Our group is working on dissection of cellular signalling events in various metabolic diseases including type-2 diabetes, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), and musculoskeletal disorders and in devising therapeutic strategies against such diseases. We work on primary cells, cell-lines, as well as various rodent model systems, and also extensively utilize various bio-chemical and molecular techniques. Our work involves extensive collaborations within and out-side CDRI with chemists, clinicians and pharmaceutical industries.
Our group is particularly interested in signalling associated with Adiponectin and its receptors (AdipoR1 and AdipoR2) in health and disease.
Adiponectin is an anti-inflammatory cytokine released primarily from the adipose tissue and is also known to be produced by the skeletal muscle. Clinical evidences show that depletion/lowering of adiponectin in blood is associated with a plethora of metabolic diseases including but not limited to diabetes, atherosclerosis, and various cancers. Conversely, in some diseases higher circulating adiponectin is also visible and new research suggest that this higher circulating adiponectin is a result of adiponectin-resistance, where adiponectin is rendered less functional due to lower expression of its receptors in these disease conditions.
Although a decade of preclinical and clinical studies have established the key role of circulatory adiponectin depletion in diverse metabolic diseases, adiponectin replenishment therapy is yet not available owing to the complex molecular structure and properties of the adiponectin protein and it appears that identification of small molecule adiponectin receptor agonists may be the only way to approach adiponectin depletion-associated metabolic diseases.
Our group is one of the first in the world to have discovered such small molecule AdipoR agonists and are currently working on detailed molecular and pharmacological characterization of a number of other promising candidates.
In addition to AdipoRs, our group is also working on various facets of GLP-1, and PPAR signalling, wrt musculoskeletal disorders and CML.
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