Dr. Aditya Prasad Nayak

I am a biochemist interested in understanding oligomerization properties of axis proteins involved in synaptonemal complex formation in plants. I am particularly interested in understanding how these proteins respond to temperature changes and screen for naturally occurring variants, which are stable even at higher ambient temperature. I use an integrated biophysical/biochemical approach to achieve this. The Ultimate aim of my work is to find naturally occurring higher ambient temperature stable axis proteins that can carry out meiosis. This can help us face the challenge of reducing grain yields in the face of climate change.

I did my PhD at the CEA (Commissariat à l'énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives) research Centre at Grenoble, France. During my PhD, I worked on understanding temperature sensing circadian proteins from a structural perspective.

I strongly believe that we can engineer future plants that can survive at higher ambient temperature and looking at natural protein variants could be a quick way to achieve that when combined with gene editing.