Mahita Jarjapu

Postdoctoral Fellow, La Jolla Institute for Immunology, La Jolla, California, USA.

November 2020-Present|Advisor: Prof. Bjoern Peters

1. Development of machine learning methods to predict antibody specificity.

2. Development of B-cell tools for the Immune Epitope Database (IEDB).

3. Systematic analysis of anti-SARS-CoV-2 antibodies to identify relationships between different antibody features.

Postdoctoral Research Associate, Department of Computer Science, Dartmouth College,USA.

1. Computational-guided epitope localization and binning of antibodies and repebodies from their respective repertoires-in collaboration with experimental research groups.

2. Development of a computational pipeline to guide experimental de-aggregation and de-immunization of protein therapeutics-in collaboration with experimental research groups.

Short-term Visiting Researcher, TIFR Centre for Interdisciplinary Sciences, Hyderabad, India.

2. Design and chemical synthesis of peptides for inhibiting merozoite invasion.

Bridging Postdoctoral Fellow, National Centre for Biological Sciences (NCBS), Bangalore, India.

• Genomic and transcriptomic analysis of plants having medicinal value.

• Structural modeling and analysis of protein-protein interactions among select odoran-tbinding proteins present in mosquito-in collaboration with experimental research groups.

• Development of a computational pipeline to analyze protein-protein interactions in molecular dynamics trajectories.

• Prediction of cancer-causing fusion genes from RNA-seq data.

Ph.D Research Scholar, NCBS-TIFR, Bangalore, India.

• Insights into TIR domain-mediated protein-protein interactions within the Toll-like receptor signalling pathways through various computational approaches.

M.Sc Student, Department of Chemistry, IIT-Madras, Chennai, India.

• Organic synthesis of a beta-turn mimic for the development of internally functionalized pores.

Trainee, Aurigene Discovery Technologies Ltd, Dr. Reddy’s Laboratories, Hyderabad,India.

• Trained in the synthesis, purification and mass spectrometric analyses of various intermediates used in the development of drugs.

1. Pasha, S. A,. Shafi ,K.M., Joshi, A. G., Meenakshi, I., Harini, K., Mahita, J., Sajeevan, R.S., et al., (2019). The transcriptome enables the identification of candidate genes behind medicinal value of Drumstick tree (Moringa oleifera)

2. Mahita, J and Sowdhamini, R. (2018). Probing subtle conformational changes induced by phosphorylation and point mutations in the TIR domains of TLR2 and TLR3

3. Mahita, J and Sowdhamini, R. (2018).Investigating the effect of key mutations on the conformational dynamics of toll-like receptor dimers through molecular dynamics simulations and protein structure networks

4. Mahita, J and Sowdhamini, R. (2017). Integrative modelling of TIR domain-containing adaptor molecule inducing interferon-β (TRIF) provides insights into its autoinhibited state

5. Mahita, J et al., (2015). An in silico approach towards the identification of novel inhibitors of the TLR-4 signaling pathway

6. Genome sequencing of herb Tulsi (Ocimum tenuiflorum) unravels key genes behind its strong medicinal properties

7. Vaccination and immunization strategies to design Aedes aegypti salivary protein based subunit vaccine tackling Flavivirus infection

Doctor of Philosophy (Biology), August 2011- August 2017, National Centre for Biological Sciences, TIFR, Bengaluru, India

Master of Science (Chemistry), 2009-2011, Indian Institute of Technology, Madras, Chennai,India

Bachelor of Sciences (Biological Sciences), 2006-2009, St. Francis College for Women, Hyderabad, India

Computational:

1. Machine learning and data analysis

2. Large-scale analyses of antibody-antigen interactions

3. Computational-based sequence and structural analysis of proteins.

4. Computational protein design,protein structure modelling, protein-protein and protein-ligand docking, virtual screening of small molecules, and structure-based drug design, protein structure network analyses.

5. Performing long-length molecular dynamics simulations on clusters,

6. Working with high-performance computing clusters and Linux environment.

7. Programming in Python and R.

8. Genomic and transcriptomic analyses.

Experimental:

1. Basic cell and molecular biology techniques such as transfection, western blotting, immunofluorescence, confocal imaging, screening of small molecule inhibitors using cell line-based assays, cDNA synthesis, PCR.

2. Organic synthesis (solid phase and solution phase) of peptides, column chromatography, interpretation of 1D NMR spectra, HPLC-MS/MS spectrometry of peptides.

• Keystone Symposium Future of Science Scholarship, March 2017.

• Travel Award, Department of Biotechnology, Government of India, March 2017.

• Best Poster Presentation, NCBS Annual Talks, January 2015.

• Best M.Sc Thesis Award, July 2011.

• Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR)-NET, June 2011    All India Rank 57.

I grew up and was educated in the Indian cities of Chennai, Hyderabad, and Bengaluru, all located in South India, before moving to Hanover for my postdoctoral research. I am an avid reader and like to dabble in multiple things including painting, blogging and dancing. I also maintain a blog at Chronicles of Life. During my graduate studies, I participated in a few dance performances organized by the Cultural Club of NCBS. A few videos of my dances can be found here.

I previously volunteered as a science writer for The STEM Times, an Instagram page, that aims to convey complex scientific concepts in a simple manner to the general public.