Dr. Vikas P. Sukhatme

Dr. Vikas P. Sukhatme has been named chief academic officer of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC), the medical center announced last week. He succeeds Dr. Jeffrey S. Flier, who became dean of Harvard Medical School last September.

A widely respected physician-scientist in the fields of vascular biology, cancer and kidney disease, Sukhatme joined the former Beth Israel Hospital in 1992. As chief academic officer, he will oversee BIDMC’s research and academic programs, which include more than 850 active sponsored projects and total more than $200 million annually.

A graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology holding both a bachelor’s and a Ph.D. in theoretical physics, Sukhatme attended the Harvard MIT Program in Health Sciences and Technology before graduating cum laude from Harvard Medical School in 1979. Following clinical training at Massachusetts General Hospital, he was awarded an immunology fellowship at Stanford University and was a Howard Hughes investigator at the University of Chicago before joining BIDMC. He is currently the Victor J. Aresty Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School.

Flier called Sukhatme “one of the most ‘outside-of-the-box’ thinkers that I have known,” saying that he has “the uncanny ability to see connections in different areas of scientific endeavor.”

Sukhatme’s research has resulted in major advances in our understanding of numerous blood vessel disorders. The author of more than 160 papers, his current primary area of investigation is the study of cancer therapies focusing on the metabolism of tumor cells.

“I am deeply privileged and honored to be asked to oversee research and education at an institution that is very dear to me,” he said.