Gopal Kundu

Gopal Chandra Kundu (born 1959) is an Indian cell biologist and a former professor at National Centre for Cell Science.^[1] He is known for his contributions to the regulation of melanoma and breast cancer.^[2] An elected fellow of the Indian Academy of Sciences^[3] and the National Academy of Sciences, India,^[4] he received the National Bioscience Award for Career Development of the Department of Biotechnology in 2003.^[5] The Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, the apex agency of the Government of India for scientific research, awarded him the Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize for Science and Technology, one of the highest Indian science awards, in 2004, for his contributions to biological sciences.^[6]

Education and career

Kundu obtained his Ph.D. from Bose Institute, Kolkata, India (1989) in protein biochemistry and did his post-doctoral research work at the Cleveland Clinic Foundation, University of Colorado, University of Wyoming, and the National Institutes of Health from 1989 to 1998. He has performed work in the area of cardiovascular biology, inflammation and immunomodulation during that period. In 1998, he joined as Scientist-D at the National Centre for Cell Science (NCCS), Pune.^[7] At present, he is working as Scientist-G at NCCS. His area of research at NCCS is tumor biology, regulation of gene expression, cell signaling, angiogenesis, cancer therapeutics, biomarker studies for cancer detection, and nanomedicine.^[8][9]

He is Fellow of The National Academy of Sciences, India, and Indian Academy of Sciences. He is member of American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology and New York Academy of Sciences. He has published 70 papers in peer reviewed international journals.

He serves as Editorial Board Member of Current Molecular Medicine, Molecular Medicine Reports, The Open Cancer Journal and American Journal of Cancer Research.

Awards

In 2004 Kundu was awarded a Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize for Science and Technology,^[10][11] following the receipt of an earlier National Bioscience Award for Career Development in 2003.^[11] International Journal of Oncology, Oncology Reports and International Journal of Molecular Medicine Award for an outstanding achievement in Oncology, Greece; International Young Investigator Award, USA. 7th National Grassroots Innovation Award-2013, Rashtrapati Bhavan, New Delhi.

Controversy

A controversy erupted in the NCCS in 2006 when an anonymous mail alleged that Kundu and others might have misrepresented data in a paper published in the Journal of Biological Chemistry. The allegation was that they had rehashed the same set of data which they had published earlier.^[12] An internal committee of the NCCS advised the authors to take back their paper, however an independent committee led by G. Padmanabhan, a former director of Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, concluded that there was no manipulation in the data.^[13] This led to some heated debate between Indian Scientists with several viewpoints being presented.^[14][15] On 23 February 2007, the Journal of Biological Chemistry withdrew the paper amid allegations of data manipulation, although the authors maintained that the two papers used different set of data though similar experiments. One JBC paper was retracted by JBC ^[16] because they found the data to be unreliable.^[17] In November 2010, after an internal investigation by its ethics committee, the Indian Academy of Sciences banned Gopal Kundu from participating in its activities for three years.^[18]

Selected publications

• Philip, S; Bulbule, A; Kundu, GC (2001). "Osteopontin stimulates tumor growth and activation of pro-matrix metalloproteinase-2 through NF-kappa B mediated induction of membrane type 1-matrix metalloproteinase in murine melanoma cells". J. Biol. Chem. 276 (48): 44926–44935. doi:10.1074/jbc.m103334200. 
• Mahabeleshwar, GH; Kundu, GC (2003). "Syk, a protein tyrosine kinase, suppresses the cell motility and NF-kappa B mediated secretion of urokinase type plasminogen activator by inhibiting the phosphatidylinositol 3'-kinase activity in breast cancer cells". J. Biol. Chem. 278 (8): 6209–6221. doi:10.1074/jbc.m208905200. 
• Philip, S; Kundu, GC (2003). "Osteopontin induces NF-kappa B mediated promatrix metalloproteinase-2 activation through IKK/IκBα signaling pathways and curcumin (diferulolylmethane) down regulates these pathways". J. Biol. Chem. 278 (16): 14487–14497. doi:10.1074/jbc.m207309200. 
• Das, R; Mahabeleshwar, GH; Kundu, GC (2003). "Osteopontin stimulates cell motility and NF-kB mediated secretion of urokinase type plasminogen activator through phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase/Akt signaling pathways in breast cancer cells". J. Biol. Chem. 278 (31): 28593–28606. doi:10.1074/jbc.m303445200. 
• Mahabeleshwar, GH; Kundu, GC (2003). "Tyrosine kinase, p56lck regulates cell motility and NF-kB-mediated secretion of urokinase type plasminogen activator through tyrosine phosphorylation of IkBa following hypoxia/reoxygenation". J. Biol. Chem. 278 (52): 52598–52612. doi:10.1074/jbc.m308941200. 
• Mahabeleshwar, GH; Das, R; Kundu, GC (2004). "Tyrosine kinase, p56lck-induced cell motility and urokinase type plasminogen activator secretion involves activation of epidermal growth factor receptor/extracellular signal regulated kinase pathways". J. Biol. Chem. 279 (11): 9733–9742. doi:10.1074/jbc.m311400200. 
• Das, R; Mahabeleshwar, GH; Kundu, GC (2004). "Osteopontin induces AP-1-mediated secretion of urokinase type plasminogen activator through c-Src dependent EGF receptor transactivation in breast cancer cells". J. Biol. Chem. 279 (12): 11051–11064. doi:10.1074/jbc.m310256200. 
• Rangaswami, H; Bulbule, A; Kundu, GC (2004). "Nuclear factor inducing kinase plays crucial role in osteopontin induced MAPK/IKK dependent nuclear factor kB-mediated promatrix metalloproteinase-9 activation". J. Biol. Chem. 279 (37): 38921–38935. doi:10.1074/jbc.m404674200. 
• Rangaswami, H; Bulbule, A; Kundu, GC (2006). "Osteopontin: role in cell signaling and cancer progression". Trends in Cell Biol. 16 (2): 79–87. doi:10.1016/j.tcb.2005.12.005. PMID 16406521. 
• Chakraborty, G; Rangaswami, R; Jain, S; Kundu, GC (2006). "Hypoxia regulates crosstalk between Syk and Lck leading to breast cancer progression and angiogenesis". J. Biol. Chem. 281 (16): 11322–11331. doi:10.1074/jbc.m512546200. 
• Jain, S; Chakraborty, G; Kundu, GC (2006). "The Crucial Role of cyclooxygenase-2 in osteopontin-induced PKCα/c-Src/IKKα/β dependent prostate tumor progression and angiogenesis". Cancer Research. 66 (13): 6638–6648. doi:10.1158/0008-5472.can-06-0661. 
• Chakraborty, G; Jain, S; Kundu, GC (2008). "Osteopontin promotes VEGF dependent breast tumor growth and angiogenesis via autocrine and paracrine mechanisms". Cancer Research. 68 (1): 152–161. doi:10.1158/0008-5472.can-07-2126. 
• Jain, S; Chakraborty, G; Raja, R; Kale, S; Kundu, GC (2008). "Prostaglandin E2 regulates tumor angiogenesis in prostate cancer". Cancer Research. 68 (19): 7750–7759. doi:10.1158/0008-5472.can-07-6689. 
• Behera, R; Kumar, V; Lohite, K; Karnik, S; Kundu, GC (2010). "Activation of JAK2/STAT3 signaling by osteopontin promotes tumor growth in human breast cancer cells". Carcinogenesis. 31 (2): 192–200. doi:10.1093/carcin/bgp289. 
• Ahmed, M; Kundu, GC (2010). "Osteopontin selectively regulates p70S6K/mTOR phosphorylation leading to NF-kappa B dependent AP-1-mediated ICAM-1 expression in breast cancer cells". Molecular Cancer. 9 (1): 101. doi:10.1186/1476-4598-9-101. 
• Sharma, P; Kumar, S; Kundu, GC (2010). "Transcriptional regulation of human osteopontin promoter by histone deacetylase inhibitor, trichostatin A in cervical cancer cells". Molecular Cancer. 9 (1): 178. doi:10.1186/1476-4598-9-178. 
• Kumar, V; Behera, R; Lohite, K; Karnik, S; Kundu, GC (2010). "p38 Kinase is Crucial for Osteopontin-induced Furin Expression that Supports Cervical Cancer Progression". Cancer Research. 70 (24): 10381–10391. doi:10.1158/0008-5472.can-10-1470. 
• Panda, JJ; Kaul, A; Kumar, S; Alam, S; Mishra, AK; Kundu, GC; Chauhan, VS (2013). "Modified dipeptide-based nanoparticles: vehicles for targeted tumor drug delivery". Nanomedicine (Lond). 
• Raja, R; Kale, S; Thorat, D; Gowrishankar, S; Lohite, K; Mane, A; Karnik, S; Kundu, GC (2013). "Hypoxia driven osteopontin contributes to breast tumor growth through modulation of HIF1α-mediated VEGF dependent angiogenesis". Oncogene. 33 (16): 2053–2064. doi:10.1038/onc.2013.171. 
• Kale, S; Raja, R; Thorat, D; Gowrishankar, S; Patil, TV; Kundu, GC (2013). "Osteopontin signaling upregulates cyclooxygenase-2 expression in tumor-associated macrophages leading to enhanced angiogenesis and melanoma growth via α9β1 integrin". Oncogene. 33: 2295–2306. doi:10.1038/onc.2013.184. 
• Mishra R, Thorat D, Soundararajan G, Pradhan SJ, Chakraborty G, Lohite K, Karnik S and G C Kundu GC: Semaphorin 3A upregulates FOXO 3a-dependent MelCAM expression leading to attenuation of breast tumor growth and angiogenesis. Oncogene (in press), (IF: 7.4), 2014.

See also

• Scientific plagiarism in India

References