Jordan Orange, MD, PhD, Joins Columbia as Chair of Pediatrics

Jordan Orange, MD, PhD, has joined Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons as the Reuben S. Carpentier Professor and Chair of the Department of Pediatrics. Orange, who will also serve as pediatrician-in-chief at NewYork-Presbyterian/Morgan Stanley Children’s Hospital, succeeds Lawrence R. Stanberry, MD, PhD, who served as chair of pediatrics since 2008.

His tenure began on July 1.

“As one of the nation’s top academic medical centers, we’re committed to delivering outstanding care for our youngest patients and also to pursuing groundbreaking research in children’s health,” said Lee Goldman, MD, dean of the Faculties of Health Sciences and Medicine at Columbia University and chief executive of Columbia University Irving Medical Center. “Dr. Orange’s exceptional experience as a pediatrician and scientist makes him an outstanding choice for this leadership role, and all of us are delighted to welcome him to Columbia.”

Throughout his distinguished career, Orange has blended a commitment to pediatric clinical care with a focus on basic and translational research. An international leader in pediatric primary immunodeficiency, Orange is credited with defining a new class of diseases known as natural killer cell deficiencies. These diseases prevent the immune system from fighting pathogens and cancer. His research, which aims to translate discoveries about the underlying mechanisms of these diseases into better diagnostics and therapeutics, has received continuous funding support from the NIH, resulting in more than 250 published papers.

“I am very excited to be joining an institution that has such an amazing legacy in providing world-class care to children,” says Orange. “I’m looking forward to building upon this legacy, to achieve new heights through exceptional clinical care, innovative research, and the education of our future doctors so that the children of New York–of all backgrounds, affected by both simple and complex diseases–receive the best possible treatment and care.”

For the past six years, Orange was at Baylor College of Medicine, where he was professor of pediatrics and vice chair for research and chief of immunology, allergy, and rheumatology. He also served as director of the Pediatrician-Scientist Training and Development Program at Baylor, the Jeffrey Modell Diagnostic and Research Center for Primary Immunodeficiency, and the Center for Human Immunobiology at Texas Children’s Hospital. In the decade prior to joining Baylor, Orange was on the faculty of the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine.

A past president of the Clinical Immunology Society, Orange was recently awarded the 2018 Edith and Peter O’Donnell Award in Medicine from The Academy of Medicine, Engineering and Science of Texas and the 2017 E. Mead Johnson Award from the Society for Pediatric Research.

Orange earned a bachelor’s degree in biology from Brown University, where he also received his PhD and MD degrees. After his residency in pediatrics at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, he completed a clinical fellowship in allergy, immunology, and rheumatology at Boston Children’s Hospital followed by a postdoctoral research fellowship in molecular and cell biology at Harvard.