Welcome!
Dr. Rubul Mout is a scientist (Research Fellow) at Harvard and BCH, working in the fields of Hematopoietic stem & T-cell engineering, protein design, and gene editing.
He is also the author of two books in Assamese.
He is the founder of Uplift Libraries, an initiative to create small-scale libraries for children in rural India. Currently, it has six libraries and serves many thousands of underprivileged students.
Every Sunday, he runs an outreach program through Zoom (Sunday Science Activism) to interact with college and university students from around the world.
His journey in science and writing has been featured in this Apple podcast.
Full Biography:
Dr. Rubul Mout is a Fellow (Research) at Harvard Medical School, Harvard University, and at the Stem Cell Program, Boston Children’s Hospital (BCH).
Born, brought up, and educated in India, Dr. Mout moved to the United States to pursue his PhD from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. Prior to joining Harvard/BCH, he was a Washington Research Foundation Innovation Fellow at the Institute for Protein Design, University of Washington.
At Harvard/BCH, Dr. Mout works to engineer bone marrow stem cells (also called Hematopoietic stem cells, or HSCs) to cure genetic diseases of blood origin. HSCs are the ‘mother’ cells of all blood cells that defend human bodies from diseases. Mutations in genes in the HSCs lead to hundreds of genetic diseases, from cancer to autoimmune. Dr. Mout uses various technologies, including techniques he invented in his prior research, to engineer these HSCs. In particular, he uses human somatic cell derived pluripotent stem cells (iPSC) to differentiate them to HSC first, and then to produce and train T-cells that could potentially fight off many diseases.
Dr. Mout is the co-author of more than 35 research articles and the inventor of numerous technologies in gene editing, protein design, and T-cell engineering with multiple patents. Between the years 2014-2018, he developed a technology for intracellular protein delivery and gene editing in mammalian cells, termed as the ‘E-tag’ method, which was published in a series of five research papers, and a granted patent for this technology by USPTO. His research has been featured in numerous media, including in a mini-documentary produced by LabTV and the National Institute of Health; and in a feature video by the American Chemical Society (ACS).
Dr. Mout is also the author of two books—a collection of short stories and a memoir—in his native language, Assamese. His memoir depicts his extraordinary journey from a poor peasant’s family in a far-remote corner of India, near the Assam-Arunachal border. The book has been an instant bestseller, and since its first publication in 2017, it has sold over 40,000 copies (till January 2024), making it one of the highest-sold books in the Assamese language. The book is also included in many school/college/university curriculums across Assam.
Please visit the following pages to learn more about Dr. Mout's work: