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Harrison College of Pharmacy

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Amit Kumar Mitra headshot

Amit Kumar Mitra

Associate Professor
Unit: Drug Discovery and Development
Auburn University
Harrison College of Pharmacy
3306d Walker Building
Auburn, AL 36849
Email: akm0060@auburn.edu
Phone: 334-844-7404
Fax: 334-844-8331


Center for Pharmacogenomics and Single-Cell Omics Initiative

Now accepting applications for Masters and Ph.D. students.


Bio

Education:
  • B.Sc., Zoology, Chemistry, Botany - University of Calcutta (India), 2001
  • M.Sc., Zoology, Cytogenetics and Molecular Biology - University of Calcutta (India), 2003
  • Ph.D., CSIR-Central Drug Research Institute, India - Jawaharlal Nehru University (India), 2009

Research Interests:
  • Pharmacogenomics
  • Translational Research
  • Single-cell genomics/transcriptomics/proteomics
  • Next-generation (DNA/Exome/whole genome/RNA) sequencing, SNP arrays and Microarrays
  • Functional genomics/ Cell and Molecular Biology
  • Bioinformatics and Computational Biology
  • Population Genetics

Amit Kumar Mitra, Ph.D. is an Associate Professor in the Department of Drug Discovery and Development, joining the Harrison College of Pharmacy on Oct. 1, 2017. He received his B.SC. in Zoology (Honors - Cell and Molecular Biology, Genetics, Biostatistics, Microbiology, Biochemistry), Chemistry, Botany from the University of Calcutta in India in 2001 and his M.SC. in Zoology, Cytogenetics and Molecular Biology (Special Paper) from the University of Calcutta in 2003. Dr. Mitra went on to complete his Ph.D. from the Central Drug Research Institute (India) at Jawaharlal Nehru University in 2009. While completing his education, Dr. Mitra was a Research Associate with the Central Drug Research Institute.

Prior to joining HCOP, Dr. Mitra completed post-doctoral work with the Pharmacogenomics Laboratory in the College of Pharmacy at the University of Minnesota between 2009-12. He stayed on for one more year as a Research Associate in the Institute of Human Genetics before accepting a position as Research Assistant Professor in University of Minnesota’s Department of Genetics, Cell Biology, and Development from 2013-17.

Professionally, Dr. Mitra is involved with Pharmacogenomics Research Network (PGRN), American Society of Hematology (ASH), American Association of Cancer Research (AACR), American Association of Indian Scientists in Cancer Research (AAISCR), The American Society for Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics (ASCPT), International Society for the Study of Xenobiotics (ISSX), and the Indian Genome Variation Database Consortium (IGVdb). Additionally, he has served as an ad-hoc journal reviewer for Oncotarget, PLoS One, BMC Medical Genetics, Molecular Biology Reports, and Experimental and Molecular Pathology.


Research

Extensive inter-individual variation in response to chemotherapeutic drugs is a major limitation in achieving consistent therapeutic effect in human diseases. Not all patients respond equally well to treatment and those who do often acquire therapy resistance over the course of treatment.

Dr. Mitra's current research focuses on identifying the genomic and pharmacogenomic factors governing the wide heterogeneity in human diseases including multiple myeloma, AML and solid tumors that influence susceptibility, disease progression, clinical aggressiveness, drug sensitivity and eventual treatment outcomes.

In recent years, he has combined in vitro drug chemo-sensitivity modeling, next-generation sequencing and CRISPR technologies, single cell transcriptomics and computational approaches like supervised machine learning-based prediction algorithms to predict both inter-tumor (between tumor) as well as intra-tumor (within tumor or subclonal) heterogeneity in drug response. His long term goal is to create a comprehensive pharmacogenomics-based signature profile incorporating genomic, transcriptomic and epigenomic information that can be used as a robust predictor qualitatively and quantitatively associated with drug sensitivity/resistance and the choice of effective personalized pharmacogenomics-guided secondary therapies.

As a genomics and pharmacogenomics expert, Dr. Mitra is also involved in collaborative efforts to identify novel, de novo variants associated with the risk of complex human disorders like autism and non-syndromic cleft lip and palate.


Dr. Amit Kumar Mitra's Awards
Year Award
2015 Brian D. Novis Junior Investigator Award | International Myeloma Foundation
2012 Best Post-Doc Poster Award | Rho Chi Research Symposium, University of Minnesota
2011 Best Post-Doc Poster Award | Rho Chi Research Symposium, University of Minnesota
2006-09 Senior Research Fellowship | Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, India
2004-06 Junior Research Fellowship | Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, India
2003 Junior Research Fellowship | State Level Eligibility Test (SLET) | West Bengal, India
2003 Graduate Aptitude Test in Engineering (GATE), India | All India Rank-281
2002 National Eligibility Test (NET) | India | Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, India (among Top 20% of the 2% candidates who qualified)
2001 Merit Scholarship | University of Calcutta, India
1993 All India Talent Search Scholarship | INCEF, India | Awarded by Prime Minister of India

Funded Research Grants

NIH U54 grant (2017)

  • Title: Pharmacogenomics of drug resistance in myeloma
  • Role: Co-I; in collaboration with Prof. Brian Van Ness (University of Minnesota), Prof. Shaji Kumar (Mayo Clinic-Rochester), Prof. Keith Stewart and Prof. Leif Bergsagel (Mayo Clinic- Scottsdale)

Brian D. Novis Junior Investigator Research Grant (2015)

  • Title: Identifying tumor response heterogeneity using single cell transcriptomics
  • Role: PI
  • Sponsor (s): International Myeloma Foundation (IMF)

UMGC Single-cell Genomics Grant (2014)

  • Title: Single cell analysis in myeloma using Fluidigm’s C1 system
  • Role: Co-PI; in collaboration with Prof. Brian Van Ness (University of Minnesota)
  • Sponsor (s): Fluidigm, University of Minnesota Genomics Center


Publications

Dr. Amit Mitra Bibliography/Published Works: Click


Patent

  • ‘Transcription Classification and Prediction of Drug Response (T-CAP DR)” (U.S. Patent Application Serial No.: 15/366,912, filed December 1, 2016).

Last Updated: September 19, 2024