I joined the Karandikar lab in February 2020. I am excited to bring my prior training in cell and regenerative biology and apply my skills to and learn from this new area of research. The Karandikar lab focuses on understanding the complex immune regulatory mechanisms underlying the autoimmune demyelinating disease, multiple sclerosis (MS). This is a chronic neurological inflammatory disease of the central nervous system (CNS) characterized by multifocal areas of demyelination, axonal damage and immune cell infiltration mediated by CD4⁺ and CD8⁺ T-lymphocytes. It is essential to investigate the interplay between CD4⁺ and CD8⁺ T-lymphocytes during different stages of MS and in its animal model such as an Experimental Autoimmune Encephalomyelitis (EAE). My interests involve elucidating the crucial interactions between CD4⁺ and CD⁸+ T- lymphocytes during autoimmunity. We plan to use advances in cell, molecular biology, immunofluorescence methods and genome editing tools such as CRISPR-Cas9 mediated gene editing to unravel these complicated T-cell interactions under MS condition. We believe that our continued research in this area could be useful to gain insights and aid the development of new immunotherapeutic strategies for MS patients.

Publications

• Chakrapani Vemulawada, Pranav S. Renavikar, Michael P. Crawford, Scott Steward-Tharp, Nitin J. Karandikar; Disruption of IFNγ, GZMB, PRF1, or LYST Results in Reduced Suppressive Function in Human CD8⁺ T Cells. J Immunol 1 June 2024; 212 (11): 1722–1732. https://doi.org/10.4049/jimmunol.2300388.
   
• Chakrapani Vemulawada, Patra SK, Panda RP, Rasal KD, Jayasankar P, Barman HK. Establishing targeted carp TLR22 gene disruption via homologous recombination using CRISPR/Cas9. Dev Comp Immunol. 2016 Aug;61:242-7. Epub 2016 Apr 11. PMID: 27079451. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dci.2016.04.009.
   
• Chakrapani Vemulawada, Kiran Dasharath Rasal, Shibani Dutta Mohapatra, Avinash Rambhau Rasal, Pallipuram Jayasankar, Hirak Kumar Barman. Molecular characterization, computational analysis and transcript profiling of glutamate dehydrogenase (gdh) gene of Macrobrachium rosenbergii exposed to saline water. Gene Reports, Volume 8, 2017, Pages 37-44, ISSN 2452-0144, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.genrep.2017.05.005.
   
• Chakrapani Vemulawada, Patra, S.K., Mohapatra, S.D. et al. Comparative transcriptomic profiling of larvae and post-larvae of Macrobrachium rosenbergii in response to metamorphosis and salinity exposure. Genes Genom 38, 1061–1076 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13258-016-0452-0.
   
• Chakrapani Vemulawada, Rasal KD, Kumar S, Mohapatra SD, Sundaray JK, Jayasankar P, Barman HK. In Silico Analysis of nsSNPs of Carp TLR22 Gene Affecting its Binding Ability with Poly I:C. Interdiscip Sci. 2018 Dec;10(4):641-652. Epub 2017 Jun 28. PMID: 28660537. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12539-017-0247-2.
   
• Chakrapani Vemulawada, Panda RP, Patra SK, Saha JN, Jayasankar P, Kar B, Sahoo PK, Barman HK. First evidence of comparative responses of Toll-like receptor 22 (TLR22) to relatively resistant and susceptible Indian farmed carps to Argulus siamensis infection. Dev Comp Immunol. 2014 Nov;47(1):25-35. Epub 2014 Jul 3. PMID: 24998226. DOI: 10.1016/j.dci.2014.06.016.
   
• Patra SK, Chakrapani Vemulawada, Panda RP, Mohapatra C, Jayasankar P, Barman HK. First evidence of molecular characterization of rohu carp Sox2 gene being expressed in proliferating spermatogonial cells. Theriogenology. 2015 Jul 15;84(2):268-76.e1. Epub 2015 Mar 25. PMID: 25913275. DOI: 10.1016/j.theriogenology.2015.03.017.
   
• Rasal KD, Chakrapani Vemulawada, Patra SK, Mohapatra SD, Nayak S, Jena S, Sundaray JK, Jayasankar P, Barman HK. Identification of Deleterious Mutations in Myostatin Gene of Rohu Carp (Labeo rohita) Using Modeling and Molecular Dynamic Simulation Approaches. Biomed Res Int. 2016;2016:7562368. Epub 2016 Feb 25. PMID: 27019850; PMCID: PMC4785247. DOI: 10.1155/2016/7562368.
   
• Rasal, Kiran D., Chakrapani Vemulawada, Patra, Swagat K., Jena, Sasmita, Mohapatra, Shibani D., Nayak, Swapnarani, Sundaray, Jitendra K., Jayasankar, Pallipuram, And Barman, Hirak K. (2016) "Identification and prediction of the consequences of nonsynonymous SNPs in glyceraldehyde 3-phosphate dehydrogenase (GAPDH) gene of zebrafish Danio rerio," Turkish Journal of Biology: Vol. 40: No. 1, Article 4. https://doi.org/10.3906/biy-1501-11.
   
• Mohapatra, S.D., Chakrapani Vemulawada, Rasal, K.D., Jayasankar, P., Barman, H.K., & Subudhi, E. (2017). Hypoxia-Induced Gene Expression Profiling in The Liver of Freshwater Fish, Channa striatus. Turkish Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences, 17, 565-579. http://doi.org/10.4194/1303-2712-v17_3_13.
   
• Kiran Dashrath Rasal, Chakrapani Vemulawada, Amrendra Kumar Pandey, Avinash Rambhau Rasal, Jitendra K. Sundaray, Arun Ninawe, Pallipuram Jayasankar. Status and future perspectives of single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) markers in farmed fishes: Way ahead using next generation sequencing. Gene Reports, Volume 6, 2017, Pages 81-86, ISSN 2452-0144, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.genrep.2016.12.004.
   
• Patra SK, Chakrapani Vemulawada, Soren MM, Sundaray JK, Panda MK, Barman HK. Molecular characterization and expression patterns of Nanog gene validating its involvement in the embryonic development and maintenance of spermatogonial stem cells of farmed carp, Labeo rohita. J Anim Sci Biotechnol. 2018 Jun 11;9:45. PMID: 29992021; PMCID: PMC5994655. https://doi.org/10.1186/s40104-018-0260-2.
   
• Rasal K.D., Chakrapani Vemulawada, Patra S.K., Sundaray J.K., Jayasankar P., Hirak K. Barman, 2016. Volume 10. Global status of transgenic fish production, its implication and future perspectives with special emphasis to the development of novel color varieties of ornamental fish. Journal of Fisheries Sciences. https://api.semanticscholar.org/CorpusID:55275157.
   
• Mohapatra S.D., Chakrapani Vemulawada., Rasal K.D., Jayasankar P., Hirak K. Barman, Enketeswara Subudhi, 2018. Characterization and expression analysis of NADH dehydrogenase (ubiquinone) iron-sulfur protein-2 in channa striatus. Research journal of biotechnology. Vol. 13 (1) January (2018).
   
• Barman HK, Mohapatra SD, Chakrapani Vemulawada, Mondal S, Murmu B, Soren MM, Patra K, Swain RK. Genomic organization and hypoxia-inducible factor responsive regulation of teleost hsp90β gene during hypoxia stress. Mol Biol Rep. 2021 Sep;48(9):6491-6501. doi: 10.1007/s11033-021-06657-7. Epub 2021 Aug 30. PMID: 34460062. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11033-021-06657-7.
   
• Sundaray, J.K., Rasal, K.D., Chakrapani Vemulawada. et al. Simple sequence repeats (SSRs) markers in fish genomic research and their acceleration via next-generation sequencing and computational approaches. Aquacult Int 24, 1089–1102 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10499-016-9973-4.
   
• Barman HK, Rasal KD, Chakrapani Vemulawada, Ninawe AS, Vengayil DT, Asrafuzzaman S, Sundaray JK, Jayasankar P. Gene editing tools: state-of-the-art and the road ahead for the model and non-model fishes. Transgenic Res. 2017 Oct;26(5):577-589. Epub 2017 Jul 5. PMID: 28681201. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11248-017-0030-5.
   
• Barman HK, Mohanta R, Patra SK, Chakrapani Vemulawada, Panda RP, Nayak S, Jena S, Jayasankar P, Nandanpawar P. The β-actin gene promoter of rohu carp (Labeo rohita) drives reporter gene expressions in transgenic rohu and various cell lines, including spermatogonial stem cells. Cell Mol Biol Lett. 2015 Jun;20(2):237-47. PMID: 26204405. https://doi.org/10.1515/cmble-2015-0010.
   
• Swapnarani Nayak, Lipika Patnaik, Meenati Manjari Soren, Chakrapani Vemulawada, Shibani Dutta Mohapatra, Subhajit Mondal, Binita Murmu, Niyati Das, Hirak Kumar Barman. The regulatory elements of PLZF gene are not conserved as revealed by molecular cloning and functional characterization of PLZF gene promoter of Clarias batrachus. Gene Reports, Volume 16, 2019, 100402, ISSN 2452-0144, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.genrep.2019.100402.