Vrajesh K. Pandya, PhD

Assistant Professor (Clinical), University of Utah School of Medicine

Specialties

• Clinical chemistry
• Toxicology
• Cancer biomarkers

Education

• Doctorate—University of Alberta
• Postdoctoral Fellowship—Biochemistry, University of Alberta
• Postdoctoral Fellowship—Clinical Chemistry, University of Utah School of Medicine

Certification/Affiliations

• American Board of Clinical Chemistry (Clinical Chemistry)

Research Interests

• Renal function testing
• Cancer biomarkers
• Interferences in laboratory assays
• Drugs of abuse
• Testing in alternative specimen types

Awards

• AACC Annual Meeting Travel Award (North American Chinese Clinical Chemists Association, 2021)
• Paul E. Strandjord Young Investigator (Academy of Clinical Laboratory Physicians and Scientists, 2021)
• Medical and Scientific Learning Exchange Program (Siemens Healthineers, 2021)  
• Oral presentation award at Residents and Fellows Research Grand Rounds (Department of Pathology, University of Utah, 2021)
• MSACL LC-MS/MS 101 Course Scholarship (SCIEX, 2021)
• Best PhD Thesis in Biochemistry (Department of Biochemistry, University of Alberta, 2019)
• Oral Presentation Award (Women’s and Children’s Health Research Institute, 2019)
• CSCC Annual Meeting Travel Award (Graduate Students’ Association, University of Alberta, 2019)
• Canadian Cancer Research Conference Travel Award (Canadian Institutes of Health Research, 2017)
• Canadian Cancer Research Conference Travel Award (Cancer Research Institute of Northern Alberta, 2017)
• Med Star Award for best publication by a graduate student in the Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry (University of Alberta, 2016)
• Best Poster Award (Department of Biochemistry, University of Alberta, 2016)
• Doctoral Recruitment Scholarship (University of Alberta, 2012)
• Junior Research Fellowship (Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, Government of India, 2012)

Recent Publications

• Pandya V, et al. Can umbilical cord and meconium results be directly compared? Analytical approach matters. J Anal Toxicol. 2022 [Published online ahead of print Jun 2022]
• Pandya V, et al. Connected by the cord—comparison of drug positivity rates and concentrations in a large cohort of paired umbilical cord and meconium specimens. Am J Clin Pathol. 2021;156, Supplement_1.
• Pandya V, et al. Excessively low cholesterol and triglyceride levels in an apparently healthy patient. Clin Biochem. 2021;96:78–81.
• Githaka JM, et al. BAD regulates mammary gland morphogenesis by 4E-BP1-mediated control of localized translation in mouse and human models. Nat Commun. 2021;12:2939.
• Klionsky DJ, et al. Guidelines for the use and interpretation of assays for monitoring autophagy−4th edition. Autophagy. 2021;17(1):1–382.
• Salla M, et al. Resveratrol and resveratrol-aspirin hybrid compounds as potent intestinal anti-inflammatory and anti-tumor drugs. Molecules. 2020;25(17):3849.
• Pandya V, et al. BIK drives an aggressive breast cancer phenotype through sublethal apoptosis and predicts poor prognosis of ER-positive breast cancer. Cell Death and Dis. 2020;11(6):448.
• Salla M, et al. Identification and characterization of novel receptor interacting serine/threonine‐protein kinase 2 (RIPK2) inhibitors using structural similarity analysis. J Pharmacol Exp Ther. 2018;365(2):354–67.