Associate Professor, Department of Ageing Research, Manipal School of Life Sciences, Manipal Academy of Higher Education (MAHE), Manipal

I seek to understand how different brain circuits regulate a wide range of behaviors, with particular emphasis on the network interactions between distinct brain regions. My research focuses on the role of brain rhythms—especially hippocampal theta oscillations—in modulating behavior. Recently, we identified that abnormalities in perineuronal nets (PNNs), specialized extracellular matrix (ECM) structures within the CA2 region, contribute to age-related impairments in hippocampal-dependent recognition memory and network rhythmicity. In another study, we demonstrated that medial septal cholinergic neurons are crucial for mediating social memory in mice. Before joining MAHE, during my postdoctoral training in Dr. Hee-Sup Shin’s laboratory in South Korea (KIST & IBS), I established the causal role of hippocampal theta rhythm in regulating animal behavior by integrating genetic and circuit-level approaches.

https://www.thehindu.com/sci-tech/studies-in-mice-reveal-neural-mechanism-of-fear-conditioning/article66549520.ece

2024- Present Associate Professor, Dept. of Ageing Research, School of Life Sciences, MAHE, Manipal, Karnataka, India

2019- 2024 DBT-Ramalingaswami Fellow, Dept. of Cell & Molecular Biology, School of Life Sciences, MAHE, Manipal, Karnataka, India

2012 – 2018: Post-Doctoral Research Fellow, Center for Cognition and Sociality, Institute for Basic Science (IBS), Daejeon, S. Korea

2007– 2012: Post-Doctoral Research Fellow, Center for Neural Science, Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST), Seoul, S.Korea

Awards and recognition:

Ramalingaswami Fellowship, Department of Biotechnology, Government of India