Download Dr - JNU

Dr. Rakesh Bhatnagar
Professor
Ph: +91 11 26704079; 26742040
Email: [email protected]
[email protected]
Education: Ph. D. (Biochemistry), National Sugar Institute, Kanpur.
M.Sc. (Chemistry), Kanpur University, Kanpur.
Career:
1997: Professor, School of Biotechnology, JNU, New Delhi.
1990-1993: Coordinator, Bioinformatics Centre, JNU, New Delhi.
1989-1997: Associate Professor, Special Centre for Biotechnology, JNU, New Delhi.
1987-1989: Senior NRC Associate, USAMRIID, Fredrick, USA.
1986-1987: Visiting Associate, NHLBI, NIH, Bethesda, USA.
1985-1986: Visiting Associate Prof. Lab. Connect. Tissue, CHU, Caen, France.
1979-1982: Scientist, Biochemistry & Molecular Biology Institute, Freiburg University,
Germany
Area of Interest
 Molecular Biology of Infectious Diseases
 Recombinant Vaccine Development
 Programmed cell death in prokaryotes.
Research Summary:
Prof. Rakesh Bhatnagar has been working in the field of anthrax for the past 20 years. He
has to his credit the development of genetically engineered vaccine against anthrax. The
technology of recombinant anthrax vaccine has been transferred to Panacea Biotec Ltd.
and the vaccine has successfully undergone Phase I and Phase II Human clinical trials.
Also, his research group pioneered the expression of Protective Antigen gene in a plant
system, which marks the first milestone towards developing edible vaccine against
anthrax. DNA vaccine against rabies has been developed in his laboratory and is ready
for technology transfer. Further research is being done to develop DNA vaccine against
anthrax. Laboratory is also engaged in study of programmed cell death in prokaryotes.
Honors/Awards:





Fellow, National Academy of Sciences
Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) award for his outstanding research
work in the field of Immunology (Development of recombinant anthrax vaccine)
for the year 2001.
All India Biotech Association Award 2001-2002, in recognition of achievement in
Promotion of Biotechnology, In The Area of Biotechnology For Health Care.
Haffkine Institute, Bombay, Dr. Gharpure Oration Lecture, 2002.
Invited to address Press Conference to announce Development of Genetically
Engineered Vaccine against Anthrax, with Minister of Science & Technology,
Govt. of India, November 2001




Invited to deliver Press Conference to announce Development of Genetically
Engineered Vaccine against Anthrax, Annual Meeting of American Society for
Cell Biology, Washington, DC., December 2001.
Institute of Pathology Silver Jubilee Oration Lecture, 1992.
Senior N R C (USA) Research Award, 1987-1989.
Best Research paper presented in Society of Biological Chemists Meeting, 1984.
Selected Publications:
1. M.C. Joshi, A. Sharma, S. Kant, A. Birah, G.P. Gupta, S. R. Khan, R. Bhatnagar,
and N. Banerjee (2008). An insecticidal GroEL protein with chitin binding
activity from Xenorhabdus nematophila. J. Biol. Chem., 283: 28287-28296.
2. S. Midha and R. Bhatnagar (2008). Anthrax protective antigen administered by
DNA vaccination to distinct subcellular locations potentiates humoral and cellular
immune responses. Eur. J. Immunol., 39: 159-177.
3. S. Agarwal, S. Agarwal, R. Bhatnagar (2007). Identification and Characterization
of a Novel Toxin-Antitoxin Module from Bacillus anthracis. FEBS Letters, 581:
1727-1734.
4. M.Gupta, S. Alam and R. Bhatnagar (2006). Kinetic characterization and ligand
binding studies of His351 mutants of Bacillus anthracis adenylate cyclase. Arch.
Biochem. Biophys., 446: 28 -34.
5. M. A. Aziz, D. Sikriwal, S. Singh, S. Jarugula, A. Kumar and R. Bhatnagar
(2005). Transformation of an edible crop with pagA gene of Bacillus anthracis.
FASEB J,.19: 1501-1503.
6. J. Singh, M.C. Joshi and R. Bhatnagar (2004). Cloning and expression of
mycobacterial glutamine synthetase gene in E. coli. Biochem. Biophys. Res.
Commun., 317: 634-638.
7. P. Kumar, N. Ahuja and R. Bhatnagar (2002). Anthrax edema toxin requires
influx of calcium for inducing cAMP toxicity in target cells. Infect. Immun., 70:
4997-5007.
8. V. Chauhan and R. Bhatnagar (2002). Identification of amino acid residues of
Protective antigen involved in binding to Lethal factor. Infect. Immun., 70: 44774484.
9. P. Kumar, N. Ahuja and R. Bhatnagar (2001). Purification of Anthrax Edema
Factor from Escherichia coli and identification of residues required for binding to
Protective Antigen. Infect. Immun., 69: 6532-6536.
10. R. Bhatnagar, N. Ahuja, R. Goila, S. Khetarpal, S.M. Waheed and P.
Gupta(1999). Activation of phospholipase C and protein kinase C is required for
expression of anthrax lethal toxin cytotoxicity in J774A.1 cells. Cellular
Signalling, 11: 111-116.
11. P. Gupta, S. Khetarpal, A.P. Chopra, Y. Singh and R. Bhatnagar(1998).
Expression and purification of the recombinant Lethal factor of Bacillus
anthracis. Infect. Immun., 66: 862-865.