Dr. Meenakshi Iyer completed her PhD from the National Centre for Biological Sciences (NCBS). Subsequently she conducted her postdoctoral research at NCBS in collaboration with KAVI-Institute of Clinical Research, University of Nairobi, Kenya. She worked on vaccine design for dengue and sequencing and analysis of antibiotic-resistant Neisseria gonorrhoeae isolates from Nairobi. She has also worked as a Bioinformatics consultant for Molecular Solutions Care Health on SARS CoV2 genome sequencing and analysis from wastewater and patient samples. She then worked as a Project Scientist in NCBS on protein-protein interactions and host-parasite interactions during infections.

Research Interests: 

My group is interested in the genomics and transcriptomics analysis of pathogens primarily focusing on virulence and antimicrobial determinants. We are also interested in structural mechanisms of drug resistance and drug discovery targeting pathogen proteins and protein-protein interactions. We are also interested in sequence and structural analysis of proteins with an emphasis on function and evolution of protein domain families. Our group will also work on developing algorithms, tools, databases and webservers for big data and genomics data analysis.

Awards and achievements

• Infosys travel award for attending the Albany 2019: 20th Conversation, State University of New York, Albany, 11-15th June 2019.
• Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR-JRF) qualified (June 2012, December 2012).
• Graduate Aptitude Test in Engineering (GATE). All India rank-11.
• Dept. Of Biotechnology (DBT), Govt. Of India Scholarships holder for all 4 semesters of Masters Course (July 2011 – June 2013)
• Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) Combined Entrance Exam for Biotechnology (CEEB) qualified (2011)

Publications:

1. Revisiting Myosin Families Through Large-scale Sequence Searches Leads to the Discovery of New Myosins. Pasha SN, Meenakshi I, Sowdhamini R. 2016, Evolutionary Bioinformatics, 12: 201–211. DOI: 10.4137/EBO.S39880
2. Draft Genome of Cissus quadrangularis to elucidate the Medicinal Values. Gandhimathi A, Margaret Sunitha S, Pritha Ghosh, Harini K, Subramanian Hariprasanna P, Iyer Meenakshi S. et. al. 2016, Herbal Medicine, 2, 1-7. DOI: 10.21767/2472-0151.10007
3. Evolutionary Analysis of A Few Protein Superfamilies in Ocimum tenuiflorum in the book, The Ocimum Genome. Gandhimathi A., Nitish Sathyanarayanan, Meenakshi Iyer, Rachit Gupta and R.Sowdhamini., 2018. (Eds. Sashany A.K. and Kole C.) DOI:10.1007/978-3-319-97430-9
4. Genome-wide survey of remote homologues for protein domain superfamilies of known structure reveals unequal distribution across structural classes. Iyer, M.S., Joshi, A.G. & Sowdhamini, R., 2018. Molecular omics, 14(4), 266-280. DOI: 10.1039/C8MO00008E.
5. GenDiS database update with improved approach and features to recognise homologous sequences of protein domain superfamilies. Iyer, M.S., Bhargava, K., Pavalam, M., & Sowdhamini, R., 2019. Database, DOI: 10.1093/database/baz042
6. Genome-wide survey of protein structural domains and analysis of domain architectures. Iyer Meenakshi S., Adwait G. Joshi and, R. Sowdhamini, 2019. Journal of Biomolecular Structure & Dynamics: 10.1080/07391102.2019.1604468
7. The transcriptome enables the identification of candidate genes behind medicinal value of Drumstick tree (Moringa oleifera) Pasha SN, Shafi KM, Joshi AG, Meenakshi I et. al., 2019.Genomics. pii: S0888-7543(18)30690-6. doi: 10.1016/j.ygeno.2019.04.014
8. Dataset for the first combined transcriptome assembly of M. oleifera and functional annotation. Shafi KM, Joshi AG, Meenakshi I et. al., 2019. Data Brief.; 30:105416. doi:10.1016/j.dib.2020.105416
9. A knowledge-driven protocol for prediction of proteins of interest with an emphasis on biosynthetic pathways. Joshi AG, Harini K, Meenakshi I, et al. 2020. MethodsX. 7: 101053. doi:10.1016/j.mex.2020.101053
10. Antimicrobial Resistance Profiling and Phylogenetic Analysis of Neisseria gonorrhoeae Clinical Isolates From Kenya in a Resource-Limited Setting. Juma M, Sankaradoss A, Ndombi R, Mwaura P, Damodar T, Nazir J, Pandit A, Khurana R, Masika M, Chirchir R, Gachie J, Krishna S, Sowdhamini R, Anzala O and Meenakshi IS (2021) Front. Microbiol. 12:647565. doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2021.647565
11. Immune profile and responses of a novel dengue DNA vaccine encoding an EDIII-NS1 consensus design based on Indo-African sequences. Sankaradoss A, Jagtap S, Nazir J, Moula SE, Modak A, Fialho J, Iyer M, Shastri JS, Dias M, Gadepalli R, Aggarwal A, Vedpathak M, Agrawal S, Pandit A. Nisheetha A, Kumar A, Shafi M, Balachandra S, Damodar T, Masika MM, Mwaura P, Anzala O, Muthumani K, Sowdhamini R, Medigeshi G, Roy R, Pattabiraman C, Krishna S, Sreekumar E (2022). Mol Ther. 7:S1525-0016(22)00013-2. doi: 10.1016/j.ymthe.2022.01.013.
12. Exploring the Medicinally Important Secondary Metabolites Landscape Through the Lens of Transcriptome Data in Fenugreek (Trigonella foenum graecum L.). Naika MB, Sathyanarayanan N, Sajeevan RS, Bhattacharyya T, Ghosh P, Meenakshi IS, Jarjapu M, Joshi AG, Harini K, Shafi KM, Kalmankar NV, Karpe SD, Mam B, Pasha SN, Sowdhamini R (2022). Sci Rep 12, 13534. doi: 10.1038/s41598-022-17779-8.
13. A census of actin-associated proteins in humans. Meenakshi S I, Rao M, Mayor S and Sowdhamini R (2023) Front. Cell Dev. Biol. 11:1168050. doi: 10.3389/fcell.2023.1168050.