Post Docs
Satish Bollimpelli
Post-doctoral Fellow
Satish is currently working on HIV prophylactic vaccines in Rhesus Macaque models. Through our studies we are trying to address key gaps in the HIV vaccine field such as a) Durable antibody response of high magnitude and broad neutralization, b) Role of tissue resident memory CD8 T cells in vaccine induced immune protection, c)Synergy between T-cell mediated immune response and humoral response to prevent HIV acquisition, d) Susceptibility of vaccine induced CD4 T cells to HIV acquisition and possible modalities to optimize the balance between protection and susceptibility in vaccine induced immune response , e) Imprint B-cell repertoire to achieve enriched anti-HIV envelope B-cell response. Immunogens we are using towards this end are targeted against BG505, a Tier 2, clade A HIV strain. They include DNA vaccine that induce gp-160 trimer on VLPs, MVA vaccine that induce gp-150 trimer on VLPs and soluble BG505 gp-140 SOSIP trimer protein. We use adjuvants like CD40-L by expressing it on DNA induced VLPs and TLR7/8 agonist 3M-052 in PGLA nanoparticles along with soluble protein.
We are trying to optimize best combination of above immunogens, route of immunizations and timing of these immunizations to address the aforementioned issues.
Satish received his PhD from the University of Hyderabad, India in 2016.
Kishor Jakkala
Post Doctoral Fellow
Kishor Jakkala has done his masters in Andhra University (India) in the department of Biochemistry and did his Ph.D. in Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore, India. His Ph.D. work focused on studying the morphological and molecular level response of the Mycobacterium Tuberculosis to hypoxic and antibiotic stress. He has also worked on investigating the response of Mycobacterial cells upon prolonged antibiotic treatment. Apart from these studies, he has also contributed his efforts on other studies, which dealt with response of mycobacterial subcultures to different antibiotic, nitrite, oxidative stress and resister emergence, in collaboration. Currently, he is working on the vaccine development against HIV.
Anusmita Sahoo
Post-doctoral Fellow
Anusmita’s research interests center around the structure of HIV-1 envelope. We aim to design novel Clade C immunogens which can induce functional antibodies and protective responses in a challenge study. The design strategies are driven by lessons learnt from solved structures and HIV-1 sequences obtained from natural isolates. Major part of our immunogen design focusses to understand how certain changes on the envelope trimer influence the immune outcome, without altering the global structural organization. We also attempt to understand the influence of adjuvants, oral and systemic routes of immunization on the activation of different immune cell types and protection from intra-rectal SHIV challenge.
Anusmita received her PhD from IISC Bangalore India in 2015.
Bhrugu Yagnik
Post-doctoral Fellow
Bhrugu has completed his PhD in Biotechnology, wherein he used probiotic bacterium, L. lactis as a mucosal vaccine delivery vehicle against Shigella. Currently, he is working towards developing therapeutic interventions to achieve functional cure for HIV in SIV/rhesus macaque model.
