Sushmita Purkayastha, Ph.D.

Sushmita Purkayastha, Ph.D., is a scientific review officer in the Scientific Review Branch at NIAMS. In this capacity, she coordinates scientific review of applications submitted to AMSC, a chartered study section at NIAMS that reviews clinical studies (both clinical observational and clinical trials) related applications.

Prior to joining the NIH, Dr. Purkayastha was an Associate Professor (with tenure) and director of the Cerebrovascular Research Laboratory in the Department of Applied Physiology and Sports Management at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas. Her laboratory investigated autonomic nervous system dysfunction, impairments in brain blood flow regulation, and their association to symptoms following sports related mild traumatic brain injury.

Dr. Purkayastha received her Ph.D. in Biomedical Sciences from the Department of Physiology and Anatomy at the University of North Texas Health Science Center at Fort Worth, in Fort Worth, Texas. Her doctoral dissertation focused on examining the role of the sympathetic nervous system in brain-blood flow regulation in humans at rest and during physiological perturbation such as exercise. Dr. Purkayastha completed an NIH-T32 postdoctoral fellowship at Hebrew SeniorLife and Harvard Medical School in Boston, MA. There she received training in the designing and conduct of clinical trials and her work focused on cerebrovascular factors and brain structure and function in the aging population.