I am a gold medalist in Bachelors, and Doctorate from Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology, Hyderabad. My earlier training in Bachelor’s and Master’s was in microbiology while in PhD I got hands-on-experience on cutting edge molecular biology techniques and traditional genetics. My doctoral research focused on understanding the interrelationships between various gene silencing phenomena using the Drosophila model.  I have been awarded Research Fellowships and have won various state level science awards. Since 2008, I have been working on various aspects of secondary metabolism in microorganisms and plants at CSIR-IIIM. During these years, we have used genomics, transcriptomics and metabolomics coupled with functional characterization of genes to understand secondary metabolite pathways. Long term goals of my lab are to understand secondary metabolite pathways, their regulation, their roles in host physiology and ecological interactions as well as their pharmacological activities. I have successfully completed several externally funded projects and coordinated CSIR Network Project as PI. Three PhD students have completed their degrees under my supervision and more than 50 Bachelor’s and Master’s internships / dissertations have been supervised by me. We have published in reputed peer-reviewed SCI journals such as Science, FEBS Journal, Chemosphere, Journal of Hazardous Materials, etc.