Host City India: Cambridge

Sonika Chibh

Dr. Sonika Chibh is a postdoctoral fellow at Tel Aviv University, Israel. She obtained her B.Tech. in biotechnology degree from Jaypee University of Information Technology, Solan, Himachal Pradesh in 2014, and her master’s (M.Tech.) in biotechnology from Thapar University, Patiala, Punjab in 2016. She then received her Ph.D. in 2022 from the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research/ Institute of Nanoscience and Technology Mohali, Punjab. Her Ph.D. work focused on the formation of self-assembled peptide-based nanoparticles as a drug delivery system in cancer therapy. Her postdoctoral research at Tel Aviv University focused on the development of monoclonal antibodies against phenylalanine for the treatment of phenylketonuria, with Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd.

Dr. Sonika Chibh has published several research articles in recognized international journals during her Ph.D. and postdoctoral studies. She received a George S. Wise Post-doctoral fellowship at Tel Aviv University in 2022. During her Ph.D. she received the Young Researcher award in an oral presentation organized by SYBS in 2021. She also received the Best Poster award in Bengaluru Nano in 2022.

As a Fulbright-Nehru Postdoctoral Research fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Dr. Chibh is working on a project entitled “Design of Chemokine-Based Self-Assembled Nanoparticles for Receptor-mediated Specific Drug Delivery”. This project is in collaboration with Dr. Shuguang Zhang and MIT Institute Professor Robert Langer, who is the father of controlled drug delivery.

Vasudharani Devanthan

Dr Vasudharani Devanthan is Associate Professor, Department of Biology and Associate Dean of Students at IISER Tirupati. Dr Devanathan’s research group at IISER Tirupati is engaged in understanding the structure and functional changes induced in retinal neurons in altered metabolic conditions such as hyperglycemia and hypoxia. Their research will contribute to understanding signaling mechanisms underlying diabetic retinopathy and the impact of glucose insult to neurons in long term diabetes. Collaborating with clinicians in Tirupati area, she is also engaged in novel biomarkers for Glioblastoma.

Dr Devanathan completed her postgraduate degree from the University of Madras and was working in Astra Zeneca, Bengaluru as a junior scientist. She completed her Ph.D. from Center for Molecular Neurosciences in Hamburg. She did her postdoctoral studies in university hospitals of Duesseldorf and Tübingen. She returned to India and had a short stint at the M.S University of Baroda (Dr Vikram Sarabhai Institute of Cell and Molecular Biology) as a teaching faculty. She has been with IISER Tirupati since its inception from 2015.

Dr Devanathan’s Fulbright-Nehru Academic and Professional Excellence project is focused on understanding the electrophysiological changes in retinal neurons altered glucose and will be engaged in mouse behavioral studies.