Featured in theTime 100 list of most influential people in 2011, Mukherjee writes forThe New Yorker and is a columnist inThe New York Times. He is described as part of a select group of doctor-writers (such asOliver Sacks andAtul Gawande) who have "transformed the public discourse on human health,"[8] and allowed a generation of readers a rare and intimate glimpse into the life of science and medicine.[9] His research concerns the physiology of cancer cells, immunological therapy for blood cancers, and the discovery of bone- and cartilage-forming stem cells in the vertebrate skeleton.[10]
Siddhartha Mukherjee was born to aBengali Brahmin family in New Delhi, India. His father, Sibeswar Mukherjee, was an executive withMitsubishi, and his mother Chandana Mukherjee, was a former school teacher from Calcutta (nowKolkata). He attendedSt. Columba's School in Delhi, where he won the school's highest award, the 'Sword of Honour', in 1989. As a biology major atStanford University, he worked in Nobel LaureatePaul Berg's laboratory, defining cellular genes that change the behaviours of cancer cells. He earned membership inPhi Beta Kappa[12] in 1992, and completed his bachelor of science (BS) degree in 1993.[1]
In January 2025, Mukherjee launched Manas AI, an AI-enabled drug discovery startup, together withReid Hoffman, with about $25 million in venture capital funding.[21]
Mukherjee is a trainedhematologist and oncologist whose research focuses on the links between normalstem cells and cancer cells. Through his findings, he had shown the roles of cells in cancer therapy.[22] He has been investigating the microenvironment ("niche") of stem cells, particularly onblood-forming (haematopoietic) stem cells. Blood-forming stem cells are present in thebone marrow in very specific microenvironments.Osteoblasts, cells that form bone, are one of the principal components in this environment. These cells regulate the process of blood cell formation and development by providing them with signals to divide, remain quiescent, or maintain their stem cell properties.[23] Distortion in the development of these cells results in severe blood cancers, such as myelodysplastic syndrome and leukemia.[24] Mukherjee's research has been recognised through many grants from theNational Institutes of Health and from private foundations.[10][25][26]
Mukherjee and his co-workers have identified several genes and chemicals that can alter themicroenvironment, or niche, and thereby alter the behavior of normal stem cells, as well as cancer cells.[27][28][29][30][31][32] Two such chemicals—proteasome inhibitors[27] and activin inhibitors[33]—are under clinical trials.[34][35] Mukherjee's lab has also identified novelgenetic mutations inmyelodysplasia andacute myelogenous leukaemia and has played a leading role in finding therapies for these diseases.[36][37]
Mukherjee's team is also known for defining and characterizing skeletal stem/progenitor cells (also called osteochondroreticular or OCR cells). In 2015, they prospectively identified these progenitor cells from bone, and showed, using lineage tracing, that these cells can give rise to bone, cartilage, andreticular cells (hence the term "OCR" cells). They established that these cells form a part of the adult skeleton in vertebrates, and that they maintain and repair the skeleton.[38]
OCR cells are among the newest progenitor cells to be defined in vertebrates.[39] The work generated wide interest and was described in journals as a major breakthrough for understanding biology and for understanding diseases such asosteoporosis andosteoarthritis.[40][41] Mukherjee's team have shown that OCR cells can be transplanted into animals, and they can regenerate cartilage and bone after fractures.[38] With Daniel L. Worthley's team at the University of Adelaide and South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute they have been working on thetranslational cell-based research on osteoarthritis and cancer.[38][42]
Mukherjee's lab has also been investigating the interaction between cancer genetics and the microenvironment, including the metabolic environment. It has been well established that metabolism in cancer is fundamentally altered,[43] Mukherjee's team has found the role of a high-fat, adequate-protein, low-carbohydrate diet (ketogenic diet) in cancer therapy. They showed that ketogenic diet suppressed insulin production in the body, and this in turn enhances pharmaceutical inhibition ofPIK3CA, a gene which is mutated and commonly overactive in cancers.[44]
Mukherjee's lab, with the help ofPureTech Health plc, has been investigatingchimeric antigen receptor redirected T cells (CAR-T) therapy in a joint venture called Vor BioPharma since 2016.[45] They have combined CAR-T therapies with genetically modified hematopoietic stem cells to specifically target malignant hematopoietic lineages, while transplanted stem cells replenish the lineage but remain antigenically concealed. This technology has been developed so that, in addition to B cell malignancies, other lineage specific cancers could be targeted.[46] This provides an important new approach to managing acute myeloid leukemia.[47]
In 2010,Simon & Schuster published his bookThe Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer[48] detailing the evolution of diagnosis and treatment of human cancers from ancient Egypt to the latest developments inchemotherapy andtargeted therapy.[49] On 18 April 2011, the book won the annualPulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction; the citation called it "an elegant inquiry, at once clinical and personal, into the long history of an insidious disease that, despite treatment breakthroughs, still bedevils medical science."[50] It was listed in the "All-Time 100 Nonfiction Books" (the 100 most influential books of the last century)[4] and the "Top 10 Nonfiction Books of 2010" byTime in 2011.[51] It was also listed in "The 10 Best Books of 2010" byThe New York Times[52] and "Top 10 Books of 2010" byO, The Oprah Magazine.[53] In 2011, it was nominated as aNational Book Critics Circle Award finalist.[54]
He followed it withThe Gene: An Intimate History (2016). It is a history ofgenetics fromGregor Mendel toJennifer Doudna. It also delves into the personal genetic history of Mukherjee's family, including mental illness. The book discusses the power of genetics in determining people's health and attributes, but it also has a cautionary tone to not let genetic predispositions define fate, a mentality that led to the rise ofeugenics in history and something he thinks lacks the nuance required to understand something as complex as human beings.Harriet Hall describesEmperor andThe Gene as "the story of science itself".[57]The Gene was shortlisted for theRoyal Society Insight Investment Science Book Prize 2016, "the Nobel Prize of science writing."[58] The book was also the recipient of the 2017Phi Beta Kappa Society Book Award in Science.[59]
Burns made a two-part PBS documentary,The Gene: An Intimate History in 2020.[60]
In his bookThe Song of the Cell, published in 2022, Mukherjee describes the history and medical mystery from the discovery of cell. Narrated in metaphors, many of which he created, such as "gunslinging sheriff" for antibody and "gumshoe detective" toT cell, he tells the development of cell biology and how it became vital to modern medicine, from genetic engineering to immunotherapies.[61]Suzanne O'Sullivan, reviewing inThe Guardian, explains the book as a tool for "the reader to imagine they are an astronaut investigating the cell as if it is an unknown spacecraft".[62]
Chance events—injuries, infections, infatuations; the haunting trill of that particular nocturne—impinge on one twin and not on the other. Genes are turned on and off in response to these events, as epigenetic marks are gradually layered above genes, etching the genome with its own scars, calluses, and freckles.[63]
Mukherjee also claimed that understanding of epigenetics "would overturn fundamental principles of biology, including our understanding of evolution," as he said:
Conceptually, a key element ofclassical Darwinian evolution is that genes do not retain an organism's experiences in a permanently heritable manner.Jean-Baptiste Lamarck, in the early nineteenth century, had supposed that when an antelope strained its neck to reach a tree its efforts were somehow passed down and its progeny evolved into giraffes.Darwin discredited thatmodel. Giraffes, he proposed, arose through heritable variation andnatural selection—a tall-necked specimen appears in an ancestral tree-grazing animal, and, perhaps during a period of famine, this mutant survives and is naturally selected. But, if epigenetic information can be transmitted through sperm and eggs, an organism would seem to have a direct conduit to the heritable features of its progeny. Such a system would act as a wormhole for evolution—a shortcut through the glum cycles of mutation and natural selection... Lamarck is being rehabilitated into the new Darwin.[63]
The article, an excerpt from the chapter "The First Derivative of Identity" of his bookThe Gene: An Intimate History,[64] "unleashed a torrent of criticism" from geneticists, asThe Guardian book review wrote.[65] As David Hornby of the University of Sheffield put it: "all (scientific) hell broke loose! It seemed to some that the slumbering giant of Lamarck was about to gain a new audience."[66] Mukherjee foresaw the reaction, as he noted: "These fantasies should invite skepticism."[63]
The article was critiqued by geneticists such asMark Ptashne, at theMemorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, and John Greally, at theAlbert Einstein College of Medicine, because of overemphasis on histone modification and DNA methylation. They commented that these two processes have only minor influences in overall gene function.Steven Henikoff, at theFred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, opined that, "Mukherjee seemed not to realize that transcription factors occupy the top of the hierarchy of epigenetic information," and said, "histone modifications at most act as cogs in the machinery."[67] Omission of transcription factors was viewed as an "overarching" mistake,[68] as Richard Mann at the Columbia University Medical Center remarked: "Only a talmudic-like reading can reveal a hint that something other than histone modifications are at play."[67]
It is now generally believed that histone modification and DNA methylations are major factors of epigenetic functions, aging and certain diseases,[69] and with an ability to influencetranscription factors.[70] However, they contribute little to development.[71][72] In response, Mukherjee did admit that omission of transcription factors "was an error" on his part.[67] However,The New Yorker defended the article that: "None of it negates the fundamental importance of transcription factors."[68]
Jerry Coyne of the University of Chicago remarked: "Until there is evidence for this kind of evolutionary transformation—ANY evidence, people should stop yammering about this kind of 'Lamarckian' evolution."[73] Phillip Ball, British science writer and editor of the journalNature, also agreed that Mukherjee certainly "got some things wrong". Writing in theProspect, he said, "Such claims [that some epigenetic changes can be inherited] are controversial—but even if they prove to be true, it seems highly unlikely that the effect will persist for many generations or will have long-term consequences for human evolution."[73] According toUte Deichmann of theBen-Gurion University of the Negev, even if there are evidences of variation by epigenetic inheritance, they would not be counted as Lamarckian as they are not acquired or adaptive.[74]
Mukherjee did not say that epigenetic processes have established Lamarckism, as he noted in his article that "epigenetic scratch marks are rarely, if ever, carried forward across generations."[63] In an interview onNPR, he said, "[Lamarckian inheritance is] very rarely true and I would say almost never true".[75]
Mukherjee also criticises theIQ test as a measure of intelligence, and endorses thetheory of multiple intelligences (introduced byHoward Gardner) overgeneral intelligence. He argues that the results of IQ tests for determining general intelligence do not represent intelligence in the real world. Reviewing the book inThe Spectator, Stuart Ritchie, a psychologist at theUniversity of Edinburgh, remarked that Gardner's theory is "debunked" and that "general intelligence is probably the most well-replicated phenomenon in all of psychological science."[76]
Siddhartha Mukherjee, "Early Warnings: New technologies promise to catch more cancers sooner. But such screening can pose hidden hazards",The New Yorker, 23 June 2025, pp. 36–43. "In 2021... the United States spent more than forty billion dollars on cancer screening. On average, a year's worth of screening yields nine million positive results—of which 8.8 million are false. Millions endure follow-up scans, biopsies, and anxiety so that just over two hundred thousand true positives can be found, of which an even smaller fraction can be cured by local treatment, like excision. [p. 38.] Early work with cell-free DNA hints [that] blood tests... may one day tell us not only where a cancer began but whether it's likely to pose a threat to health. For now... hope still outpaces certainty and the holy grail of perfect screening remains just out of reach." (p. 43.)
2023:The Song of the Cell: An Exploration of Medicine and the New Human. Notable Book, American Library Association. Reference and User Services Association.[91]
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^Komrokji, Rami; Garcia-Manero, Guillermo; Ades, Lionel; Prebet, Thomas; Steensma, David P; Jurcic, Joseph G; Sekeres, Mikkael A; Berdeja, Jesus; et al. (2018). "Sotatercept with long-term extension for the treatment of anaemia in patients with lower-risk myelodysplastic syndromes: a phase 2, dose-ranging trial".The Lancet Haematology.5 (2):e63–e72.doi:10.1016/S2352-3026(18)30002-4.PMID29331635.
^"Padma Awards Announced". Press Information Bureau, Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India. 25 January 2014. Archived fromthe original on 22 February 2014. Retrieved26 January 2014.
