Ranjith Kumavath
School of Life Sciences, Dept. of Biotechnology, Pondicherry University, India
- Orcid: 0000-0002-0751-5491
- Publications: 75
- Citations: 1280
- Keywords: Cancer Biology, Genomics, Metagenomics, drug discovery
Short Bio
- •Dr. Ranjith Kumavath, FRSB, pursued his M.Sc. (Biochemistry) from S.V University, Tirupati, and Ph.D. (Life Sciences) from the University of Hyderabad. •He was a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow at NTU (Singapore), Mercer University Georgia (USA), and UGC Kothari PDF at the University of Hyderabad. •He joined the Central University of Kerala as an Assistant Professor in a regular post in 2011 in the Department of Genomic Sciences. He was appointed as the founder and Head (i/c) of the Department of Genomic Science from 2011 to 2014. •He received many awards viz Young Scientist Award, Mahatma Gandhi Gold Medal, APJ Kalam Gold Medal Award, and Bio-Asia Young Scientist, to name a few. •He is also a Fellow of the SAB Society of Applied Biotechnology, a Fellow of Young Investigator (YIM) by India Biosciences, and an elected member of the Fellow of Royal Society of Biology (FRSB) from the Royal Society of Biology, London, as one of the eminent biologists in the world. •He has successfully executed 6 projects (~5 crores) and two ongoing projects. •He has been awarded 4 Ph.D., 3 MPhil, and 55 Masters in Genomics dissertation thesis. He has published 67 research papers in peer-reviewed journals; also, he has published 3 books and 25 book chapters. •He is an editor and reviewer in several reputed International Journals. He has nearly 45 peer-reviewed abstracts published in National and international symposiums and conferences. •He has collaborations with the NUS Cancer Science Institute of Singapore, the National Institute of Infectious Diseases (Japan), Virginia Tech University (USA), San Diego State University (USA), the Federal University of Brazil, and the University of Alicante (Spain). •Dr. Ranjith Kumavath's Lab is focused on Cancer Genomics, Metagenomics, and infectious diseases, aiming to uncover innovative drug targets and delivery systems to tackle the challenges of various cancers, infectious diseases, and antibiotic resistance. His vision stems from the rich diversity of natural compounds from the environmental microbiome, which can be implemented as novel anti-infectious and anticancer drugs. •His team has also discovered microbial metabolites, novel bioactive carotenoids, Bacterioruberin, Rubrivivaxin, and Rhodethrin. These novel compounds exhibit anticancer and antimicrobial activities against infectious pathogens. •On the other hand, he is working on the functional logic of sequence-specific multiple antibiotic resistance genes underlying the TCST mechanisms. The microbial communities from various abiotic and biotic environments are being studied to harness the enormous Microbial-derived Biomolecules and AMPs with desirable biological activities for therapeutic and Integrative Omics based markers and target drug discovery. •The team is also working to make sense of the deluge of (Meta) Genomic, Exomic, and Transcriptomic data by (i) Correlating genome variation to phenotype, (ii) Identifying the specifics of sequence-encoded molecular functions, and (iii) Elucidating complex system/community interactions. (iv) microbial meta-barcoding; sequence-encoded molecular functions (SEMF), and metagenomics of natural and built environments. •His team has discovered that the Kerala mangrove has the most diverse microbiome and Resistomes globally. The halophiles of the Arabian Sea coastline are enriched with Crtl carotenoids and CruF bacterioruberin pigments genes from extremophile sp. •His current research is inclined toward infectious disease epidemiology and genetics, novel biomarkers in the human microbiome, and Resistomes through AI/Deep Machine Learning, drug repurposing, and immunogenic modulators for cancer treatment. These biomarkers shall be implemented for disease prevention, diagnosis, and possible drug targets.
