Hi, I’m Karthik Shanbhag

Lipids are one of the key mediators in several cellular signalling pathways and their imbalance/deregulation could potentially lead to various (patho)physiological disorders. As a part of my doctoral research, I aim to identify and map the protein interactome of two of the emerging class of signalling lipids, monoacylglycerols and lysophosphatidylserines using bifunctional lipid probes followed by mass spectrometry – based identification. Both these signalling lipids have been assigned with various functions in the cells and human physiology yet there is a lack of knowledge regarding the proteins these lipids interact with and the downstream signalling they trigger. Mapping the interactome of these signalling lipids would not only help in gaining insights on their protein interactors but would also help in identifying and annotating any novel proteins whose functions are still not established. Yet another application that these lipid probes can be employed in, is to track the dynamics of the respective lipid within the cells via microscopy which would further prove useful in shortlisting the putative protein interactors of these lipids.