CCMB Daak - Building leaders in science

From solving profound and urgent questions with the tools of science to being an intrinsic part in making CCMB the place that it is, this Daak thanks the women of CCMB. PC: Nectar, by Greeshma Murthati

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Knocking out the malarial parasite

Puran Singh Sijwali's group at CCMB studies the protein degradation machinery of the malaria-causing parasite Plasmodium falciparum. They study how parasitic cells tag proteins with ubiquitin to mark them for degradation.

Cullin Ring Ligases are a prominent group of the enzymes that facilitate this tagging. Their recent paper has identified two Cullin Ring Ligase enzymes - PfSCF and PfCRL4.

They show that PfCRL4 is critical for parasite's development in human RBCs, specifically for cell division and membrane integrity. Being crucial for the parasite, these enzymes are promising chemotherapeutic targets for development of new drugs to treat malaria.

Developing antimalarial drugs has been of key importance given that making vaccines against the malarial parasite has not been straightforward. Do you know why the malarial vaccines have taken so long? Srinivas Reddy writes.

Breaking the cell-wall to grow the cell-wall

Bacteria's protective cell-wall is made up of peptidoglycan. This refers to a backbone of glycan strands, cross-linked with peptide strands. How do bacteria expand their cell-walls when they have to grow in size?

Earlier work from Manjula Reddy's lab had identified enzymes that break the cross-links for new cell-wall material to be added to increase its size. Their recent work identifies MltD enzyme, a glycan hydrolase's role in chopping the glycan backbone with the earlier identified enzymes such as Mep S/M/H, to allow the bacterial cell-wall to grow.

An animal model system for keratoconus

Keratoconus is a degenerative eye disorder. It results from collagen degradation in the cornea of the eye. Studying it requires establishing a working animal model system. In this paper, scientists from Kiran Bokara’s group at CCMB and LVPEI have detailed a protocol for rabbit keratoconus model induced by collagenase.

Genome sequencing to understand cyanobacteria

Cyanobacteria are the major nitrogen fixers and primary producers in aquatic ecosystems and the ultimate source of atmospheric oxygen. But growing them in labs is challenging, and studies to understand them in detail has been limited.

Umapathy's latest paper talks of using environmental DNA samples to study cyanobacteria. Through this method, they have accessed genomes of cyanobacteria otherwise not possible, and have identified genes that explain how it not only plays a role in nitrogen fixation but also in sulfur recycling in our ecosystems.

Many congratulations

Ajay Sarawagi for the best poster award at the Advances in Proteomics Technologies conference at the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay.

Yogita Kapoor for getting the Keystone Travel Grant and becoming one of the 25 poster participants to give a talk at the Keystone Symposium on Tuberculosis: The Host-Pathogen Interface.

Growing the Indo-French scientific collaborations

CCMB welcomed the Ambassador of France to India, H. E. Mr Thierry Mathou and other delegates from the embassy to further our discussions on CSIR-Pasteur collaboration as the Indo-French innovation programs take ground.

Throwback to the CCMB Founder's Day

CCMB's Founder's Day, celebrated on the occasion of PM Bhargava's birth anniversary, is a day for the present and past students of CCMB to come together and CCMB to experience the journey of the institute through its students. If you missed attending the celebrations in-person, check them online now.

Check here

Reaching out to rural children

"Can we extract water from atmospheric moisture?" "How did the first cell form?" were the kind of Qs the young & curious minds asked at the Pratham Science camp led by Annapoorna PK & Sai Poojitha. The 10-14 year olds of rural Telangana reminded us that science enthuses all to ask questions and seek ways to solve them as well as of the need for science communication in native languages.

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