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From the Director's desk:
Doing Science in
India is an 'Art' they say. While I do agree with this
cliche to some extent, I am fairly certain that building
Science institutions in India is a strange Art form. There
are no set rules or time tested models to follow blindly
since what succeeded in a different era will not work now
and no one knows what works best in today's times. More so
in a vibrant democratic country like ours in which everyone
has more than one opinion on every issue and I need to
listen to all of them, filter out and follow what I think is
the correct path! Ironically it appears to me that at a
stage when resources were scarce but regulations were less
it was relatively easy to build institutions than what it is
in contemporary times! Some features however are consistent
and needed for science institutions to succeed - a blend of
highly motivated faculty and competent students with fire in
their belly to indulge in science. Equally critical are
maturity and comradeship amongst them to realize that we can
succeed as an institution only when most people succeed and
not just by small islands of 'good performance'. Much of my
time is spent in nurturing these attributes, even though
these qualities need to be inherent much before they get
into the institution.
Scientific activities continued to flourish at ILS going by
globally accepted indicators viz., increase in numbers as
well as quality of scientific publications, number of
extramural projects generated by faculty, number of PhD
students etc., But we are not 'there' yet - hopefully we
will be, sooner than later! There is much to talk about our
overall performance during the last one year.
Characterization of a nematode glycoprotein resulted in
identifying a carbohydrate residue that unexpectedly
demonstrated high affinity for TLR-4, a receptor needed for
causing bacterial sepsis in both animals and humans. This
led to discovering a small molecule synthetic antagonist for
blocking sepsis in experimental model systems. Insights into
programmed cell death of T cells led to understanding
critical molecules needed for regulating apoptosis and
taking it further in the context of autoimmune disease and
allergies is expected to offer translational dividends.
Studies on genes that synthesize cholera toxin in several
environmental isolates of Vibrio cholerae indicated the need
for constant surveillance of aquatic environment. One of the
features of EB virus infections in humans is its
predilection for getting into latent phase and ongoing
studies have offered leads to understand the molecular basis
for cellular transformation as well as latency. Chikengunya
virus was once considered to have been eradicated from India
but has become a major public health problem today.
Investigations into non-structural proteins of the virus (a
hitherto neglected aspect) being undertaken have offered
leads to understand their function in life cycle of the
virus. An unusual approach taken by a plant biochemist on
the mode of action of the anti malarial drug Artemisnin
resulted in developing a highly sensitive spectrophotometric
assay of the drug using thylakoid/chloroplast assay system.
Another example of consequence of hosting people with
diverse background under one roof is the ongoing project on
generation of transgenic plants by expressing mammalian
anti-microbial peptides such as human defensins with an
objective to develop plants resistant to fungal infections
and also to use them as topical antibiotics in animals and
humans. The need for critical mass in a given discipline is
often an issue of debate in small science institutions. ILS
is clearly inching towards achieving this goal in the area
of Cancer biology - different groups are addressing issues
on a) epigenetics and role of Estrogen related receptor-beta
in regulation of apoptosis in breast cancer, b) use of
PEGylated drug such as Pemetrexel for reduced folate carrier
independent internalization into breast cancer cells and
targeting human pancreatic stem cells in xenotransplantation
models using nanoparticles loaded with gemcitamin , c)
identifying miRNAs involved in Chronic Myeloid Leukemias
that may have potential for use as biomarkers and as
signatures for disease progression, d) use of small animal
model systems for gene therapy in cancer and e) to
investigate the role of pathogenic microbes in aetiology of
prostate cancer. Bioprospecting is a potential area in
biotechnology and several extremophilic microorganisms have
been isolated and characterised for possible application is
studying metabolic pathways and virulence associated factors
in microbes. The role of the enzyme PM-H+ATPase in
maintenance of ion-homeostasis or salt tolerance in plants
were addressed during the year. Studies on genomic
instability and DNA polymerase have been initiated using
Candida albicans as a model organism. Considering that
approaches for discovery of antibiotics in the future would
have to be a undertaken on a rational basis investigations
on understanding bacterial cell division have also been
initiated. Another new addition to the armoury of models
systems at the institute is Zebra fish to address issues on
development, infection biology as well as immunology. Given
the diversity of ethnic population in the country and more
specifically in the region, studies on genetic basis of
infectious as well as non infectious diseases were
undertaken during the last year - linkage analysis revealed
inheritance of same haplotype in all the affected members in
families thus offering evidence of linkage at 7q22-22.1
locus in Otosclerosis and the role of a 23 bp deletion
mutation in 5' UTR region of TLR2 gene resulting in
increased inflammation in patients with severe P.falciparum
malaria and sepsis.
The year gone by has been very eventful in the short history
of existence of ILS. Years of patience and perseverance seem
to be bearing fruit both in terms of science productivity as
well as putting infrastructure in place. The new laboratory
block and animal house facility are nearing completion and
we hope to formally inaugurate and occupy them before the
end of this calendar year. The next major activity will
begin very soon when we start construction of residential
campus about 3.0Km from ILS which we hope to complete in
2014. I derive my enthusiasm and energy primarily from my
faculty colleagues, students and staff and hopefully it will
sustain for the rest of the period that I will be around!
B.
Ravindran
Director |