratory and drug institute, as a director on September 5.

Dr Rangarajan’s career

An alumnus of Stanford University, University of Michigan, and Rockefeller University, Dr Rangarajan has been a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard School of Public Health.

She also worked in the drug discovery division of Hyderabad’s Dr Reddy’s Laboratories between 2003-2009. In 2020, the CDRI director was chosen as the chief technology officer of HealthCubed, a medical equipment company. Herein, she handled the product development, manufacturing, clinical validation and more.

“She served in multiple roles, successfully developing early-stage molecules for various therapeutic areas such as anti-infectives, diabetes and cardiovascular disease. Thereafter, she co-founded Vitas Pharma, a drug discovery and development company focused on novel therapies to treat infection,” shared CDRI Spokesperson Sanjeev Yadav.

Dr Rangarajan led the Vitas Pharma team that won the Discovery Award of the Longitude Prize Committee in 2016 in UK.

Dr Rangarajan has garnered various accolades during her service. To name a few — she was one of the finalists in Economic Times Start up Awards (Woman Ahead Category) in 2016, was chosen for the ‘Champions of Change’ initiative by PM Modi, as one of India’s emerging entrepreneurs in 2017. Furthermore, she also received the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industries (FICCI) Award of Excellence in R&D in 2019.

The Director of CSIR-IICT Dr Srinivasa Reddy handed over the charge to Dr Rangarajan, praising her for holding expertise in both the pharma industry and academia. He also recognised her as an asset for the institute which is working to achieve affordable healthcare for all.