Dr Bhushan Patwardhan from the University of Pune has taken over as director of the Institute of Ayurveda and Integrative Medicine (I-AIM), the multidisciplinary Research, Education and Outreach arm of the Foundation of Revitalization of Local Health Tradition. He succeeds DK Ved who has superannuated.

Prof. Patwardhan, a researcher in biochemistry, led the Interdisciplinary School of Health Sciences, Pune University, and has over 20 years of experience in research and development in industry and University systems. He developed the standardized poly herbal formulation for the treatment of arthritis under Council of Scientific Industrial Research (CSIR)'s New Millennium Indian Technology Leadership Initiative (NMITLI) project. The formulation is indicated for control of pain, cartilage regeneration and has established pre-clinical safety, pharmacology and clinical efficacy in randomized controlled clinical trials for which one US and an Indian patent have been granted that are commercialized.

He was the principal investigator of vaccine adjuvant for a Department of Science and Technology research in collaboration with the industry partner Serum Institute of India for which four patents were filed. Another project was for the development of AyuSoft which is an intelligent decision support system based in ayurvedic knowledge in collaboration with Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC).

Further Prof. Patwardhan's research career includes globally acclaimed contributions to Ayurveda, ethnopharmacology, herbal drug technology and drug discovery. He is ranked among the top authors of Elsevier's SciTopic most popular pages, Journal of Ethnopharmacology and Oxford Journal ECAM. He is also the founding Editor-in-Chief of Ayurveda Integrative Medicine. He has also been a major contributor to several government initiatives and is a member of many high-level academic, government and civil committees. He has been a promoter of industry academia cooperation and participatory corporate governance.