Emeritus Professor, Dr Gundu H. R. Rao has spent forty years as a faculty member of Laboratory Medicine and Pathology at the University of Minnesota. He was the Director of Thrombosis Research at the Lillehei Heart Institute and adjunct faculty of the Institute for Engineering Medicine as well as Anesthesiology. For four decades, he conducted research on morphology, ultrastructure, biochemistry, physiology, and pharmacology of blood platelets. During these years of research, he presented his work at various national and international conferences as well as published his work in over 300 peer reviewed journals. In early 1990, he obtained a research grant from the International Society on Thrombosis and Hemostasis (ISTH, USA), and started a professional society, ‘South Asian Society on Atherosclerosis and Thrombosis’ at the University of Minnesota. He organized international conferences on topics associated with thrombosis and hemostasis in India every other year from 1994. He also has edited and published books on topics related to this area of public interest. Undurti N. Das is an M.D. in Internal Medicine from Osmania Medical College, Hyderabad, India; a Fellow of the National Academy of Medical Sciences, India, and Shanti Swaroop Bhatnagar prize awardee. Apart from clinical work, he is researching the role of polyunsaturated fatty acids, cytokines, nitric oxide, free radicals, and anti-oxidants in cancer, inflammation, metabolic syndrome, schizophrenia, sepsis, rheumatological conditions and autisms. His current interests include the epidemiological and molecular aspects of autism, diabetes mellitus, hypertension, cardiovascular diseases and metabolic syndrome. Dr. Das was formerly scientist at Efamol Research Institute, Kentville, Canada; Professor of Medicine at Nizam’s Institute of Medical Sciences, Hyderabad, India and Research Professor of Surgery and Nutrition at SUNY (State University of New York) Upstate Medical University, Syracuse, USA. At present, he is the Chairman and Research Director of UND Life Sciences LLC, USA, and serves as a consultant to both Indian and USA based biotech and pharmaceutical companies. Undurti Das is the Founding Editor of the international journal: Lipids in Health and Disease; and serves on the editorial board of another 10 international journals. Dr Das has more than 500 international publications and has been awarded 5 USA patents.
