Personal Information
Dr. Dhaneswar Prusty
Assistant Professor (UGC)
M.Sc. (Biotechnology), Ph.D. (Molecular Medicine)
7749874182
Antimalarial Drug discovery by using in silico, in vitro, and parasite culture methods
Antiviral Drug discovery by using in silico and in vitro methods
Biochemical characterization of apicoplast housekeeping machinery of the malaria parasite
M.Sc.- Department of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology, Tezpur University, Assam
Ph.D.- Special Centre for Molecular Medicine, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi
Postdoctoral research- Department of Pathology and Molecular Medicine, McMaster University, Hamilton, Canada
DBT scholarship for M.Sc. Biotechnology
CSIR NET- JRF; DBT- JRF; GATE
Despite the continuous efforts to implement improved preventive measures for malaria, the World Health Organization has been reporting the rise of malaria's morbidity for the last five years. The primary cause of malaria treatment failure is the emerging resistance towards all most all front line antimalarials. The requirements for developing new antimalarials to support the current therapeutics include biochemical characterization of novel drug targets, identification of lead compounds for combination therapy, and the development of antimalarial therapeutics strategies from clinical drug libraries. Therefore, our lab research is extended from identifying novel targets to the identification of new drugs through high throughput screening.
Drug library and Natural compound screen to identify potent antimalarial agents
The prolonged timeline and enormous investment required for new drug discovery are significant obstructions to the formulation of therapies for neglected diseases. In this context, my laboratory focuses on the virtual high-throughput screening and validation of lead compounds in parasite culture of different drug libraries and natural compounds for malaria treatment. My earlier studies on nicotinamide and acriflavine in this direction are quite encouraging. We have some significant leads in discovering polypharmacological compounds in virtual screening, which we are carrying forward testing against chloroquine-sensitive and multidrug-resistant parasites. If everything goes fine will be further tested in animal models.
Rational approaches for the use of antibiotic scaffolds against the malaria parasite
The malaria parasite possesses a non-photosynthetic plastid called apicoplast that serves as an operational site for many indispensable biochemical pathways. I have identified and characterized some key players of the bacterial type DNA replication process of the apicoplast. Because the apicoplast's prokaryotic housekeeping functions are radically different from human metabolism, they are promising drug targets. Compounds that are meant to target bacterial housekeeping functions have been shown to have antimalarial properties. However, the proteins of apicoplast housekeeping functions retain significant differences in sequence and biochemical properties. So my lab is currently exploring specific inhibitors that target precisely the apicoplast housekeeping functions to provide a good source of leads for new malaria drugs.
Biochemical analysis of transcription machinery of Plasmodium apicoplast
Among different antibiotics, rifampicin, supposed to target a putative bacterial type RNA polymerase of apicoplast, was the fastest-acting and most potent. Despite the importance of apicoplast transcription, little is known about the molecular machine "RNA polymerase" of apicoplast transcription. It is also not known how the process is initiated and regulated. Therefore, My lab focuses on the structural and functional characterization of the apicoplast RNA polymerase that will definitely reveal many enigmatic features of apicoplast transcription and potential new drug leads for malaria.
Antiviral drug discovery by virtual screening and in vitro assays
In the COVID-19 pandemic, we expanded our research in discovering new antiviral compounds against SARS CoV-2. Our chemical system biology approach could identify many lead multi-targeting natural and FDA compounds. We are in the process of establishing various virus-free in vitro assays and cell culture assays to strengthen our research in the direction of antiviral compound discovery.
| S. No. | Authors | Title of Article | Journal/Conference Details | Journal/Conference | Publication Year |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Srivastava, V., ., & Prusty, D* | Peptide-Ligand Conjugate-Based Immunotherapeutic Strategy Targeting Nipah Virus Glycoprotein G: A Novel Approach for Treating Virus Infection by Employing Host Innate Immune Response | Peptide Science. 2026 Jan;118(1):e70021. | Journal | 2026 |
| 2 | Naik, B., Bhalerao, P., Shekhar, S., Varghese, S.A., Makwana, S., Mandal, C.C., Bhatt, T.K., Dhar, S.K. and Prusty, D* | Targeting Plasmodium falciparum Single‐Stranded DNA‐Binding Protein: Discovery of New Scaffold Compounds Effective against Drug‐Sensitive and Artemisinin‐Resistant Strains | ChemMedChem, 20(19), p.e202500282. | Journal | 2025 |
| 3 | Panda, M., Srivastava, V., Singh, S., & Prusty, D* | Unveiling Prospective Therapeutic Potential of Conserved Hypothetical Plasmodium falciparum Proteins by Using Integrated Proteo Genomic Annotation and In-Silico Therapeutic Discovery Approach | The Protein Journal, 1-27. | Journal | 2025 |
| 4 | Naik, B., & Prusty, D* | Molecular docking, MD simulation, and MMGBSA-binding free energy estimation study identify antibiotic analogs as potential antimalarials targeting housekeeping proteins of Plasmodium falciparum apicoplast | Molecular Simulation, 1-25 | Journal | 2024 |
| 5 | Srivastava, V., Godara, P., Jena, S. P., Naik, B., Singh, S., Prajapati, V. K., & Prusty, D* | Peptide-ligand conjugate based immunotherapeutic approach for targeted dismissal of non-structural protein 1 of dengue virus: A novel therapeutic solution for mild and severe dengue infections | International Journal of Biological Macromolecules, 129562. | Journal | 2024 |
| 6 | Godara, P., Reddy, K., Sahu, W., Naik, B., Srivastava, V., Das, R., Mahor, A., Kumar, P., Giri, R., Anirudh, J. and Tak, H., Prusty D*. | Structure-based virtual screening against multiple Plasmodium falciparum kinases reveals antimalarial compounds. | Molecular Diversity, pp.1-21. | Journal | 2023 |
| 7 | Naik, B., Godara, P., Prusty, D* | Structure-based virtual screening approach reveals natural multi-target compounds for the development of antimalarial drugs to combat drug resistance | Journal of Biomolecular Structure and Dynamics,1-25. | Journal | 2023 |
| 8 | Singh S, Srivastava V, Godara P, Banavath H, Tak H, Nayak A, Kumari D, Naik B, Prusty D* | An in-silico- based study identified peptide inhibitors that can block the egression of the monkeypox virus by inhibiting the p37 protein target | Peptide Science 115.5, e24325 | Journal | 2023 |
| 9 | Srivastava, V., Naik, B., Godara, P., & Prusty, D* | Identification of FDA-approved drugs with triple targeting mode of action for the treatment of Monkeypox: a high throughput virtual screening study. Molecular Diversity | Molecular Diversity,1-15. | Journal | 2023 |
| 10 | Godara P, Naik B, Meghwal R, Ojha R, Srivastava V, Prajapati VK, Prusty D * | Rational designing of peptide- ligand conjugates-based immunotherapy for the treatment of complicated malaria | Life Sciences,15;311:121121. | Conference | 2022 |
| 11 | Singh S, Banavath HN, Godara P, Naik B, Srivastava V, Prusty D* | Identification of antiviral peptide inhibitors for receptor binding domain of SARS-CoV-2 omicron and its sub-variants: an in-silico approach | 3 Biotech;12(9):198. | Journal | 2022 |
| 12 | Naik B, Mattaparthi VS, Gupta N, Ojha R, Das P, Singh S, Prajapati VK, Prusty D* | Chemical system biology approach to identify multi-targeting FDA inhibitors for treating COVID-19 and associated health complications. . | Journal of Biomolecular Structure and Dynamics 40.19, 9543-9567. | Journal | 2022 |
Funded research projects
- PI: UGC FRP-start-up-grant (No. F4-5/2018).
- PI: ICMR project on “A novel multi-targeting approach to develop resistance immune antimalarials” (Project ID: IIRPIG-2023-0000879) with total budget of Rs. 2,28,75, 000. 00 (Duration: 2024-2028)
- Co-PI: ICMR project on “Inhibiting glycosomal membrane biogenesis as a potential leishmaniasis treatment” (ICMR Project ID IIRPIG-2023-0001623) with total budget of Rs. 2,47, 24, 960.00 (Duration: 2024-2028),
Start up
PI: Innovative dual strategy for antimalarial therapy (2025) iTBI Ignition Grant is being offered by CURAJ Incubation Foundation.
Attended
•Young Investigator Meeting, 2020, organized by India Biosciences
•Young Investigator Meeting, 2020, organized by India Biosciences
•8th Annual Future of Malaria Research Symposium, Johns Hopkins Malaria Research Institute, 2022
•Frontiers in Biomedical Research 2022 (FBR-2022), University of Delhi
•International Conference on Emerging Trends in Biosciences and Chemical Technology-2022, Shri Mata Vaishno Devi University, Jammu
Organized
Organizing Secretary:
•Integrated Strategies to Combat the Pandemic COVID-19, 2020 (International)
•Universal Access to Vaccine and Medicine as a Fight Against COVID-19, 2021
•Emerging Trends in Systems Biology, 2021
