Sushmita Mukherjee

Sushmita Mukherjee is an Associate Professor at Weill Cornell Medicine, serving as the Director of Optical Microscopy and Image Analysis services within the Microscopy and Image Analysis Core Facility. She is affiliated with the Biomedical Imaging and Clinical & Translational Investigation programs at the Weill Cornell Graduate School of Medical Sciences.

Her research focuses on developing and applying advanced optical microscopy techniques, particularly multiphoton microscopy, for medical diagnostics. Dr. Mukherjee specializes in what's known as "optical biopsy" - using imaging techniques to provide histopathological diagnosis in fresh, unlabeled tissue without traditional biopsy procedures. Her work spans applications in bladder cancer detection, gastrointestinal inflammation assessment, and kidney tumor evaluation.

Her publications demonstrate a consistent focus on translating multiphoton microscopy from research tool to clinical application, with particular emphasis on rapid histopathological evaluation that could potentially replace traditional biopsy methods in certain scenarios.

Scientific Awards:

• Young Scientist Award of the Indian National Science Academy (INSA) (1995)
• Norman and Rosita Winston Foundation Fellowship in Biomedical Research (1997-1998)
• K12 Career Development Award, Clinical and Translational Science Center, WCMC, NY (2008-2010)
• Gastrointestinal inflammation & neoplasia research cited in Cancer Prevention Research Editorial (2013)

As Director of the Optical Microscopy and Image Analysis services, Dr. Mukherjee provides extensive support to the Weill Cornell research community, training researchers, maintaining equipment, consulting on experimental design from sample preparation through image analysis, and assisting with grant applications. She also contributes significantly to teaching optical microscopy theory and application to graduate and medical students and postdoctoral fellows.

Dr. Mukherjee helped establish Multiphoton Microscopic research at Weill Cornell in collaboration with Professor Watt Webb, the inventor of this technique, demonstrating her role at the forefront of imaging technology development and application.