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Nav Chandel

Navdeep S. Chandel (Nav) is the David W. Cugell Distinguished Professor of Medicine, Biochemistry, and Molecular Genetics at Northwestern University. He was born in London (UK) and at the age of 1 moved to the town of Shimla (India) located in Himalayan mountains in part due to the rising anti-immigration sentiment in the UK at that time. Subsequently, he moved to Miami, Florida at the age of 10. Subsequently, he received his BA in Mathematics (1991) and Ph.D. in Cell Physiology at the University of Chicago (1993-1997, Paul Schumacker) as well as a post-doctoral fellowship at the University of Chicago (1997-1999, jointly with Paul Schumacker and Craig Thompson). In 2000, he started his laboratory at Northwestern University on the concept of “Mitochondria as signaling organelles”. He has written a widely utilized introductory book entitled “Navigating Metabolism” (Cold Spring Harbor Press). He received NCI outstanding investigator Award in 2016. He has been on Web of Science Highly Cited Researcher list from 2018 to present. He has been an active member organized many meetings including Cell Symposia, Keystone Symposia, and CSHL meetings. Furthermore, he is an associate editor at Journal of Clinical Investigation, Deputy editor at Science Advances and serves on editorial boards of Molecular Cell and Cell Metabolism. Currently, he sits on the NIH/NCI Board of Scientific Counselors (basic sciences) and Pew-Stewart Scholars Advisory Board. He received the Clarence Ver Steeg Faculty Mentor Award, which recognizes individual faculty members from any department throughout Northwestern University for their outstanding efforts in supporting and encouraging the academic and professional development of graduate students.

Link to Google Scholar

Personal Statement

I became an academician because I wanted to “discover new knowledge” and “pass knowledge”. I am firm believer that a lab is only as good as the members that populate the lab. Any success that I have achieved as an academician is largely due to my outstanding lab members and the microenvironment where the lab resides, the Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine (PCCM) Division at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. In late 1999, I was hired by Jacob (Iasha) Sznajder, at that time Chief of PCCM, who put a great emphasis on teaching the next generation the joy of discovery as well providing an environment that promotes flexibility and freedom to be creative. Importantly, Iasha always emphasized “Treat people the way you want to be treated.” I have been very fortunate that this ethos is still vibrant in my microenvironment within the Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine Division at Northwestern University.

A few years ago, Iasha stepped down as Chief of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine and my long-time collaborator since my days as a graduate student, Dr. G.R. Scott Budinger took over as Chief. Like Iasha, Scott understands mechanism-based science is the key to ameliorating diseases. More importantly, he always emphasizes that basic science discoveries take at least two decades to have meaningful clinical impact. This point is addressed in a perspective by Mark Fishman and colleagues in Science Translational Medicine. Scott has continued Iasha’s legacy and invested resources in new state of the art technologies for the division. It reminds me Sydney Brenner’s line that "Progress in science depends on new techniques, new discoveries and new ideas, probably in that order”. Today my lab utilizes state of the art technologies to uncover new discoveries in the field of mitochondria and metabolism that can be translated into ameliorating diseases while providing a supportive environment training the next generation of “discoverers”.

I am grateful to the taxpayers which has funded much of my research through NIH grants as well as grants from the H foundation, American Lung Foundation and Michael J. Fox foundation. The Lurie Cancer Center under the leadership Dr. Leon Platanias has been a huge supporter of metabolism research on campus and was instrumental in establishing the metabolomics core at Northwestern University (currently I am the director of this core). I have a secondary appointment in Biochemistry and Molecular Genetics led by Dr. Ali Shilatifard that has been very supportive of the metabolism endeavors at Northwestern and has hired outstanding new faculty in the metabolism field.

Finally, I have been fortunate that the late Lou Simpson and Kimberley Querrey have been generous benefactors to Northwestern University. The state-of-the-art building where we conduct our daily research is in part due to their generosity. Importantly, Lou and Kimberley have a deep appreciation for discovery-based science and long trajectory it takes to translate basic science discoveries into clinical impact.