Sharda Prasad Yadav, Ph.D.

Postdoctoral Fellow

Sharda Prasad Yadav obtained a degree in Biophysics from Molecular and Structural Biology Division, Central Drug Research Institute Lucknow and received his Ph.D. from Jawaharlal Nehru University New Delhi, India. During his doctoral work, he identified and characterized an amphipathic, conserved leucine zipper motif (H-205, aa region 205-234), its extended version H-198 (aa region 198-234) and a 33-residue peptide (H-88, aa region 88-120) derived from a toxin hemolysin E isolated from a pathogenic strain of Escherichia coli. He later contributed to the structure function study of the bee venom antimicrobial peptide melittin and reported a leucine zipper that showed a structural dissection of hemolytic and antibacterial activity. Very recently, the amphipathic leucine zipper-like sequence was utilized to design antibacterial peptides with simultaneous modulation of toxic activity against human red blood cells.

Sharda's current main focus is to understand the mechanism of gene regulation and pathogenesis of associated neurodegenerative disorders using retinal development as a paradigm. The objective of his project will be to decipher the biochemical function of the rod photoreceptor transcription factor NRL during photoreceptor development and disease.