Dr. Vijapurkar is an experienced scientific researcher in cancer biology and has supported the development of oncology therapeutics from discovery, pre-clinical to early clinical trials. Since 2015, Dr. Vijapurkar lectures in Multicellular Life (BILD2) and Human Physiology 1 (BIPN100) at UC San Diego. During her career she has enjoyed mentoring undergraduate and graduate students and teaching pharmacy and medical students (courses in advanced physiology and molecular medicine/pharmacogenomics.
B.Pharmacy (Hons.), Pune College of Pharmacy, University of Pune, India, (1992), Ph.D. Pharmacology, University of Iowa (1999), Post-doctoral research fellow, University of California, San Francisco (1999-2003).
Awards and Honors:
“ASH Travel Award to 45th Annual Meeting”, American Society of Hematology (ASH) (2003), Research Fellowship, Department of Pharmacology, University of Iowa (1995-1999)
“Growth Factor & Signal Transduction Conferences Award”, Iowa State University (1997), “ASBMB Travel Award”, University of Iowa Student Government (UISG) (1997), “Tata Endowment Scholarship and Mahindra Education Trust Scholarship”, India for Graduate Education (1995), “First /Second in Merit Honors”, Pune College of Pharmacy, University of Pune, India.
Contemporary Topics in Pharmacology I (SPPS 218A)
Contemporary Topics in Pharmacology II (SPPS 218B)
Contemporary Topics in Pharmacology III (SPPS 218C)
Patent for the Combinations of Phosphoinositide 3-Kinase Inhibitor Compounds and Chemotherapeutic Agents, and Methods of Use. Provisional filed Sept. 11, 2007. Issued 8/21/2012.
Managed a team of research associates at a leading biotechnology company. In which, she successfully led the biology research efforts of an oncology project from early stage through preclinical development into Phase1 (2006-2012).
Gnad F, Wallin J, Edgar K, Doll S, Arnott D, Robillard L, Kirkpatrick DS, Stokes MP, Vijapurkar U, Hatzivassiliou G, Friedman LS, Belvin M., Quantitative phosphoproteomic analysis of the PI3K-regulated signaling network, Proteomics, 2016, 16(14):1992-7
Vijapurkar, U., Robillard, L., Zhou, S., Degtyarev, M., Troung, T., Tremayne, J., Pei, Z., Friedman, L., Blackwood, B., Belvin, M., mTOR kinase inhibitor potentiates apoptosis of PI3K and MEK inhibitors in diagnostically defined subpopulations, Cancer Letters, 2012; 326(2):168-75.
Sampath, D., Oeh. J., Wyatt S.K., Cao, T., Koeppen, H., Robillard, L., Ross, J., Zhang, G., Vitorino, P., Barck, K.H., Van Bruggen, N., Yee, W., Vijapurkar, U., Ferrara, N., L.S. Friedman, L., Carano, R.D. Multi-Modal Microvascular Imaging Reveals that Selective Inhibition of Class I PI3K is Sufficient to Induce an Anti-Vascular Response In Vivo, Neoplasia. 2013 Jul;15(7):694
Pei, Zhonghua; Blackwood, Elizabeth; Liu, Lichuan; Malek, Shiva; Belvin, Marcia; Koehler, Michael F. T.; Ortwine, Daniel F.; Chen, Huifen; Cohen, Frederick; Kenny, Bergeron, Philippe; Lau, Cuong; Estrada, Anthony A.; Truong, Tom; Epler, Jennifer A.; Nonomiya, Jim; Trinh, Lan; Sideris, Steve; Lesnick, John; Bao, Linda; Vijapurkar, Ulka; Deshmukh, Gauri; Friedman, Lori S.; Lyssikatos, Joseph P. Discovery and biological profiling of potent and selective mTOR inhibitor GDC-0349 ACS Med. Chem. Lett., 2013, 4 (1), pp 103