Piramal Life Sciences' Dr P D Mishra, senior group leader, Natural Product Chemistry, NCE Research, has won 'OPPI Scientist Award 2013' for outstanding performance in natural products drug discovery research. In his endeavour to reduce burden of disease Dr Mishra has discovered and characterized several new and potent compounds from streptomycetes, fungi and plants in the area of infection, cancer and inflammation. Some of these compounds being studied by Piramal Life Sciences in the area of cancer therapy.

These compounds would treat different types of drug resistant cancer patients and would help to understand new mechanisms in cancer biology. Dr Mishra also discovered antibiotics and those would be helpful to treat drug resistant infections. He not only discovered new molecules but also established new applications to several known natural products. His work is on the line of the phrase that “natural bioactive compounds are excellent source of lead molecules for therapeutic drug development”.

Piramal Life Sciences has pioneered natural products drug discovery research through various collaborations with different scientific national and international institutions, All these efforts are evident by significant number of national, international patents, publications and presentations in this area.

OPPI has instituted the scientific award to honour outstanding research scientist working in India to encourage scientific culture. The award has been set up with an objective to recognise scientific contribution of significance from scientists in India in the field of human healthcare.