Rakesh Kumar

WORK HISTORY

EDUCATION

ABOUT RAKESH KUMAR

Rakesh Kumar is the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of the Breast Cancer in Young Women Foundation (USA) and holds an International Endowed Chair Professorship at the Cancer Research Institute-SRHU, India, as well as Adjunct/Visiting Professorships at Rutgers NJ Medical School and VCU School of Medicine, USA, and Medanta Cancer Institute, India. In 2023, Prof. Kumar founded the first global foundation focused on Breast Cancer in Young Women, with BCYW team members from 35 countries (breastcancerinyoungwomen.org). In 2024, he launched the first journal dedicated to this field, the Journal of Young Women’s Breast Cancer & Health (journals.lww.com/ywbc). In 2025, he established the Youth Council for Breast Health (ycbh.org) to promote breast health across campuses.With more than four decades of leadership in innovative breast cancer research, Prof. Kumar has served in faculty positions at leading US institutions, including MD Anderson Cancer Center (MDACC) & Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC). After completing his PhD at AIIMS, he spent a short stint as a research officer before starting his cancer research at MSKCC in Jan 1986. Over his 40-year career, he has held multiple positions, including tenured professor, endowed distinguished professor, department vice-chair and chair, endowed chair, institutional leadership positions, and a Govt of India National Chair in Cancer Research with Distinguished Professorship (5-yr term appointment).Prof. Kumar has made seminal conceptual contributions to breast cancer research in the areas of growth factor & estrogen receptor signaling, coregulator biology, and therapeutic target identification. His laboratory has discovered & functionally characterized +20 genes and put the PAK & MTA families on the cancer research map. Prof. Kumar has trained 67 students, postdoc fellows & physician-scientists- many of whom hold tenured full-professor positions in the US, India, & other countries.He has authored >325 peer-reviewed articles & invited reviews, edited 10 books/vols, had work featured on 18 scientific journal covers & 2 MDACC annual reports, delivered +300 invited lectures, and served on the editorial boards of +20 cancer journals and on +100 prominent peer-review funding panels. Stanford Uni data have ranked him < 0.5% of scientists globally in oncology & carcinogenesis over 5 yrs. Among his several honors are the 1995 Penn State Outstanding Investigator Award, 2004 Dallas/Fort Worth Living Legend Faculty Achievement Award, 2006 Ranbaxy Research Award, & a US Lifetime Achievement Award (2013).