Indian American immunologist Dr. Bernard P. Arulanandam has been appointed vice president for research and innovation at Tufts University and now leads a new office known as the Office of University Research and Innovation (OURI).
“Under Bernard’s leadership, the OURI will encompass research administration and development, compliance, infrastructure, environmental health and safety, technology commercialization, and enhanced corporate and government engagement related to research,” University President Sunil Kumar stated in a communication to the Tufts community.
It will also help coordinate cross-school faculty cluster hiring, foster a growing innovation ecosystem, and provide strategic oversight for Tufts’ signature research centers and institutes.
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“The new structure also reflects the realities of today’s research environment, where expectations around research security, foreign influence disclosure, export controls, and compliance have increased substantially—and where it is important that our chief research officer has the institutional standing that these responsibilities require,” Kumar wrote.
Dr. Arulanandam has served as the university’s vice provost for research since July 2022, and has overseen a 20% expansion of the university’s research portfolio, all while providing steady leadership through an increasingly complex and challenging funding environment.
Before joining Tufts, he served as vice president for research, economic development, and knowledge enterprise at the University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA).
At UTSA, Dr. Arulanandam spearheaded the effort to strategically expand the research enterprise by forming partnerships with several federal agencies, including the Department of Defense and Department of Energy, and led to the establishment of the National Security Collaboration Center and the Cybersecurity Manufacturing Innovation Institute (CyManII).
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These initiatives increased research expenditures, doctoral student graduation and grew the number of National Academy faculty members, culminating with the institution earning the Carnegie R1 designation.
He is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Academy of Microbiology, and the National Academy of Inventors. In 2025, he was elected a foreign fellow of the Indian National Sciences Academy.
As an established Immunologist, Dr. Arulanandam holds an appointment as Professor at the Tufts University School of Medicine. His research focuses on elucidating host-microbial interactions and the cellular and molecular mechanisms involved in the induction of immune responses against infectious diseases.
Dr. Arulanandam obtained a PhD in Microbiology and Immunology at the Medical College of Ohio and received a postdoctoral fellowship at the Albany Medical College in New York and an executive MBA at The University of Texas at San Antonio.