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What do I do?

A physicist (UniPune) and computational researcher (HCU) by training, I have been investigating questions of biological origin. I have been working on biological complex systems; specifically, on questions related to proteins, diseases, medicine, and brain.

I modeled protein structures as complex networks (Residue Interaction Graphs) and pondered on questions related to their topology, folding, kinetics and function. During doctoral research, I stumbled upon the fact that residue interaction graph models of protein structures are characterized by 'assortative mixing', which has a bearing on their folding kinetics. Insights from these studies have led to engineering of a thermostable enzyme. I have been working to understand complexity and control structures of diseases phenotypes, such as asthma, cancers, metastasis, and diabetes. Presently, I am dwelling on subtle regulatory mechanisms underlying health and unhealth by taking a 'systems perspective of life'.

Aligned with applications of food design for health and medicine, our discovery of novel food pairing phenomenon in Indian cuisine has been well received by academia as well as media. You may want to try beta version of Flavidoscope, an Android app that attempts to bring our discovery of molecular essence of Indian cuisine to your kitchen.

FlavorDB: A database of flavor molecules, Nucleic Acids Research (2017).

What interests me?

I have studied quantum mechanics and cosmological models of the universe. The desire for understanding human phenomena drove me into a wonderful exploration of mate selection, natural selection, creativity, nature of human mind, neuroscience, design of brains, consciousness, diseases and their control mechanisms. Few of the questions I have been fascinated by are associated with the nature of complex systems, their structure, function, evolution and design.

Career Affiliations

Associate Professor (tenured) @ IIIT-Delhi, New Delhi.

Assistant Professor @ DA-IICT, Gandhinagar.

Assistant Professor @ Indian Institute of Technology—Jodhpur, Rajasthan.

Scientist @ CSIR—Institute of Himalayan Bioresource Technology, Palampur & Assistant Professor @ Academy for Scientific and Innovative Research (AcSIR).

Post-Doctoral Fellow @ Max-Planck-Institute for Molecular Genetics (MPIMG), Berlin & @ TIFR-National Centre for Biological Sciences (NCBS), Bangalore.

Graduate Student @ Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB), Hyderabad.

SFI International Fellow @ Santa Fe Institute, USA.

Orcid ID: 0000-0003-1924-6070