Principal Scientist
Therapeutic Genome Editing
Debojyoti Chakraborty's research focuses on the dissection and engineering of factors that modulate cellular pathways, enable rapid identification of pathogenic conditions, and generate therapeutic strategies. His lab develops genome editing tools and applies them for identifying, modelling, and correcting disease-causing mutations.
Current focus areas include:
- Therapeutic Genome Editing for the treatment of genetic disorders
- Engineered Cas systems and their applications in dissecting biological phenomena
- Stem cell derived organoid models for disease modelling
Debojyoti Chakraborty's lab has extensively characterized an orthogonal Cas9 from Francisella novicida (FnCas9) and applied it for genome editing and diagnostic applications. Working closely with clinicians, the group has shown the applicability of CRISPR based therapeutics in patient derived cells and are working towards the development of editing platforms that can be clinically translated. The group also studies certain fundamental aspects of long noncoding RNA biology and its impact in development using mini brains and spheroids as models. In recent times, the lab has contributed to the pandemic surveillance through one of the first commercially available CRISPR based diagnostic applications. Ongoing studies to make it accessible for other diseases is underway.
Selected Publications:
- FnCas9 based CRISPR diagnostic for rapid and accurate detection of major SARS-CoV2 variants on a paper strip. Kumar M, Gulati S, Ansari AH, Phutela R, Acharya S, Azhar M, Murthy J, Kathpalia P, Kanakan A, Maurya R, Vasudevan JS, Murali A, Pandey R, Maiti S, Chakraborty D. Elife 2021; 10:e67130.
- Rapid and accurate nucleobase detection using FnCas9 and its application in COVID-19 diagnosis. Azhar M, Phutela R, Kumar M, Ansari AH, Rauthan R, Gulati S, Sharma N, Sinha D, Sharma S, Singh S, Acharya S, Sarkar S, Paul D, Kathpalia P, Aich M, Sehgal P, Ranjan G, Bhoyar RC, Indian CoV2 Genomics & Genetic Epidemiology (IndiCovGEN) Consortium, Singhal K, Lad H, Patra PK, Makharia G, Chandak GR, Pesala B, Chakraborty D, Maiti S. Biosensors and Bioelectronics 2021; 183:113207.
- Rapid identification and tracking of SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern. Chakraborty D, Agrawal A, Maiti S. The Lancet 2021; 397(10282):P1346-1347
- Francisella novicida Cas9 interrogates genomic DNA with very high specificity and can be used for mammalian genome editing. Acharya S, Mishra A, Paul D, Ansari AH, Azhar M, Kumar M, Rauthan R, Sharma N, Aich M, Sinha D, Sharma S, Jain S, Ray A, Jain S, Ramalingam S, Maiti S, Chakraborty D. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 2019; 116(42):20959-20968
- Combined RNAi and localization for functionally dissecting long noncoding RNAs. Chakraborty D, Kappei D, Theis M, Nitzsche A, Ding L, Paszkowski-Rogacz M, Surendranath V, Berger N, Schulz H, Saar K, Hubner N, Buchholz F. Nature Methods 2012; 9:360-362
