Research interests

Research Area

Broadly, I am interested in understanding the evolution of sex chromosome using computational tools. My fascination for the sex chromosomes has two major reasons.

  1. The number of different species with different sex determination systems (Some weird ones are even more interesting). Each species is interesting in its own unique way. With a unique history, I believe each species has a story to tell.

  2. Now, my curiosity lies in the underlying “pattern”. That is, what makes a species determine sex environmentally or genetically? and if its genetically determined why does a species “adopt” XY or ZW or UV system of sex determination and how does the species determine sex?

Although I am interested in understanding the evolution of Y chromosome, I am currently focussed on understanding the evolution of genes on the X chromosomes that is a nice segue to my Ph. D. research.

PhD Research

Right now (As a 4th year Ph.D. student), I am currently trying to answer two major questions in my thesis. They are

  1. Are Neo-X genes dosage compensated and balanced in a specific beetle species?

    • The degeneration of the genes on the Y chromosome may result in some form of compensation mechanism on the genes on the X chromosomes. I am trying to identify the pattern of the dosage compensation in a beetle species. That is, is it only equal between males and females and/or is it equal between current and ancestral expression levels? Ultimately, why do we see what we see with respect to dosage compensation in this beetle species?

    • I am trying to answer this question by analyzing RNA-Seq data using multiple related species and comparing the expression between males and females with the ancestral expression.

  2. Does Tribolium exhibit Meiotic Sex Chromosome Inactivation?

    • Understanding the presence or absence of meiotic sex chromosome inactivation has been challenging in the past years due to controversies in the methodologies. Eliminating room for such controversies, single cell RNA-Seq (scRNA-seq) provides a novel opporunity to study Meiotic Sex Chromosome Inactivation.

    • I will be comparing the expression of the meiotic cells vs non-meiotic cells in Tribolium to answer this question.