PUSHPANATHAN MUTHUIRULAN, PH.D

BIO

Who I Am

I am currently working as a Research Associate at the Harvard University, Cambridge, MA. The overarching goal of my research is to use functional genomic approaches on understanding how the epigenetic reprogramming contributes to complex skeletal diseases, and if it can identify any therapeutic vulnerabilities to this deregulated epigenetic factors in some cases or actually in most instances in recent findings acts as pathogenic drivers in skeletal diseases. In my current research, I try to integrate epigenomics, genomics, transcriptomics and targeted genetics using CRISPR to identify the targets which could be translated to the clinic, and I also have huge interest in translating my research findings to the clinic, which helps saving billions of people lives who suffer from skeletal diseases.

For my Postdoctoral work at NICHD, National Institutes of Health (NIH), I developed a novel receptor-based GRASP method using CRISPR-cas9 and high resolution microscopy to map neurotransmitter receptors to brain neural circuits that involves visual motion processing in Drosophila.

For my Ph.D. at Department of Genetics, Madurai Kamaraj University, I had discovered a novel antifungal Peptide, MMGP1 from marine metagenome and characterized its distinct anti fungal mechanism with an ultimate goal to combat opportunistic human fungal infections such as, candidiasis and aspergillosis.

With my research experience, I gained adequate knowledge and expertise in Omics technologies, genetic engineering, antimicrobial drug discovery, protein engineering and mapping neural circuits, developmental and evolutionary genetics.

And also, exposure to a diverse mixture of academic and industrial research experiences had shaped my ability to be highly productive working either as an individual or part of research teams. Exposure to diverse research groups during my graduation and postdoctoral research have allowed me to interact effectively with scientists across various disciplines. This collaborative experience has allowed me to communicate ideas effectively across different biological disciplines. These skill sets, in combination with my high levels of focus and attention to detail, scientific project management skills allowed me to complete technically challenging scientific task with publishable quality of results.

Technical expertise: NGS, CRISPR, flow cytometry, Mass spectrometry, Confocal & Super resolution Microscopy, CD spectroscopy, FPLC/HPLC, 2Dgel, Cell culture, rDNA technology, IHC, transgenesis.